A recent Washington Post article on yoga and cultural appropriation has been circulating on social media since yesterday. The quick recap: a yoga class taught by a student at the University of Ottawa has been canceled over concerns of cultural appropriation.
The student instructor, named Jennifer Scharf, has taught a similar class since 2008. She even designed it to be accepting of participants with disabilities. However, Ms. Scharf received an email from University of Ottawa Student Foundation, which describes itself as the “instrument for political action” for the undergraduate population at the university, which informed her that the class would be paused.
From the email:
“I think that our centre agreed … that while yoga is a really great idea, accessible and great for students, that there are cultural issues of implication involved in the practice,” the response read. “I have heard from a couple students and volunteers that feel uncomfortable with how we are doing yoga while we claim to be inclusive at the same time.”
“Yoga has been under a lot of controversy lately due to how it is being practiced and what practices from what cultures (which are often sacred spiritual practices) they are being taken from,” the e-mail read. “Many of these cultures are cultures that have experienced oppression, cultural genocide and diasporas due to colonialism and western supremacy, and we need to be mindful of this and how we express ourselves and while practicing yoga.”
I’ve read commentary of people being concerned over the commercialization of yoga in the western world. I would agree objectively that such a thing has occurred.
Normally you may have expected me to post a snarky article blasting this decision, but I’m trying to be less snarky in my life, online and offline. So instead, I’m posting this as a forum for discussion (isn’t that what Daily Kos is about?)
Should there be a threshold for cultural appropriation that makes certain actions/events acceptable? Who gets to decide whether this threshold exists, and if it does, what that threshold is?
Personally, while I can understand the concerns over commercialized yoga, this particular example seems over the top. It’s fascinating that some of my friends have viciously criticized other instances of appropriation (for example, a white person wearing a Keffiyeh), but stayed silent on this example (maybe because they do yoga themselves...)
This is why I’ve argued against groups having carte blanche over deciding what actions are appropriation/offensive. There needs to be objective, inclusive, and informed decisions regarding these matters, otherwise any group can use such statements as a shield against debate. That’s what happened at Yale over Halloween costumes.
I fully admit that this diary does not have depth regarding yoga’s history, British colonialism of India, and the commercialization of yoga, nor other incidents of appropriation. Consider it more of an open thread discussion focused on the topic of appropriation, particularly involving this above circumstance.
Do those of you who are fierce critics of appropriation agree or disagree that this is appropriation? If you disagree, then how are you deciding what is or is not appropriation? And the fact that you are deciding, shouldn’t that get to mean that we all get to decide collectively, after inclusive and informed debate? How do we distinguish appropriation vs. cultural borrowing? Do you think there even is a distinction between the two?