Why Do Non-Desis Keep Bowing to Me? and other thoughts on Namaste.
Maybe I’ve got a sign written on my forehead.
A vividly neon one, flashing “this is a Hindu woman in wellness.”
Why else would non-desi folks feel the need to bow and say “namaste” to me?
DISCLAIMER: This article does not intend to speak for all South Asian cultures and persons around the world. I only seek to speak to my experiences with Namaste as an Indo-Canadian Gujarati woman. South Asia is a diverse continent and the uses of Namaste within its desi language groups are diverse as well.
Namaste comes from the Sanskrit root words ‘namah’ (bows/bends) and ‘te’ (you), thus meaning “bow(s) to you” in literal translation. For my Gujarati ethnic group, it commonly means "Hello”, and is sometimes accompanied by joint palms or prayer hands known as the Anjali Mudra. Namaste is not a word that leaves my lips often, even as a practicing Hindu, and Gujarati speaker. I seldom use the word because it is reserved for very formal greetings and unfamiliar faces. We use it when we first meet strangers or uncommon guests, and hope to cease the use of namaste with them as they become familiar to us. Any other use of ‘namaste’ was non-existent in my cultural space, so you can imagine my surprise when non-desi folks started using the word out of context and/or began bowing to me in a variety of situations: parties, classes, meetings, and more. “Namaste” is just a formalized “Hello”, and strangers are using it as anything but because of its misrepresentation in yoga.
Yoga is exploited in Anglophonic countries in a myriad of ways. White practitioners and teachers have turned it into a simple and exotic exercise form, rejecting its philosophical teachings, and have also managed to marginalize desi folks while turning the cultural appropriation dial to ‘high’. Practitioners and teachers wear mala beads as accessories, use Buddha and other deities as decoration, and sell yoga sessions with goats, beer, and puppies. A number of exploitative classes and sessions continue to use “namaste”, a word used in greeting, to signal the end of a yogic exercise class. The claim is that it means “the light in me sees the light in you". I have never known a single Hindi speaker or Hindu person to use the word in this way, and have never seen or heard them using it when leaving gathered company or concluding events. I then ask myself: does this alternate meaning used predominantly by non-Hindus and non-desis hold weight or merit? I’d argue that it doesn’t and shouldn’t, especially when Desis are being left out of the conversation- incidentally about a word that they created and molded centuries ago!
Languages evolve over millennia with transformations in meaning, and develop new dialects that in turn become their own language families. Sanskrit has behaved in a similar vein. It is effectively a dead language, which means that it isn’t spoken by any living community, but it does have many living and thriving descendants such as Hindi, Gujarati, Nepali, Sinhalese, and many more. I have only ever known a single person who was able to string a true Sanskrit sentence together - my Hindi teacher who earned the title of Shashtriji by studying Sanskrit to become a Doctor of Ayurveda. After becoming a master of Sanskrit in his 20s, and teaching it to a number of students well into his 90s, he also only used “namaste” to mean ‘hello’, and I can still remember him asking us to say Namaste or Namaskar to a number of visitors to his classes. The writing is clearly on the wall…and that tacky “Namastay in Bed” poster shouldn’t be.
A white woman colleague once asked me to explain more about the word “namaste” and its meaning to our other coworkers. I flippantly replied that “Namaste” merely meant “Hello”, and ‘not that yoga class b*llshit about light’, not realizing that her prior definition of the word to our colleagues had used that phrase. She experienced a shock to the senses when the expected exotic elaboration was smothered by my tragically plain understanding of Hinduism and my cultural use of Namaste. With an anxious and embarrassed “that’s not nice”, she turned back to her computer. I was unapologetically unperturbed. Depictions of Desi folks in Anglophonic countries revolve around archaic stereotypes and the exoticism of our culture. They don’t allow for Indian-ness to grow past the mysticism that sells so very well. The wrongful use of Namaste adds to this trend so that yoga can continue to be sold as an exotic practice from an “ancient” people.
The incorrect use of Namaste has somehow permeated my day to day Toronto life. I encounter folks who think it is okay to say Namaste and bow to me in spaces that have nothing to do with yoga, and nothing to do with traditional greeting practices upon first meeting. It is beginning to feel quite targeted, as I physically present as a person of Indian origin. I have had people join their hands in prayer and bow to me when I’ve given them a compliment on their clothing. I have had people exclaim “Namaste!” and bow to me when I have made a strong point in a work meeting. I have had folks take it upon themselves to end MY mindfulness and meditation sessions with Namaste for me - when I actively choose not to say it at the end of my sessions because I consider it plain wrong. All of this is a micro-aggression. Folks believe in exoticizing our moments together, and unfortunately believe that their use of Namaste is quirky, cute, and brings us closer together. Spoiler alert: it does none of these things. It is a tired trope in which a non-Desi person shows me what they think my culture is. As always, they are very much mistaken.
The overarching change of Namaste’s meaning to ‘Hello’ demonstrates natural semantic change in our many Sanskrit based languages. These changes aren’t forced in their use like the exotic and uncommon use of “Namaste” in yogic exercise classes. This yoga class use of Namaste aims to tie Indian/desi culture to antiquated time periods and erases the evolution of what it means to use Namaste as a Desi person. It eliminates our right to self-determination. Yoga classes that are appropriative in nature seek to establish what it means to be Indian, and try to define what Indian essence/aesthetic is without the involvement of Indian people. Anglophonic Yoga has created a farce out of the word Namaste - and in doing so has become a farce of itself.
