Sites of learning and practical knowledge : against normativity / Vivek Dhareshwar.

Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2024.

©2024

xvi, 192 pages ; 25 cm.

"This book examines the relationship between cultural difference and practical knowledge and its implications on the study of humanities and the social sciences. It sketches a meta-theory of Western thought to grasp the conceptual distortions that result when a theoretical way of understanding the world seeks to displace practical forms of understanding. The book draws on the writings of Edward Said, Gandhi, Tagore and Foucault to formulate frameworks of interpretation which reject normativity and reformulate Western theories in terms which do not occlude experiential knowledge. It reconciles the problems of loss-of concepts, and ideas and the violence generated by the grafting of ill-understood normative conceptual structures on the fabric of practical life. Finally, the author offers an alternative conceptualization of Indian sociality through the idea of a practitional matrix, which explains both why the West necessarily misunderstood or misdescribed India and how that misdescription enables us to theorize the West. Part of Critical Humanities across Cultures series, this book will be an essential read for scholars and researchers of philosophy, anthropology, sociology, religious studies, post-colonial studies, cultural studies, Indian studies and literature"-- Provided by publisher.

Online version: Dhareshwar, Vivek. Sites of learning and practical knowledge London ; New York, NY : Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2024

English

March 12, 2024

Critical humanities across cultures

Includes bibliographical references and index.