Essay on The Composite Culture of India

Essay on The Composite Culture of India

Introduction

In India, as in some other countries of the third world great civilizations and cultures have flourished from times immemorial. Elsewhere the link has been broken. Contemporary India reverberates with the echoes of the past and gives them new shape and form each day.

Indian culture is a composite culture. It develops a mixed culture which derives from the Indus Valley Civilization. Indian culture is called ‘composite culture’, because it comes through Hinduism on the one hand and Muslim and other cultures on the other hand.

Time to time it had accepted many ideas and influences from the various civilizations of the world and adopted its own culture. Now India is a secular country with different religions, faiths, ideas, belief systems etc.

Meaning of Culture

Before we go through composite culture of India we must understand the meaning of culture. The most general terms in which culture could be explained would be something like this “The sense of ultimate values which a certain society has and according to which it wants to shape its life.”

This initial explanation given above refers to the ideal aspect of culture. Now the collective complexes (state, society, art, science) which are permanent results of the attempt to create ultimate values could be regarded as its objective mental aspect, the qualities and attitudes of individuals inspired by these values as its subjective aspect, and the physical objects in which these values are embodied, e.g. buildings, pictures, etc., would be its material aspect.

After the preliminary discussion, it is comparatively easy for us to give a definition of culture. We can now say “culture is a sense of ultimate values possessed by a particular society as expressed in its collective institutions, by its individual members in their dispositions, feelings, attitudes and manners as well as insignificant forms which they give to material objects.”

Religion in its wider sense coincides with, and goes beyond culture; and in its narrower sense, forms an important part of it.

Civilization is sometimes used as just another word for culture but generally in the sense of a higher order of culture. As a matter of fact, civilization is that stage in the cultural development of a people when they begin to live in large habitations called cities, which represent a higher level of material life or a higher standard of living.

Indian national culture consists of two elements: the common temperament and outlook which constitute the Indian mind and the intellectual influences of various movements and cultures which have been incorporated harmoniously with the national mind.

Amongst these are included cultures which existed in I India in the pre-historic period, those with which the country had a temporary contact, those which came from outside and made India their home, and lastly the revolutionary intellectual movements which developed in the country itself from time to time.

The Sources of Indian Culture

National temper and mind is the most important source of the common national culture. Amongst other sources are the new religious or philosophical movements which take their birth in the country from time to time or the cultures of people who have come from outside and settled in this country, or of those with whom this country has come into contact in war or trade and commerce.

But it should be clearly understood that only such elements of these different cultures are considered to be part of the common national culture as can be incorporated so harmoniously with the collective mind of the people that all sections and communities regard them as their own. The complex formed from these elements is called National Culture.

Ideas, theories and beliefs are not bound to any particular locality. They leap across racial, national and geographical boundaries, and establish themselves as a part of world culture. Composite Indian culture is also a beautiful example of world culture developed in this way.

Perhaps the most prominent feature of India’s geographical configuration is the fact that, barring the mountainous regions of the north and the Eastern and Western Ghats of the southern Peninsula, the whole country consists either of plains or low plateaus, watered by big rivers.

The most noteworthy feature of India’s economic life is the fact that, the basic needs of life are fewer than in colder countries; the resources needed for satisfying them are ample. The influence of climate and economic resources on the material aspects of culture, e.g. food, dress, modes of living etc. has molded the pattern of physical and economic environment.

Such is the atmosphere in which the Indian mind has grown and developed. Naturally, therefore, it has two main characteristics-the capacity for contemplation which dominates all other mental powers, and the capacity to see and apprehend unity in diversity. Role of Regional Literature in Cultural Integration

Language and Culture are inseparable from one another. However, despite the diverse linguistic peculiarities in India, the regional literature while depicting the peculiar nuances of the local culture, also rises above the merely local, to reflect in full measure-something that is national in character.

Regional literature in fact, has often contributed to the fostering of a national identity a national consciousness and a national culture. India has always been a linguistically diverse community.

Even in the ancient times there was no language which was spoken by everybody. Sanskrit was only the language of the elite whereas Prakrit and Ardha Magadhi were more commonly spoken by the masses.

During the Mughal rule Persian took the place of Sanskrit as the court language while Urdu and Hindustani were the languages of the common masses in North India. However the Dravidian languages continued to flourish in the south.

A survey of the modern day regional languages and literature reveal an attempt at integration especially in Assamese, Bengali, Marathi, Gujarati and the Southern languages.

However the pace of Endeavour towards national integration in Hindi and Punjabi has been relatively slow. On the whole from the ancient texts in Sanskrit to Bengali literature which pioneered the 19th century Indian renaissance, to modern day regional literature, what is reflected is an attempt to break the narrow walls of provincialism and build bridges of integration and peace between the far-flung cultures of India.

While regional literature is doing a commendable job of integrating India, we must remain on guard lest these languages should become reactionary and unleash retrogressive and parochial trends.

This national style has evolved on the basis of a cultural community that developed in the course of time. It is that cultural community which makes the Indians, despite regional limitations and variety of faiths and languages, regard themselves as a single integrated whole.

It is this concept of a single national entity that forms the ingredients of national integration, which is nothing but the spirit of cohesive co-existence between diverse cultural and linguistic communities.

Traditional Values of Indian Culture

By the end of ancient epoch, Sanskrit became a classical language, no more in common use. Its place was taken by Persian which became the court language of Delhi Sultanate. Later, English assumed the same role and became the language of the government and the administration.

The liberal all-embracing tradition which made Tagore write poem on Guru Gobind Singh, Shivaji. Taj Mahal and on Indian mythology had played the most significant role in the building of Indian culture. The Sanskrit Culture

The Sanskrit language itself had built up a culture which was commonly known as Sanskrit culture which later were known as composite culture.

Sanskrit was, at best, the ‘cultured’ language of north India, the language of royal courts, scriptures, epics and literary works. By the close of the ancient age, most of the modern regional languages of India had come into vague.

Today every fifth person in India speaks a language different from the North-Indian and Indo-European Sanskrit based languages. Sanskrit was considered as the mother language of most of the Indian based languages. Crisis in Composite Culture of India

Not only in culture but in every sphere, India today, is going through a period of tremendous turbulence. Today crisis in culture is owing to three main elements. Firstly, there is a continuous fragmentation of life, of man and of knowledge, undermining the unity of living.

This process leads to confusion and loss of faith. Secondly, there is widening gap between thought and action and thirdly there is insufficient stress on the moral and ethical element in promoting peace and development.

The peace of the world remains apparently fragile and threatened. Violence looms larger with the increase in self-centeredness; indifference and greed. So, the above situation calls for harmony and mutual adjustment in strengthening the cultural values.

In short, the role of humanists, who believe in their mission of understanding and appreciating different cultures and promoting cultural values, is clear.

They must do everything possible to create a climate of peace and cooperation, promote meaningful dialogues that are taken seriously by those who talk and communicate and exemplify their own faith by bold and sincere action.

Conclusion

India is a land of peace, love and unity. It is the best example in the world to claim “unity in diversity’, consisting of all qualities of sub-continent, of course, India is a sub continent with its strength rest on its Patience at the bottom developing its own composite culture and principles. Gandhian principles and the Panchsheel ideals are the direct outcome of Indian civilization and culture.