Creating readers or manuals for “Indian Philosophy” runs the risk, I am afraid, of relegating the whole field to a specific subclass, something to be dealt in a separate course and not worthy of being discussed as part of the philosophical discourse sic et simpliciter. I would rather want epistemological arguments elaborated by Kumārila, etc., along the ones elaborated by his Western peers. Just like Kant is not taught in a class about “German Philosophy”.

In this sense, the ideal case would be a reader on, say, epistemology which includes Dharmakīrti side by side with Karl Popper and the like. Until then, and given that an author who might be willing to do the effort has almost nothing helping her in the selection of the relevant Indian authors, we might follow our colleagues who wrote manuals or readers about other neglected philosophers, most notably about Women Philosophers.

However, I would prefer readers and manuals about Sanskrit or Indian philosophy of language, or aesthetics, or logics (and so on), rather than on “Indian Philosophy” in general. The latter suggests the title of an additional (perhaps, optional) class in a curriculum purely dedicated to Western philosophy, whereas the former might lead to the inclusion of Indian authors within a class on deontic, ethics, etc. Or, at least, to the addition of more than one class on Indian staff.

This post is a response to this proposal by Anand Vidya, but by no means a criticism of it.

TYPO NOW FIXED! Many thanks to Justin Weinberg!