7–8 May 2015
Freie Universität Berlin, Seminarzentrum, Room L116,
Habelschwerdter Allee 45, 14195 Berlin

What does it mean to express the inexpressible? Is it possible to talk about what is beyond words? When do we accurately give voice to an emotion or how does one depict the numinous? Many seminal works of literature grapple with these issues or incorporate concepts of the ineffable into their narrative frames, explicit arguments or use of metaphor. The philological work carried out on these texts presupposes notions of the transcendent that may be shared with the works studied, or differ substantially in their worldview. Even within a single tradition, seismic shifts in practice, socio-political conditions or literary style can radically alter how texts from that tradition are read. Furthermore, in European scholarship say, the underlying presuppositions concerning the world and its transcendence affect the scholarly distinction between what is real and yet inexpressible and what is merely impossible and falsified, as conveyed in the writing under investigation. In short, changing ideas of the ineffable alter philology, and philological work alters attempts at expressing the ineffable. This workshop will bring together various perspectives to assess the underlying dynamics at work in, and philological issues arising from, various types of language usage and its limitations, as it strains to reach beyond itself.

Convened by Joydeep Bagchee, Lewis Doney & Hajnalka Kovacs

Speakers:

Vishwa Adluri (Hunter College, New York)
Beyond Grammar: Indicating the Infinite

Joydeep Bagchee (Zukunftsphilologie Fellow der Freien Universität Berlin 2014-2015)
Philology as Apologetics: Laine Reading Hacker Reading Weber on Hinduism

Imre Bangha (University of Oxford)
Naming Kabīr’s God

Thomas de Bruijn (Leiden)
The hermeneutics of early modern Hindi mystical poetry of Kabir and Muhammad Jayasi

Lewis Doney (Zukunftsphilologie Fellow der Freien Universität Berlin 2014-2015)
Pious Alteration in Tibetan Historiography Concerning Indian Buddhism

Sonam Kachru (Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin)
Proximate Ineffables: Notes on Contested Claims for the Ineffability of Selves, Minds and Perceptual Presence in Indian Buddhist Philosophy

Matthew Kapstein (University of Chicago/EPHE, Paris)
Interpreting Indian Philosophy: Three Parables

Hajnalka Kovacs (Zukunftsphilologie Fellow der Freien Universität Berlin 2014-2015)
When Meaning Reaches the Tongue": Bedil's (1644–1720) Poetics of the Inexpressible

Anand Mishra (Universität Heidelberg)
Vallabhācārya's reading of the Bhāgavata-Purāṇa

Francesca Orsini (SOAS, London)
Shared language, distinct thoughts?


Please find the workshop program here.