Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bias in South Asian Studies

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the debate was merge with Indology. The criticism that this article is inherently POV and largely either original research or relying on unsound sources is a powerful one, and it's a criticism that isn't refuted here. However, the main proponents of deletion here do not seem to feel that there's anything wrong with the topic itself, given a proper treatment. As such, I think merging with Indology would be a good compromise here. As I see there's already an appropriately-named and filled-in section of that article, I'll just redirect ... and any further arguments can take place over there, and well away from AfD. Cheers, fuddlemark (fuddle me!) 13:13, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bias in South Asian Studies

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Indology is a stub, but here we host a detailed florilegium of every Hindu prejudice on the internet. This is not even a pov-fork of Indology, it is an ab-initio pov-fest, completely one-sided, unsalvageably biased and unencyclopedic. Wikipedia is not a soapbox. A short "history" and "alleged bias" section on Indology will be more than enough. dab (ᛏ) 17:15, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

• Delete per nom. Oy vey, that's one heck of an article. -- Kicking222 17:42, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
• Delete as per nominator. Fut.Perf. ☼ 17:50, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
• Keep This article is precisely about prejudices in South Asian Studies, and if you see there is "Hindu prejudice", then you could add your viewpoint into the article. An AFD is not a subsititue for a NPOV-tag. I'll be the first to concede that the article needs to be improved. The article may have too much focus on the AIT controversy, but this is again not a reason for an AFD.
  The topic itself is notable, the biases in Colonial Indology on the one side, and the allgegations of biases in contemporary Indology have all been the subject of much criticism, and there should be a aricle where this can be described. It doesn't look good to claim that it is "unsalvageably biased", either one is able to add his own viewpoint to an article, or one is not. --Sendrin 19:22, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

my argument is that articles titled "Bias in" should be deleted in most cases. I agree there is some (little) encyclopedic merit hidden beneath the polemics. This can be safely merged with Indology and/or colonialism, Hindutva and national mysticism. dab (ᛏ) 07:24, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

• Weak keep. Notable topic; there is potential for improvement. Buchanan-Hermit™..SCREAM!!!.... 00:11, 7 May 2006 (UTC)
• Keep.The reasons cited for deletion looks quite unreasonable.Bharatveer 03:33, 7 May 2006 (UTC)
• Merge per dab. =Nichalp «Talk»= 07:57, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

  Undecided. Withdrawing my vote but needs a copyedit. =Nichalp «Talk»= 06:01, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

• Weak Keep, the article seems very well referenced, so it is not WP:OR. -- ReyBrujo 20:57, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

Rey: please note that the references are mainly Hindu nationalist websites and forums or personal pages. It thus might still violate WP:OR: Please review http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources#Using_online_sources Hornplease

Comment The external may be trash, and many of those can be deleted. However, the references (the ones that leaded me to believe the article was well referenced) and further reading sections are well documented. While it is true I don't know what kind of references they are (if they are notable books, if those books do exist, etc), I can only assume good faith until someone gives me links to notable sites that explicitely state those books do not exist or they do but are of little importance. The further reading section has entries to Yvette Rosser blog. A very quick google search turns out that She is the co-creator and sponsor of the International Day without Violence, held annually on April 4th [1] That sounds like something notable enough for me. Even if you remove all the external links, the article continues to be well referenced. If you can probe those references are fake, I may change my vote. But, as I said, all I can do is assume good faith. -- ReyBrujo 12:27, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

True, we need to assume good faith. However note that most of the points that use the reputable books as references are about past Indologists including Mill - in which case the argument is more apprpriately (and already) covered in postcolonialism. The 'current' section uses opinion websites and the Yvette Rosser 'book'- which as you point out is actually a blog as well. A cursory google search of Yvette Rosser informs me that she had an accident in 2003; all her medical costs were paid by the radical Hindutva organisation the Vishwa Hindu Parishad. That is not an unbiased scholar. The 'Further Reading' section is simply a list of some of the classics of Indology without any connection to the supposed bias in their subject matter; along with some of the classics of postcolonial work - Sheldon Pollock for example, again without explanation - and of apologist writers such as Rosser and the Belgian Koenraad Elst, who writes on hindudharma.org, another parochial site. Nothing is fake; but the article is not structured in good faith, as the claims are not referenced, and the reading list is bolstered by reputable books that do not support the argument,and the specific references are from doubtful, non-peer reviewed sources. Hornplease 13:35, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Your information on Rosser is taken from indiatruth.com, a political ("to put it as nicely as possible") website founded by Michael Witzel (as he admits in his OutlookIndia.com article) that describes Hindus as "Nazi", "Hitler", "Racist", "Muslim hater", "Race Traitor", "Christian hater", "Creationist", and "obscurantist murders" and of being Hiina (or lost and confused). That is not an unbiased website from an unbiased scholar. Rosser is also founder of The Global Pashtun Institute for Peace and Democracy which aims to Support and strengthen peace, democracy and stability in Afghanistan and to Improve human rights situation among Pashtuns. Rosser has been known to criticize Hindu nationalists as well, but what makes her different that her criticism is fair and not stereotypical. The Rosser link is not a blog, it is an article hosted on sulekha.com. Have you been on the hindudharma.com website that you cite above? There's nothing on this site! I admit that the article needs to be improved, and the article title maybe changed. I think however that enough could be written already only on Max Müller and James Mills, where also exagerrations or unfair potrayals and counter-bias can be discussed. --Sendrin 14:39, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Please try to keep up. My information about this Rosser, whatever she may have 'founded' that exists on paper or not, is simply that she is not an unbiased scholar; you claimed I discovered her links to the radical rightwing VHP through some attack site. I did not. It is available online - on the VHP's own site, where they call her Ram Rani for some reason. The Rosser link is an opinion piece, unverified, without peer review, and not published by a known publishing house. These are the points that I made originally, and nothing you have said contradicts that. If you wish to discuss only Max Mueller and this mysterious James Mills, you can do so in the appropriate article pages for them, without claiming any form of overarching narrative that is distinct from the arguments already covered in postcolonialism. And we are discussing the dubious merits of this article, not of Mike Witzel, so that entire discussion is irrelevant.Hornplease 15:28, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

If some of the sources are not reliable, this should be discussed on the article talk page: Talk:Bias_in_South_Asian_Studies. However, many references are not websites/forums... as you say incorrectly, and books and studies have been written on some aspects of this like Chakrabartis "colonial indology", Trautmanns "Aryans and british india", Dirks "castes of mind", and more. But some of the references should be better. You say that your information is not from indiatruth.com, but you do the same thing as that site: you only bring up one rather negative (but minor) aspect about her and dismiss all her humanitary work for Afghanistan, Pashtuns, the Syed Committee, the Peace Day.. And nothing is mysterious about James Mills if you would take the time to read the article. Nothing is wrong is with the further reading section, or please say which book does not belong there.

I understand some (not all) of the arguments that the article should better be merged into Indology, or at least until there is more material. A problem is that the Indology/South Asian Studies article is a stub, and the criticism section would IMO overwhelm that article. (Which is unfair to Indology, the criticism is an important part, but as long as Indology is a stub that section would overwhelm the rest). Because of this a separate criticism article would be the better solution, as it is done for many other pages. Wikipedia has articles on criticism of scientology, islam, many smaller sects and about many other things, so another criticism article is not a big deal. Maybe a better article title would be Criticisms of South Asian Studies. --Sendrin 21:25, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

The fact that none of the sources are reliable goes towards establishing the fact that this is an unreconstructably POV-fork. The only references that are used for making the argument are online forums or opinion blogs. The other references you cite are either massive minority opinions or not quoted. Second, my opinion on the Yvette person was about her reliability as a source for this article. She has been funded by the VHP, which has a specific agenda here, and so she is not a reliable source. Whatever she may have done for the Pashtuns is thus irrelevant. JAmes Mills being mysterious was an attempted joke, as it should be James Mill. And I cant understand a criticisms article being written in the absence of information about what is being criticised. Under such circumstances the article can never attempt to be either enclyclopaedic or NPOV. Delete, delete, delete! Hornplease 02:59, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

You are again wrongly saying that all sources are unreliable, while the article cites primary sources like Mill and Macaulay, and authorities like Trautmann. (and many more could be quoted). Your remarks make me think you're either not familiar with the topic or dishonest. And for example Michael Moore is biased, as is George W. Bush, but both can be quoted in an appropriate context. It is for example possible to quote Michael Moore on Bush, if it is clear that it is Moore's opinion. You claim Rosser is biased, but have you read her work? Michael Witzel, who has also published in Marxist magazines (not that I care about that) is anyway if anything more biased, and he has had many criticisms, alleging racism, chauvinism and other things. All this has not to do with the AFD and belongs to the talk page, the opinion stated by her could also be written from other sources, as she is not the only one who criticized some aspects of South Asian Studies. In many other articles the criticism section is a separate article, and this might make sense here too. But maybe the article should first evolve into a bigger text before. --Sendrin 18:46, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

About the first section. OK, you have made your point about Trautmann being an authority. Nevertheless, to claim that (a) there is a systemic bias (b) that it is anti-Hindu and (c) that it was universal is absurd. 1. The criticisms of Indian culture were not restricted to Europeans - consider Derozio. 2. The people criticised are either historians - Mill - or generalists - Marx - or definitely not 'indologists - Macaulay. 3. The people being criticised for bias are those who were criticising the indologists! Grant attacking the 'orientalists'! The whole section is utter nonsense dressed up with footnotes. It cant be salvaged, has no place in the absence of an article on Indology, and must be deleted.

About the second section. I have spent a little time reading Rosser. She is absurdly biased. Further, I have got in touch with some people at UT Austin, where she was a grad student, and I discovered that in the well-regarded South Asian programme she was not permitted to finish her PhD and had to go on to submit it in the department of curriculum and instruction. (it was about the revising of textbooks by bjp state govts.) That is not an academically acceptable source. Further, you miss the point that all i needed to know was that she was funded by the vhp to make the determination that she was not an independent source either! Next! Witzel has tenure at Harvard, just had dinner with the President of India last month. Yet we have an article criticising his work before we have an article on the work itself! The rest of the section is similarly one-dimensional in both effect and intent and, indeed, structure. It is unsalvageable. If someone were to put this content on the Doniger and Witzel pages, then I would not demand their deletion, but leave it to be edited to NPOV status. Here the page itself can not be made NPOV, because, as nominated, it is an ab-initio pov-fest, completely one-sided, unsalvageably biased and unencyclopedic. Salvage the content, if you will. Move it elsewhere, to the appropriate article. But this article should only exist once the main article is written, and if criticisms of the theory tend to overwhelm that page. Hornplease 04:41, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

I didn't claime it was universal, however it exists. A historian like James Mill can be included into South Asian Studies, and the article is a stub, a lot could be written about Indologists, not only Max Müller. I haven't read much Rosser, but from one text I read I saw that she criticized/mentioned several pov's, not just one single one. Many people claim that Witzel is absurdely biased, and in any case Witzel rather only criticizes one side of pov and doesn't unbiasedly mention several pov's, his "interpretations" are often rather biased. Who is an independent source? Witzel publishes in Marxist magazines like Frontline and he has associated with Marxist historians, the president of Harvard Mr. Summers makes biased comments, and so on. The question is not wether someone is biased or not, but if a statement is presented as opinion or fact. The opinion exists as a fact, wether the opinion is biased itself is another thing and can then also be pointed out. This issued would belong to the talk page. Where is your source about Witzel's dinner from? From Indiatruth.com? As already stated, many articles have a separate criticims article, and in the Indology/South Asian Studies page criticisms of the theory tend to overwhelm that page. But I agree with your last sentence. It might be better if the text first evolves into a longer more detailled text before making it separate. --Sendrin 17:45, 13 May 2006 (UTC)

From what I read of Rosser online, she criticised from a single POV. And you still havent responded to my points that she is not a reliable source. About Witzel, I dont know if he can be called biased, but I do know that Frontline is one of India's leading magazines and is not a sign of being an unreliable source any more than being published in the Spectator is, although the editorial board of the first is as marxist as the editorial board of the second is Tory. My source for Witzel's dinner is the harvard gazette, not indiatruth.com (to which I have never been.) We can leave the discussion here, since it is going nowhere.

However, it seems we have some form of consensus: it is too soon for this page. I would like to see the content saved, perhaps on the Indology talk page, so it can be edited and incorportated as the latter article grows. Hornplease 12:00, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

The consensus here if any , is for keeping the article . FYI, Frontline is one of the leading mouth pieces of leftist ideology(read anti hindu )in India.Bharatveer 12:43, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

• Merge to Indology as a section. utcursch | talk 05:07, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

• Keep Good Topic. More should be known of how the colonialists degraded the culture and altered the history of the country they ruled. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 202.171.48.22 (talk • contribs) 8 May 2006, 12:24 UTC. Fut.Perf. ☼ 12:48, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

• Delete as POV/OR. Stifle (talk) 15:27, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

• Keep There is no reason to delete this page. But create a page for South Asian Studies and make Bias as a section for this article. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.41.39.123 (talk • contribs) 19:46, 8 May 2006 (UTC). Top-posted; moved into sequence by Fut.Perf. ☼ 21:12, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

• Keep very relevant topic, no reason to delete. SV 23:01, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

• Keep. Much like the academic study of orientalism and Islamophobia, Hinduphobia and Indophobia prevelant amongst current scholars in South Asian studies is an emerging topic of scholarship. Not just the past, but even the present of South Asian studies is prejudiced, and this phenomeonon needs to be studied academically, which is what Wikipedia is all about! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 207.200.116.5 (talk • contribs) 9 May 2006, 04:27.
• Keep cited references, hard facts —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 204.50.150.182 (talk • contribs) 8 May 2006, 22:36.
• Keep. This is an excellent article with portrays the eurocentric, colonial and biblical bias traditionally present in South Asian studies. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 60.51.94.140 (talk • contribs) 8 May 2006, 21:09.
• Keep This page is one of a few places that highlight the problems with Indic studies in the US. It should be cleaned up a bit, but not deleted. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 128.103.223.43 (talk • contribs) 8 May 2006, 23:32.
• Keep The irony is that the person campaigning for deletion of the article is a prime example of the bias that the article talks about! As others have pointed out, the article could definitely use some work, but judging by the history of deletions, changes, etc. made by dab this seems to be clearly a campaign to cleanse Wikipedia of all articles that criticize European "scholarship". —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 165.91.46.7 (talk • contribs) 8 May 2006, 22:47.

• Comment: The influx of unsigned IP votes may be related to the fact that the article has recently been fetured on a nationalist Hindu website ([2]). Fut.Perf. ☼ 10:06, 9 May 2006 (UTC)
• Delete. Agree completely with dab. Indology or South Asian Studies has an article; a section of that page can discuss alternative theories stifled by the sources of power in the academy. (To put it as nicely as possible.) Hornplease 09:24, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
• Keep, as above. For great justice. 17:22, 11 May 2006 (UTC)
• Delete. Original research. Zaxem 09:48, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

• Keep, why we are so obsessed with enforcing moral policing. Can't we let the article evolve. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 64.254.127.154 (talk • contribs) 11:35, 12 May 2006 (UTC).

• Keep, Bias in South Asian Studies is a major and hot topic, especially with the "natives" standing up for their versions of the story. One more step in making public/democratic the problems associated with South Asian Scholarship. Tarring folks as "Hindu nationalists" won't hide the serious issues involved. Of course the article should be more nuanced, but the underlying theme is spot on. Someone here called Yvette Roser "biased", I don't think there is such a thing as a scholar without a take. Objectivity in the Humanities is a debatable proposition. Let us keep the stub and hear all sides of the story. Witzel eating with the President of India in no way puts his work above scrutiny. The comments earlier about wikipedia protecting European "scholarship" from rational critiques is well made and relevant.Varahamihira 05:49, 14 May 2006 (UTC) — Note: very new user, see Special:Contributions/Varahamihira and Special:Contributions/24.165.161.115. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:24, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.