Nature, body and woman: An Indian perspective on value dualisms

The role of value dualisms and value-hierarchies, such as ‘mind over body’, ‘reason over emotion’ and ‘culture over nature’ in differential access to privileges, has been highlighted from a Western perspective. In the arguments of Elizabeth Spelman, Warren and Plumwood, the differentiation, subordination and domination is based on the ideas of mind–body and its link to the concepts of woman–man, nature– culture and reason–emotion. A discussion on concepts within Indian traditions must first attempt to engage with the multiplicity of conceptual sources, and must then deal with the interpretive analyses of these sources that occur across diverse genres. The concept of the mind in Indian traditions seems to lack a clear hierarchical value dualism from the body. The conception of body in Indian thought is connected to the notion of ‘experiencing’ the world. For most philosophical schools, the body is the seat of the indriyas, the capacity for sensing, the senses of knowing and the senses of action.