Often when participating in our class’s contemplative practices, I find myself in a state of dissonance. For me participating in guided contemplative practices feels alienating. Through reflection and research concerning contemplative practices, I sought to understand why contemplative exercises feel so foreign and distasteful to me. In organizing my research and personal opinions concerning contemplative practices in academia, I will first break down how contemplative practices are a form of cultural appropriation and exploitation and then parse through the nuances in my perspective on contemplative practices in education.
Contemplative practices in western education systems are forms of cultural appropriation of Asian religion, culture, and spirituality from Buddhist and Hindu philosophies (Morgan, 2015). However, these contemplative practices in the west have very little in common with these longstanding religious, spiritual, and cultural practices. Rather, they are an imitation that redesigns and capitalizes upon these concepts for “use in Western settings with individuals who may have little interest in Buddhist belief systems or traditions.” (Baer & Huss, 2008, p.123). Contemplative practices, as they are used in western educational systems, simply “reflect the cultural appropriation in the form of exploitation since the benefits to the appropriators are put above the harms caused to the community from whom the knowledge is taken [from]” (Lalonde, 2018). And while it may be the case that certain practices “may appear to be self-evidently good and their underlying assumptions obviously true (Brown, 2019)”, I argue that these assumptions are not necessarily inherently good or true, as they are the result of cultural conditioning and conflicts with worldviews that are not normed for white communities, and therefore fail to be true or good from specifically for people of color (Black, 2017). Moreover, when analyzing what contemplative practices are adopted by western societies, it is worth noting that western society has systematically chosen only to practice contemplation in a method that aligns with their worldview. Contemplative practices have existed in BIPOC communities for centuries, “but the ideology of white supremacy has rendered them inferior to European knowledge systems” (Mehta & Talwar, 2022). Thus, in perpetuating contemplative practices that appropriate Asian culture in a way that caters to the western worldview, contemplative practices fail to be truly contemplative and ultimately are simply perpetuating a thinly veiled western worldview.
Despite my distaste for contemplative practices in academia and dissonance when attempting to participate in these practices, I believe that the idea of incorporating mindfulness into academia is not inherently wrong or bad. I believe that if mindfulness or contemplation is introduced into a classroom setting, individuals should be allowed to choose their own form of mindfulness or reflection and should not be guided through the experience. Cultural imperialism in education, specifically when education attempts to parse through the harm that colonialism, imperialism, and exploitation have had on the degradation of the planet, has no place being part of the discussion or given any weight.
References:
Mehta, Naisargi (Ness) and Talwar, Gitika (2022) “Recognizing Roots and Not Just Leaves: The Use of Integrative Mindfulness in Education, Research, and Practice,” Psychology from the Margins: Vol. 4, Article 6.
Morgan, Patricia. (2015). A Brief History of the Current Reemergence of Contemplative Education. Journal of Transformative Education. 13. 197-218. 10.1177/1541344614564875.
Brown, Candy Gunther. “Why I Do Not Use Contemplative Pedagogy in the Public University Classroom.” Why I Do Not Use Contemplative Pedagogy in the Public University Classroom | Religious Studies News, 18 June 2019, https://rsn.aarweb.org/spotlight-on/teaching/contemplative-pedagogy/why-i-do-not-use-contemplative-pedagogy-public-university-classroom.
I’m curious if you’re talking specifically about the contemplative practices in this course, or just contemplative practices in general? It has never crossed my mind that the practices in this course are a form of cultural appropriation, so I want to hear more! You say that these contemplative practices in the west have very little in common with these longstanding religious, spiritual, and cultural practices, and that they are imitations, but is that really so egregious? If we can learn from a non-western perspective and get a different take on these concepts than the standardly taught white academia of the US, isn’t that beneficial to our education? Is the problem for you that this imitation isn’t specifically noted and credited by the professors who lead them, or just the use of meditation in general? Is it an issue based on race, for example it is not okay for a white professor to lead contemplative practices, but okay for an Asian professor to lead them? How do you draw that line? Since our professor has always credited the poems she reads, the inspiration for her practice designs, and conducted them with only good intent of helping us breathe and learn about challenging issues from a new perspective, I would consider this to be perfectly acceptable. My perspective has been that these practices, though not always comprehensible to me, have been a refreshing way to learn that allows me to take a breath and pause while learning about draining content, and breaks up the lectures and discussion.
No hard feelings about any of this, I’m just genuinely curious about your perspective!
Hi Heidi, thank you for your questions. I believe the questions you raise are essential to progressing the conversation, and I’m happy to answer them.
In this post, I am talking about contemplative practices in academia, which would include the practices within this class. The practices in our class don’t exist outside of the larger context of academia. The problem with contemplative practices in the west is perhaps better understood in the larger context of academia in the west, so allow me to expand. American higher education systems have a history of excluding Asian Americans in higher education research and discourse. The perspective of Asian Americans and Asians has been left out of academia in many forms, in fact, many universities did not even have Asian American studies within their curriculum until after 1969. Even universities that claim they had these programs beforehand, such as the UW, which claims their Department of Asian Languages and Literature was founded in 1909, only had them and taught them from the perspective of a white-cis-man. In fact, the first professor of this program at UW was Reverend Herbert H. Gowen, an Anglican missionary from the United Kingdom. This is to say the American higher education system has a deep history of excluding Asian Americans in higher education discourse and research but also one of teaching Asian culture and history from a Western perspective or simply excluding it. Thus, when we talk about learning from a non-western perspective, I believe we should be critical of if we are truly being taught from a non-western perspective or rather a western perspective of non-western traditions. This distinction is vital in evaluating how authentic the voices who are teaching these perspectives are to the actual experiences, perspectives, cultures, and religions of the individuals or groups they belong to. Essentially my point is that perhaps the non-western perspective that we assume we are learning about is not so non-western as we think. Thus, while they might be beneficial to some people’s education, they may not be to some Asian Americans or Asian students’ education.
I don’t believe the race of the professor is the issue I think the issue is that this is a practice that is deeply valued and holds significant meaning to individuals of the Buddhist and Hindu faith and to secularize it and ask others who are by their own choice not part of that religion to participate is both disrespectful to the cultural and religions these practices are derived from and to individuals who have made the decision to not partake in religions in general or ones that aren’t their own.
In their authentic form, these practices hold meaning to these people and have historical and ongoing associations with religion. As a result, I think it is still ethically questionable to ask students to participate in these practices simply because they have been forcibly secularized and westernized and thus normed for white communities. In doing so, we perpetuate the idea that cultural/religious practices can be secularized and “designed for use in Western settings with individuals who may have little interest in Buddhist belief systems or traditions.” (Baer & Huss Huss), 2008, p.123)…This intent itself reflects cultural appropriation in the form of exploitation since the benefits to the appropriators are put above the harms caused to the community from whom the knowledge is taken (Lalonde, 2018)”. Additionally, I think that asking people to participate in a practice derived from religion that may not be their own is also somewhat problematic. I feel that all students should be given transparency and the ability to choose whether or not the practice aligns with their own religions, values, or beliefs. This being said, I believe that even a professor whose cultural, religious, and racial background is related to Buddhism or Hinduism has no place in asking individuals to practice either a bastardized version of their culture’s contemplative practice or an authentic contemplative practice. I highly encourage you to take a quick read through the sources I have referenced in my post; they explain more eloquently and in-depth the issues I am raising in this response.
I feel that in answering your last question, I run the risk of being repetitive thus, I will conclude my response by saying that I believe that higher education systems are highly flawed institutions and choosing not to question them or look at them with a critical lens is a choice. Being complicit or complacent in our understanding of practices institutions perpetuate allows them to create and further harmful narratives, erase narratives, and control the narratives we learn about.