Michael Witzel

Michael Witzel
For the commune in Hunedoara County, Romania, see Veţel.

Michael Witzel (born 1943) is a German-American linguist and philologist, a professor of Sanskrit at Harvard University, United States.

Contents

Biographical information

Witzel was born at Schwiebus, then in Germany, now Poland.

He studied Indology in Germany (from 1965 to 1971) under Paul Thieme, H. P. Schmidt, K. Hoffmann and J. Narten as well as in Nepal (1972–1973) under the Mīmāmsaka Jununath Pandit.[1] At Kathmandu (1972–1978), he led the Nepal-German Manuscript Preservation Project and the Nepal Research Centre. He has taught at Tübingen (1972), Leiden (1978–1986), and at Harvard (since 1986) and has held visiting appointments at Kyoto (twice), Paris (twice), and Tokyo (twice). He has been teaching Sanskrit since 1972.

He is noted for his studies of the dialects of Vedic Sanskrit,[2] old Indian history,[3] the development of Vedic religion,[4] and the linguistic prehistory of South Asia.[5] He is editor-in-chief of the Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies (EJVS)[6] and the Harvard Oriental Series.[7] He has been president of the Association for the Study of Language in Prehistory (ASLIP) since 1999,[8] as well as of the new International Association for Comparative Mythology (2006-).[9] He was elected into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2003, and was elected as an honorary member of the German Oriental Society (DMG)[10] in 2009.

Research

Witzel’s early philological work deals with the oldest texts of India, the Vedas, their manuscripts and their traditional recitation; it included some editions and translations of unknown texts (1972).[11] such as the Katha Aranyaka.[12] Recently[when?], he has begun, together with T. Goto et al. a new translation of the Rigveda into German (Books I-II, 2007, Books III-V due 2010)[dated info][13]

He studied at length the various Vedic recensions (śākhā)[14] and their importance for the geographical spread of Vedic culture across North India and beyond.[15] This resulted in book-length investigations of Vedic dialects (1989), the development of the Vedic canon (1997),[16] and of Old India as such (2003, reprint 2010).

Shorter papers provide analyses of important religious (2004) and literary concepts of the period,[17] and its Central Asian antecedents[18] as well as such as the oldest frame story (1986, 1987), prosimetric texts (1997), the Mahabarata (2005), the concept of rebirth (1984), the 'line of progeny' (2000), splitting one's head in discussion (1987), the holy cow (1991),[19] the Milky Way (1984),[20] the asterism of the Seven Rsis (1995,[21] 1999), the sage Yajnavalkya (2003), supposed female Rishis in the Veda (2009,)[22] the persistence of some Vedic beliefs,[23][24] in modern Hinduism (1989[25] 2002, with S. Farmer and J.B. Henderson), as well as some modern Indocentric tendencies (2001-).[26][27]

Other work (1976-) deals with the traditions of medieval and modern India and Nepal, [28] [29][30] including its linguistic history,[31] Brahmins,[32][33] rituals, and kingship (1987) and present day culture,[34] as well as with Old Iran and the Avesta (1972-), including its homeland in Eastern Iran and Afghanistan (2000).[35]

After 1987, he has increasingly focused on the localization of Vedic texts (1987) and the evidence contained in them for early Indian history, notably that of the Rgveda and the following period, represented by the Black Yajurveda Samhitas and the Brahmanas. This work has been done in close collaboration with Harvard archaeologists such as R. Meadow, with whom he has also co-taught. Witzel aims at indicating the emergence of the Kuru tribe in the Delhi area (1989, 1995, 1997, 2003), its seminal culture and its political dominance, as well as studying the origin of late Vedic polities[36] and the first Indian empire in eastern North India (1995, 1997, 2003, 2010).

The linguistic aspect of earliest Indian history has been explored in a number of papers (1993,[31] 1999,[37] 2000, 2001, 2006,[38] 2009)[39] dealing with the pre-Vedic substrate languages of Northern India.[40] These result in a substantial amount of loan words from a prefixing language similar to Austro-Asiatic (Munda, Khasi, etc.) as well as from other unidentified languages. In addition, a considerable number of Vedic and Old Iranian words are traced back to a Central Asian substrate language (1999, 2003, 2004, 2006).[41] This research is constantly updated, in collaboration with F. Southworth and D. Stampe, by the SARVA project[42] including its South Asian substrate dictionary.[43]

In recent years, he has explored the links between old Indian, Eurasian and other mythologies (1990,[44] 2001, 2004-6), resulting in a new scheme of historical comparative mythology[45] that covers most of Eurasia and the Americas ("Laurasia", cf. the related Harvard, Kyoto, Beijing, Edinburgh, Ravenstein (Netherlands) and Tokyo conferences, 1999–2009).[46] This approach has been pursued in a number of papers.[47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54] A book to be published in 2010[dated info][55] will deal with the newly proposed method of historical comparative mythology at length.[56]

Recently, he has also published (2001-)[57] articles criticizing what he calls "spurious interpretations" of Vedic texts[58] and decipherments of Indus inscriptions such as that of N.S. Rajaram.[59][60][61][62]

He has questioned the linguistic nature of the so-called Indus Script (Farmer, Sproat, Witzel 2004).[63] Earlier, he had suggested that a substrate related to, but not identical with the Austroasiatic Munda languages, which he therefore calls para-Munda, might have been the language of (part of) the Indus population.[64][65]

He has organized a number of international conferences at Harvard such as the first of the intermittent International Vedic Workshops (1989,1999,2004; 2011 at Bucharest), the first of several annual International Conferences on Dowry and Bride-Burning in India (1995 sqq.), the yearly Round Tables on the Ethnogenesis of South and Central Asia (1999 sqq)[66][67] and, since 2005, conferences on comparative mythology (Kyoto, Beijing, Edinburgh, Ravenstein (Netherlands), Tokyo, Harvard).[68][69][70][71] [72][73]

At the Beijing conference he founded the International Association for Comparative Mythology.[9]

California textbook controversy over Hindu history

Main article: California textbook controversy over Hindu history

In 2005, Witzel joined other academics and activist groups to oppose changes to California state school history textbooks proposed by US-based Hindu groups, arguing that the changes were not of a scholarly but of a religious-political nature.[74][75] He was appointed to an expert panel set up to review the changes[76] and helped draft the compromise edits that were later adopted.[74]

Witzel's efforts received the support of academics and some South Asian community groups,[74][77][78][79] but attracted severe criticism from those supporting the original changes, who questioned his expertise on the subject[75] and his appointment to the expert panel.[74]

Witzel was issued a subpoena by the California Parents for Equalization of Educational Materials (CAPEEM), a group founded specifically for the schoolbook case, in November 2006 to support their law case against the California authorities' decisions in the textbook case.[80] However, he twice successfully objected in Massachusetts courts against CAPEEM's "overly broad" subpoena (2007,[81] 2008, case No. 07-2286).[82]

Witzel was also accused of being biased against Hinduism, an allegation he denies.[83][84] [85] Rejecting criticism that he was a 'Hindu hater', Witzel said, "I hate people who misrepresent history."[34][76][86]

References

  1. ^ Michael Witzel's curriculum vitae, accessed 13 September 2007.
  2. ^ Michael Witzel, On the Localisation of Vedic Texts and Schools (Materials on Vedic sakhas, 7), India and the Ancient World. History, Trade and Culture before A.D. 650. P.H.L. Eggermont Jubilee Volume, ed. by G. Pollet, Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 25, Leuven 1987, pp. 173-213, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007.
  3. ^ [1];[dead link] Michael Witzel, The Development of the Vedic Canon and Its Schools: The Social and Political Milieu (Materials on Vedic Sakhas, 8, in Inside the Texts, Beyond the Texts. New Approaches to the Study of the Vedas, ed. M. Witzel, Harvard Oriental Series, Opera Minora, vol. 2, Cambridge 1997, pp. 257-345, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007.
  4. ^ Michael Witzel, How To Enter the Vedic Mind? Strategies in Translating a Brahmana Text, Translating, Translations, Translators From India to the West, Harvard Oriental Series, Opera Minora, vol. 1, Cambridge: Harvard Oriental Series, 1996, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007; Steve Farmer, John B. Henderson, and Michael Witzel, Neurobiology, Layered Texts, and Correlative Cosmologies: A Cross-Cultural Framework for Premodern History, Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities 72 (2000): 48-90, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007.
  5. ^ Witzel, Michael (October 1999). Early Sources for South Asian Substrate Languages - Mother Tongue, Special Issue. 1-70. people.fas.harvard.edu. http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/MT-Substrates.pdf. Retrieved 13 September 2007. 
  6. ^ Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies homepage, accessed 13 September 2007.
  7. ^ About the Harvard Oriental Series, accessed 13 September 2007.
  8. ^ ASLIP homepage, accessed 13 September 2007
  9. ^ a b compmyth.org
  10. ^ dmg-web.de
  11. ^ Michael Witzel's list of publications, accessed 13 September 2007.
  12. ^ Katha Âranyaka. Critical edition with a translation into German and an introduction. Cambridge: Harvard Oriental Series 65. 2004 [pp. lxxix, XXVI, 220, with color facsimiles of the Kashmir bhûrja MS]
  13. ^ Rig-Veda. Das heilige Wissen. Erster und zweiter Liederkreis. Aus dem vedischen Sanskrit übersetzt und herausgegeben von Michael Witzel und Toshifumi Goto unter Mitarbeit von Eijiro Doyama und Mislav Jezic. Frankfurt: Verlag der Weltreligionen 2007, pp. 1-889; first complete translation of the Rgveda into a western language since Geldner's of 1929/1951). amazon.de
  14. ^ Michael Witzel, Caraka, English summary of "Materialen zu den vedischen Schulen: I. Uber die Caraka-Schule," Studien zur Indologie und Iranistik 7 (1981): 109-132, and 8/9 (1982): 171-240, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007; Michael Witzel, The Development of the Vedic Canon and Its Schools: The Social and Political Milieu (Materials on Vedic Sakhas, 8), in Inside the Texts, Beyond the Texts. New Approaches to the Study of the Vedas, ed. M. Witzel, Harvard Oriental Studies, Opera Minora, vol. 2, Cambridge 1997, pp. 257-345, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007.
  15. ^ Michael Witzel, On the Localisation of Vedic Texts and Schools (Materials on Vedic Sakhas, 7), in India and the Ancient World. History, Trade and Culture before A.D. 650. P.H.L. Eggermont Jubilee Volume, ed. by G. Pollet, Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 25, Leuven 1987, pp. 173-213, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007.
  16. ^ Michael Witzel, The Development of the Vedic Canon and Its Schools: The Social and Political Milieu (Materials on Vedic Sakhas, 8), in Inside the Texts, Beyond the Texts. New Approaches to the Study of the Vedas, ed. M. Witzel, Harvard Oriental Studies, Opera Minora, vol. 2, Cambridge 1997, pp. 257-345, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007.
  17. ^ S. W. Jamison and M. Witzel, Vedic Hinduism, written in 1992/95, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007; according to his list of publications a shorter version appeared in The Study of Hinduism, ed. A. Sharma (University of South Carolina Press, 2003), pp. 65-113.
  18. ^ The Rgvedic Religious System and its Central Asian and Hindukush Antecedents In: A. Griffiths & J.E.M. Houben (eds.). The Vedas: Texts, Language and Ritual. Groningen: Forsten 2004: 581-636 forsten.nl
  19. ^ [2][dead link]
  20. ^ Michael Witzel, Sur le chemin du ciel, Bulletin des Etudes indiennes 2 (1984): 213-279, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007.
  21. ^ Michael Witzel, Looking for the Heavenly Casket, Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies 1-2 (1999), accessed 13 September 2007.
  22. ^ Female Rishis and Philosophers in the Veda? Journal of South Asia Women Studies, Vol. 11 no. 1, 2009 asiatica.org
  23. ^ Michael Witzel, On Magical Thought in the Veda, inaugural lecture, Leiden, Universitaire Pers, 1979, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007.
  24. ^ Steve Farmer, John B. Henderson, and Michael Witzel, Neurobiology, Layered Texts, and Correlative Cosmologies: A Cross-Cultural Framework for Premodern History, Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities 72 (2000): 48-90, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007.
  25. ^ web.clas.ufl.edu (page not available as of 13 September 2007)
  26. ^ Michael Witzel, Autochthonous Aryans? The Evidence from Old Indian and Iranian Texts, Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies 7-3 (2001): 1-115, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007.
  27. ^ Michael Witzel, "Westward Ho! The Incredible Wanderlust of the Rigvedic Tribes Exposed by S. Talageri. A Review of: Shrikant G. Talageri, The Rgveda. A historical analysis," Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies 7-2 (2001), in three parts, part 1, part 2, and part 3 all accessed 13 September 2007; Aryomke (not English), accessed 13 September 2007.
  28. ^ Das Alte Indien [History of Old India]. München: C.H. Beck [C.H. Beck Wissen in der Beck'schen Reihe] 2003, revised reprint 2010
  29. ^ Brahmanical Reactions to Foreign Influences and to Social and Religious Change. In: Olivelle, P. (ed.) Between the Empires. Society in India between 300 BCE and 400 CE. Oxford: Oxford University Press 2006: 457-499
  30. ^ Michael Witzel, On the History and the Present State of Vedic Tradition in Nepal, Vasudha vol. XV, no. 12, Kathmandu 1976, pp. 17-24, 35-39, pdf, accessed 21 September 2007.
  31. ^ a b Michael Witzel, Nepalese Hydronomy: Towards a History of Settlement in the Himalayas, in Proceedings of the Franco-German Conference at Arc-et-Senans, June 1990, Paris 1993, pp. 217-266, pdf, accessed 21 September 2007
  32. ^ asiatica.org
  33. ^ Kashmri Brahmins. In: The Valley of Kashmir. The making and unmaking of a composite culture? Edited by Aparna Rao, with a foreword and introductory essay by T.N.Madan. New Delhi: Manohar 2008: 37-93
  34. ^ a b people.fas.harvard.edu
  35. ^ Michael Witzel, The Home of the Aryans, Anusantatyi: Festschrift fuer Johanna Narten zum 70. Geburtstag, ed. A. Hinze and E. Tichy (Muenchener Studien zur Sprachwissenschaft, Beihefte NF 19) Dettelbach: J. H. Roell 2000, 283-338, pdf, accessed 21 September 2007.
  36. ^ Moving Targets? Texts, language, archaeology, and history in the Late Vedic and early Buddhist periods. Indo-Iranian Journal 52, 2009, 287-310
  37. ^ Michael Witzel, Aryan and Non-Aryan Names in Vedic India. Data for the Linguistic Situation, c. 1900-500 B.C., in J. Bronkhorst and M. Deshpande, eds., Aryans and Non-Non-Aryans, Evidence, Interpretation, and Ideology, Cambridge (Harvard Orienatal Series, Opera Minora 3), 1999, pp. 337-404, pdf, accessed 21 September 2007; Michael Witzel, Early Sources for South Asian Substrate Languages, Mother Tongue, special issue (October 1999): 1-70, pdf, accessed 13 September 2007.
  38. ^ South Asian agricultural vocabulary. In: T. Osada (ed.). Proceedings of the Pre-Symposium of RHIN and 7th ESCA Harvard-Kyoto Round Table. Published by the Research Institute for Humanity and Nature (RHIN), Kyoto, Japan 2006: 96-120
  39. ^ The linguistic history of some Indian domestic plants Journal of Biosciences Dec. 2009, 829-833 ias.ac.in uas.ac.in
  40. ^ ejvs.laurasianacademy.com
  41. ^ Linguistic Evidence for Cultural Exchange in Prehistoric Western Central Asia. Philadelphia: Sino-Platonic Papers 129, Dec. 2003
  42. ^ aa.tufs.ac.jp
  43. ^ aa.tufs.ac.jp
  44. ^ Michael Witzel, Kumano.kara Woruga.made ("From Kumano to the Volga"), Zinbun 36, Kyoto 1990, pp. 4-5, in Japanese, accessed 21 September 2007.
  45. ^ fas.harvard.edu
  46. ^ Harvard Round Tables on the Ethnogenesis of (South and Central) Asia
  47. ^ Vala and Iwato. The Myth of the Hidden Sun in India, Japan and beyond EJVS 12-1, (March 1, 2005), 1-69
  48. ^ Creation myths. In: T. Osada (ed.), Proceedings of the Pre-Symposium of RHIN and 7th ESCA Harvard-Kyoto Round Table. Published by the Research Institute for Humanity and Nature (RHIN), Kyoto, Japan 2006: 284-318
  49. ^ Out of Africa: the Journey of the Oldest Tales of Humankind. In: Generalized Science of Humanity Series, Vol. I. Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa 2006: 21-65
  50. ^ Myths and Consequences. Review of Stefan Arvidsson, Indo-European Mythology as Ideology and Science. (Chicago University Press 2006). Science, vol. 317, 28 September 2007, 1868-1869 (Manuscript Number: 1141619). sciencemag.org
  51. ^ sciencemag.org
  52. ^ iacm.bravehost.com
  53. ^ people.fas.harvard.edu
  54. ^ “Slaying the dragon across Eurasia”. In: Bengtson, John D. (ed.) In Hot Pursuit of Language in Prehistory. Essays in the four fields of anthropology. In honor of Harold Crane Fleming. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamin’s Publishing Company 2008: 263-286
  55. ^ The Origins of the World's Mythologies. Oxford University Press, Spring 2010
  56. ^ oup.com
  57. ^ Michael Witzel publications list Harvard University website
  58. ^ people.fas.harvard.edu, Autochthonous Aryans
  59. ^ flonnet.com, pdf flonnet.com
  60. ^ Rama's Realm: Indocentric Rewritings of Early South Asian Archaeology and History. In: Archaeological Fantasies. How Pseudoarchaeology Misrepresents the Past and Misleads the Public, ed. by G. G. Fagan.London/New York: Routledge 2006:203-232 -- Discussion by Colin Renfrew
  61. ^ Indocentrism: Autochthonous visions of ancient India. In: The Indo-Aryan controversy : evidence and inference in Indian history / edited by Edwin F. Bryant and Laurie L. Patton. London & New York : Routledge, 2005: 341-404
  62. ^ Hindutva View of History. Rewriting Textsbook in India and the United States. (with K. Visvesvaran, Nandini Majrekar, Dipta Bhog, and Uma Chakravarti). Georgetown Journal of International Affairs. 10th Anniversary edition. Winter/Spring 2009, 101-112
  63. ^ safarmer.com (PDF), sciencemag.org
  64. ^ page 9 of the pdf ccat.sas.upenn.edu
  65. ^ Autochthonous Aryans? The Evidence from Old Indian and Iranian Texts. EJVS, May 2001
  66. ^ people.fas.harvard.edu
  67. ^ people.fas.harvard.edu
  68. ^ International Conference on Comparative Mythology (Beijing 2006)
  69. ^ people.fas.harvard.edu
  70. ^ iacm.bravehost.com Index page Second Annual Conference International Association for Comparative Mythology (Ravenstein, Netherlands, 19–21 August 2008)
  71. ^ kokugakuin.ac.jp
  72. ^ fas.harvard.edu
  73. ^ fas.harvard.edu
  74. ^ a b c d Swapan, Ashfaque (March 3, 2006). "Compromise Reached on California Textbook Controversy About Hinduism". Pacific News Service. http://news.pacificnews.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=6d7fd82d03a4981040f985cc4f279604. .
  75. ^ a b Nalina Taneja, A saffron assault abroad, Frontline (magazine), Volume 23 - Issue 01, January 14–27, 2006
  76. ^ a b rediff.com, interview
  77. ^ Suman Guha Mozumder (March 19, 2006). "Hindu groups sue California Board of Education". Rediff News. http://in.rediff.com/news/2006/mar/19edu.htm. 
  78. ^ Meenakshi Ganjoo (January 17, 2006). "Re-written history raises intellectual temper in California". Outlook (magazine). http://www.outlookindia.com/pti_news.asp?id=349007. 
  79. ^ "Indian history books raise storm in California". Times of India. 17 January 2006. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/World/The_United_States/Indian_history_books_raise_storm_in_California/articleshow/msid-1374564,curpg-1.cms. 
  80. ^ capeem.org
  81. ^ dockets.justia.com
  82. ^ California textbook controversy over Hindu history
  83. ^ Hindu history ignites brawl over textbooks
  84. ^ Battling the Past
  85. ^ "Multiculturalism and "American" Religion: The Case of Hindu Indian Americans", Social Forces, Volume 85; Issue 2
  86. ^ Hindutva View of History. Rewriting Textsbook in India and the United States. (with K. Visvesvaran, Nandini Majrekar, Dipta Bhog, and Uma Chakravarti). Georgetown Journal of International Affairs. 10th Anniversary edition. Winter/Spring 2009, 101-112

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