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Eastern Movement Forms as Body-SelfTransforming Cultural Practices in the West:Towards a Sociological Perspective

I David Brown

University of Wales Institute, Cardiff, UK

I Aspasia Leledaki

University of Exeter, UK

ABSTRACT

Unlike the spectacular diffusion of modern Western sporting forms, Easternmovement forms (martial arts, Eastern dance, Yoga, meditation, Tai Chi Chuan,

Qigong, etc.) have been quietly entering the fabric of everyday Western life over

the past few decades. Adopting a structurationist approach that seeks to retain

relationships between macro-, meso- and micro-levels of culture, this article

considers data gathered from a range of long-term Western practitioners of a

variety of Eastern movement forms in juxtaposition to broader media and doc-

umentary data also gathered on these practices. The analysis explores three

Western social forces (Orientalism, reflexive modernization and commodifica-

tion.) identified as acting on these movement forms in ways that intensify theprocess of (re)invention of tradition with particular transformative tensions. In

conclusion, we identify three dispositions (preservationism, conservationism, and

modernization) emerging from our analysis of these movement forms that

seem to drive how individuals respond to the transformative Western social

forces highlighted.

KEY WORDS

commodification / cultural practices / Eastern movement forms / invented

traditions / Orientalism / reflexive modernization / structuration

123

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Introduction

U

nlike the spectacular diffusion of modern Western sporting forms (Guttmann,

1978; Maguire, 2000), many Eastern movement forms (including non-

sporting martial arts, dance, Yoga, meditation, Tai Chi Chuan, Qigong, toname a few) have been quietly spreading and transforming in Western cultures

over the past few decades. These adopted Eastern cultural practices have entered

the fabric of everyday Western life while attracting relatively little socio-political

recognition or resistance.1 As Campbell (2007) suggests:

Paradoxically, it is possible that just at the point when the rest of the world seems

intent on imitating the Western way of life, the West itself is actually turning away

from its own historic roots and embracing an Eastern outlook. (Campbell, 2007: 20)

Perhaps an indication of this Easternization thesis can be found in theUKs 2002 General Household Survey (see Rickards et al., 2004), in which

Yoga is now categorized as a keep fit, leisure activity together with aerobics

and dance exercise. This cluster of lifestyle practices was the third most popu-

lar activity (22%) (annual participation) in the UK after walking (46%) and

swimming (35%), and the most likely to have been done regularly (Sport

England, 2002). Similarly, Sport England reports that martial arts clubs consis-

tently ranked third for sport clubs attended by school-aged children of both

genders between 1994 and 2002 (Sport England, 2003). Furthermore, these

Eastern movement forms are enjoying popularity among a variety of social

groups including the educated, professional middle classes (Strauss, 2005: 15),

urban populations (De-Michelis, 2004: 2), diversely embodied social groups,

including professional athletes (http://zendoctor.com/SportsExcellence.htm,

consulted 25 November 2009), pregnant women (Sparrowe and Walden, 2002),

people from different ethnic backgrounds (Queen et al., 2003), different sexu-

alities (http://www.queerdharma.org/, consulted 25 November 2009) and dif-

ferent ages and degrees of bodily ability (http://yoga-health-benefits.blogspot.

com/2009/07/yoga-for-disabled.html, consulted 25 November 2009).

What is also significant, and perhaps even surprising, is the extent to which

these Eastern movement forms increasingly occupy legitimate socio-culturalspaces in Western institutions including the armed forces, schools, universities,

prisons, hospitals, businesses, leisure centres and community halls. For example,

in the UK, a number of these movement forms are slowly moving from extracur-

ricular to curricular activities in UK schools, as indicated by Bloom (2006) and

numerous BBC news reports.2 Illustrations of the claims made about these activ-

ities are also abundant in the UK today. The following examples are taken from

promotional leaflet materials distributed by local clubs and associations:

[Yoga] can be helpful to correct muscular skeletal imbalances, develop core strength

and flexibility, improve breathing patterns, release stress and tension, increase energy,

and vitality, develop steadiness, openness and quiet for body and mind.

[Meditation] for gaining deep relaxation, eliminating stress, promoting health,

increasing creativity, and intelligence, and attaining inner happiness, and fulfilment.

124 Cultural Sociology Volume 4 I Number 1 I March 2010



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Qigong is a gentle and powerful way of healing and strengthening any part of the

body, especially the internal organs, and cultivates a strong, all round Qi field.

Karate: The [martial] art is open to all ages and aims to promote discipline, mutual

respect, confidence, and self-esteem.

These and other claims about the outcomes of such practices are as impres-

sive as they are therapeutically extensive, if indeed they are true. Disciplines as

diverse as psychology, biomechanics, biochemistry, physiology, and medicine

have begun to evaluate the truth of these body-mind transformational claims

in largely positivist empirical terms.3 Perhaps equally or even more important is

the realization that such claims have much to tell us about the current cultural

status of Eastern movement forms as body-self transforming practices in the

West and the prevailing institutional climate for their reception.

However, in spite of widespread interest in these Eastern movement forms

among the Western scientific community, there remains a palpable paucity of

research literature in the sociological discipline studying physical culture that

has attempted to make sense of this phenomenon and in particular its impact

on the lives, identities, and social practices of its practitioners in the West. While

there are a few notable exceptions to this (see for example, Bender and Cadge,

2006; Brown and Johnson, 2000; Goodger and Goodger, 1980; Irigaray, 2002;

James and Jones, 1982; Kohn, 2003; Levine, 1991; Smith, 2007; Strauss, 2005;

Tan, 2004; Villamn et al., 2004; Wilson, 1984), empirical and theoretical

articulations of the positions that these kinds of movement form have come to

occupy in Western cultural spaces remain largely absent or underdeveloped. Itis therefore the purpose of this article to begin, cautiously, the process of theo-

retical contextualization with reference to ongoing empirical work. In what

follows we identify and explore three interrelated social forces: those of

Orientalism, reflexive modernization and commodification. We highlight some

transformations that might be occurring as both intended and unintended con-

sequences. We also highlight certain tensions emerging from a dialectical view

of two contrasting deep epistemological and ontological orientations to the

world that frame cultural thought and practice in both East and West (Campbell,

2007). We conclude tentatively with the suggestion that these forces might belinked at the embodied level to three emergent dispositions (preservationist,

conservationist, and modernizing) that might orientate individual engagement

towards the invention of tradition of these movement forms, depending on an

individuals interaction with the social forces articulated.

Study Methodology and Sensitizing Concepts

The data presented here have been generated from a qualitative study that formedone of the first phases of a broader ongoing project that is considering Eastern

movement forms as body-self transforming practices in Western cultural

contexts. The data set being collected has two complementary parts: interviews

and documentary evidence. We have conducted a series of life history interviews

125Eastern Movement Forms as Body-Self Transforming Cultural Practices Brown & Leledaki



6/34

with participants who are long-term practitioners4 from a range of Eastern

movement forms including two traditions of Vipassana meditation, Zen medita-

tion, Tibetan-based meditation, neo-Advaita Vedanta practice, Asthanga Yoga,

Iyengar Yoga, and Tai Chi. The identification of the participants was guided by a

combination of purposeful and opportunistic sampling (Mason, 1996).Although there are significant differences between these movement forms

regarding their philosophies, techniques and pedagogies of self-cultivation, there

is also sufficient overlap in the way in which they are subjected to broader social

forces we identify in this article to warrant their collective inclusion. All inter-

views were recorded, transcribed verbatim and, following Lieblich et al. (1998),

subjected to a holistic-content analysis. The participants represented here include

Tony, Alan, John, Fiona, Martin, Peter, Ingrid and Marcelo (all pseudonyms).

They were recruited because of their involvement in a variety of Eastern move-

ment forms rather than any social demographic principle. While we will brieflyintroduce each participant, collectively they reflect a cross section of multi-

cultural British society, with a range of ethnic identities represented (white

English, Afro-Caribbean English and continental European). Class background

varies from (mainly) upper working-class to middle-class professionals. Ages of

participants ranged from mid-20s to mid-60s. At the time of interview all the

participants lived in the UK in locations across the South West of England,

London and the Midlands. The documentary data also presented here have been

collected in order to complement our qualitative life history work. Sources of the

documents include local and national press articles, publications from the fitnessindustry, marketing literature from Eastern movement forms, practitioner orien-

tated texts, video documentaries and World Wide Web-based information sources.

In this article these data are being drawn on for specific illustrative pur-

poses that seek to enhance our theoretical understandings of how certain social

forces we identify appear to be shaping these practices and the practitioners

experiences of them. Our rationale for using qualitative data in this way fol-

lows Plummer (2001) who considers that life history work can be used to chal-

lenge, build, and illustrate wider theoretical explanations, especially when

combined with other forms of data. In this way, the use of documentary and

media illustrations alongside other empirical research and our own qualitative

data helps to illustrate a range of sites and contexts in which the influences of

these social forces on Eastern movement forms in the West are apparent.

Moreover, this complementary use of data is intended to show how these

forces stretch from the macro- (such as large-scale change in societies), through

to the meso- (specific fields, institutions or social contexts) to the micro-level

(such as practitioner experience). In this vein, we are sensitive (although we do

not claim to be deploying the idea systematically) to the principle of Sartres

(1963)progressive-regressive method that oscillates between micro- and macro-

levels to develop more holistic explanations of socio-cultural phenomena.Finally, while we acknowledge its epistemological limitations and obfuscations

(Sparkes, 2002), the form of representation adopted for this article is that of a

realist tale.




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This methodological approach is intended to accord with our broadly

structurationist or post-dualist theoretical view of the social world as advocated

by a number of theorists including Giddens (1984, 1990, 1991), Shilling and

Mellor (1996), Mellor and Shilling (1997), Horne and Jary (2004) and Stones

(2005), to name a few. While there is no space here to develop detailed mappingsof these cultural forms in relation to structuration theories, the broad intent of

considering the dual nature of agency and structure, unintended consequences of

human action, and the reflexivity of social life all serve as sensitizing concepts

for this analysis. Therefore, in connecting our methodological and theoretical

approaches we concur with Stoness (2005) description of strong structuration

in which he contends:

Adherents of structuration are also keen to emphasize structures as well as the expe-

riences of lives lived. It can ... focus in on any set of surface appearances and make

our understanding of them richer and more meaningful by elaborating upon thestructures and agents involved and placing them in relevant networks of social and

historical relations. (Stones, 2005: 192)

Two important caveats are necessary at this point. Rightly or wrongly,

structuration theories (especially Giddens own) have been subjected to crit-

icism on the grounds that their accounts of human actors are overly cogni-

tive and disembodied (see Shilling and Mellor, 1996). In response, we remain

sensitive to Shilling and Mellors (1996) articulations that call for the reten-

tion of structuration theorys broader precepts while reinserting a more

focused appreciation and examination of human embodiment via the emo-tions and the senses. The second caveat relates to the considerable concep-

tual difficulties in attempting to provide articulations that go beyond the

deeply embedded dualisms concerning notions of culture that are defined

as Eastern or Western and to cultural forms which might be considered

traditional and modern.

In response, drawing on Hobsbawm (1983), we take the view that the move-

ment forms to which we refer are probably most accurately described as cultural

forms ofinvented tradition, which he usefully defines as follows:

Invented tradition is taken to mean a set of practices, normally governed by overtly

or tacitly accepted rules and of a ritual or symbolic nature, which seek to inculcate

certain values and norms of behaviour by repetition, which automatically implies

continuity with [a suitable historic] past Insofar as there is such reference to a

historic past, the peculiarity of invented traditions is that the continuity with it is

largely facticious. In short, they are responses to novel situations which take the

form of reference to old situations, or which establish their own past by quasi-

obligatory repetition. (Hobsbawm, 1983: 1)5

Hobsbawm also emphasizes that invented traditions are not a phenomenon

that should be attributed solely to modernity but can be observed throughouthistory. He further maintains that invented traditions most noticeably emerge

during periods of social change, thus providing a degree of continuity and

meaning through change, while paradoxically contributing to that change.




8/34

Finally, invented traditions should not be viewed as an exclusively macro-level

phenomenon but rather as also occurring at the micro- and meso-cultural lev-

els of daily life in the form of everyday cultural practice.

One of our principal rationales for considering the practice of Eastern

movement forms in the West as invented traditions is taken from Giddenss ideaof disembedding mechanisms, which he defines as characterized by processes of

lifting out of social relations from local contexts of interaction and their

restructuring across indefinite spans of time-space (Giddens, 1991: 21). With

these thoughts in mind, the Eastern movement forms we refer to are taken to be

invented traditions that have been (re)invented continually throughout Eastern

history, albeit that this process of invention intensified considerably during the

mid- to late-1800s and after with the emergence of Western modernity, Indian

modernity, and Japans Meiji restoration. Moreover, these and other modernities

were characterized by increased cross-cultural dialogue and interaction that fur-ther intensified the invention of tradition. Thus, as many thinkers have illus-

trated, this cross-cultural interaction had many intended and unintended

consequences, but the key recognition here is the way in which these invented

traditions gradually became cross-cultural, transnational, and in many cases

mundialized (see for example Alter, 1993; Clarke, 1997, 2000; De-Michelis,

2004; Strauss, 2005).

Given this position, our intention is not to debate the dualism between tra-

dition and modernity or East and Westper se, but rather to locate and articu-

late some of the more pertinent socio-cultural forces involved in the inventionof the Eastern movement forms as tradition in the Western context. Thus, while

we support the idea that the growing presence of Eastern movement forms in

the West may well be evidence of an ongoing process of Easternization of the

West (Campbell, 2007), these movement forms (as invented traditions) also

need to be understood in terms of the cultural landscape into which they are

being embedded. We are also mindful of Dawsons (2006) caveats to Campbells

Easternization thesis regarding the impact of the Western habitus in appropri-

ating Eastern culture according to its own schemes of perception. Accordingly,

we bring these perspectives together to consider an emerging clustering of

themes that point to the practice of Eastern movement forms in the West as

being heavily influenced by three interrelated social forces, omnipresent in the

West Orientalism, reflexive modernization and commodification. We consider

each in turn below.

(Invented) Tradition, Orientalism and the Appeal of the Other

Orientalism remains an important backdrop to the collective social meaning of

Eastern movement forms in the West today, and to the experiences andbehaviours of its practitioners. The philosopher and historian Clarke (1997: 7)

defines Orientalism as the range of attitudes that have been evinced in the West

towards the traditional, religious, and philosophical ideas and systems of South




9/34

and East Asia. However, it was perhaps Palestinian thinker Said (1989 [1978])

who provided the first and most sustained identification and critique of

Orientalism in which he incisively demonstrated how the colonial powers of the

West reduced Asian societies, its people, practices and cultures to essentialist

images of the other. These discursive reductions are important because theyalso envelope the culturally indigenous movement forms of the East. Such

Orientalist discourse can be defined variously as including:

1) images of the romanticized mystical, spiritual and irrational East versus

the material and rational West (Le Bris, 1981 cited in Clarke, 1997; see

also Clarke, 2000);2) images of the power/authority of the rational West over the irrational East

and the right to impose this rationality (Clarke, 1997; Said, 1989);

3) body-mind unity and self-reflexivity assumed to be essentially embedded inthe indigenous embodied practices and philosophies of the East (Said, 1989);

4) Orientalist perspectives contained within the use of the above modern

images of Eastern movement forms for purposes of intellectual association

and commercial appeal. (Alter, 2004; Clarke, 2000; Strauss, 2005)

In our work to date a lot of evidence suggests that Orientalist perceptions not

only persist, but loom large in the Western psyche and continually emerge with, for

example, concerns expressed about a particular Eastern movement forms origins,

teacher lineage (often expressed through the genealogies of Master teachers),authenticity and purity. Over the last century a myriad of Eastern movement

forms as cultural practices have been experienced by millions of Western practi-

tioners, ranging from the casual to the committed. Within this population,

Orientalist notions of the transcendental, spiritual, and exotic nature of these

cultural practices have undoubtedly fed the Western fascination for engagement

with them. This is illustrated by a typical comment from one of the practitioners in

the study, Fiona,6 who reflected that her early motivations for studying Yoga were

ignited by a teenage fascination with other cultures and especially with those of

Eastern cultures. Her early childhood was full of romantic images of herself beingan Egyptian princess amidst burning incense and saffron. Later, this (exotic) image

gave way to actual travelling, first to Japan and then to India. She comments:

In the second trip Id go to Thailand and... again was something much more... mys-

terious maybe... I mean on the surface maybe more connected with [something]...

quite spiritual, you know, incense burning, always seeing people praying, you know,

which is commonplace. In fact, people feel quite uncomfortable doing that [in her

Western locality], the gesture, sort of gesture of this [Fiona refers to the bodily

expression of the Indian every day salutation Namaste, which involves bringing the

palms of the hands together in a prayer position close to the chest]. (Fiona)

Similarly, Tonys7 concerns about the practice of Yoga are undoubtedly fed by

a sense of the positive value he ascribes to the exotic other, but they also indicate

an orientation that includes points three and four of the above definition:




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As always with generalization the exceptions deny the rule, so taking India for

example that has a great tradition of Yoga, theres body and it is something spiritual...

[It] has a great tradition in vegetarian diet and has a great tradition of holistic

medicine, so theres much for the body but it can also have forms of denial as well,

the amount of repressed sexuality would be one example of it, trying to go beyond thebody would be another and in the West we, though secular culture has liberated itself

more but still in the areas of the body some just do it to keep fit, they might do Yoga

but its just... a friend I saw last night and shes doing Asthanga Yoga, everybody seems

to do Asthanga Yoga these days, and she is not sure whether shell continue it but her

concern is, is it just a good exercise or is it, for her any sense of something spiritual in

it? And I think [in] the West we have to make up my minds what we do, why we do it to

be a little bit more clear about [that]. Yes I can run its just keeping fit, I can do a

Yoga to just keep fit or I can do it because it engages something rather beautiful. (Tony)

It is also worth noting that we find relatively little suggestion of the second

definition of Orientalism, concerning the rational/irrational dichotomy, amongour participants. Perhaps this is due to the level of advocacy of these individu-

als and the literature produced about these practices. Nevertheless, articulating

the presence of Orientalism in both positive and negative ways is a significant

first step towards developing more complex understandings of Eastern move-

ment forms as cultural practice in Western contexts. For example, Alter (2004)

notes that Orientalist scholarship about Eastern practices in the West has been,

by and large, disembodied and concerned mostly with issues concerning the

mind. In relation to Yoga and the body he elucidates:

Even though yogic literature is concerned with the body, it is clear that Orientalist

scholars were almost exclusively concerned with philosophy, mysticism, magic,

religion, and metaphysics. They were not particularly concerned with the mundane

physics of physical fitness and physiology Metaphysics and a preoccupation with

the occult prevented almost all Orientalist scholars from trying to understand the

value of the body in terms of what might be called elemental yogic materialism.

(Alter, 2004: 7)8

This is curious as many of the Indian, Chinese Daoist, and Japanese Zen

Buddhist classic texts have very often been rather more concerned with inter-

preting the body/mind as duality (i.e. lacking existence, identity, or meaning asseparate entities, and therefore standing in opposition to mind/body as dualism).9

Due to difficulty in reducing certain alternative understandings of the body, the

rationalist West versus irrational East form of Orientalism tends towards reducing

and fitting knowledge into its own paradigm prior to judging it, or excluding

reference to that which does not fit in easily. Clearly this has a strong bearing on

the scientistic debate concerning Oriental medicine and health practices that we

consider below.

On a more cautionary note, an overzealous use of Orientalism as an explana-

tory device can also create its own problems because, as Alter (2004: 910)acknowledges, it is inaccurate to attribute Western images of Eastern practices

entirely to an Orientalist disposition. For example, Yoga and meditation as

physical cultures are also linked to Indian modernity, and their transformation




11/34

was initiated in India by local actors who aimed at awakening Western spirituality

and also spiritually rejuvenating the Indian people (Strauss, 2005: 7). This

ideological programme is clearly expressed in the foreword of a well-known

modern Yoga text aimed at a cosmopolitan international audience, including

both Westerners and Indian followers of the practice. Devananda states:

Today, more than at any other time in the history of humanity, people in the West

are facing stresses and tensions that are beyond their control. Thousands and thou-

sands are turning to tranquillizers, sleeping pills, alcohol, and so on in a vain

attempt to cope. In 1957 I arrived in America, sent by Master Swami Sivananda. My

Master said: Go, people are waiting. Many souls from the East are reincarnating

now in the West. Go and reawaken the consciousness hidden in their memories and

bring them back to the path of Yoga. (Lidell et al., 1998: Foreword)

Therefore, as Van der Veer (1994, cited in Strauss, 2005: 11) points out,it is important to retain the idea that there was not a one-way imposition of

Orientalist discourse on Asian realities, but rather an intense intellectual

interaction between Orientalists and Indian scholars. Indeed, there has been

a dynamic interaction between Asian and Western representatives of various

religious traditions over the last 150 years (De-Michelis, 2004: 2).10 These

interactions do illustrate that sufficient numbers of cultural exchanges have

taken place both formally and informally for us to suspect that cultural blending

of thought and practice is embedded (to various degrees) in the invented

traditions emerging from modernities in both East and West.

A good illustration of this has been identified for Japan, where the budo-based

arts (e.g. Kyudo, Kendo, Karatedo, and Judo) have been reconstructed throughout

Japanese modernity with a view to reinstating the embodied cultural heritage of the

samurai warrior class as a central pillar of Japanese cultural identity, both internally

for Japanese people and through the exportation of these activities internationally,

in order to reconstruct notions of a national identity (Chan, 2000).11 As Chan

critically observes, the reification of these practices as culturally ancient in both

Eastern and Western contexts requires critical scrutiny, firstly since many such

practices (for example Kendo) were highly specific to certain populations, and

secondly because the movement forms themselves were only intended as culturalcontainers to carry deeper dispositions identified as quintessentially Japanese.12

Likewise, Tan (2004: 186) contends that the incorporation of an alternate Oriental

identity along with its resident stereotypes and mystifications similarly served many

non-Japanese exponents in gaining legitimacy and commercial profit a point we

shall return to later in our analysis.

Therefore, in what In-Suk (2003) refers to as mundialization, there is an

experiential exchange of embodied forms, and as such this arena forms a domain

of simultaneous accommodation and contestation. In many spheres of activity

cross-cultural exchanges continue to draw on Orientalism as one point of referenceand motivation for (re)inventing East/West identities. These insights can perhaps

also help to suggest additional motivations for the widespread migration of

Eastern teachers of many of these movement forms to the West, a migration that




12/34

is all too often assumed to be solely driven by the pursuit of commercial gain.

Orientalism also helps to explain the ethnic tourism that has exploded with

Westerners going on pilgrimage style vacations to visit the birthplaces of the

movement forms in which they have invested so much of themselves.13

Such a reflexive view is perhaps a more useful starting point when consider-ing the Western practices and practitioners of Eastern movement forms more gen-

erally. Moreover, according to Clarke (1997) overcoming our Orientalist views and

seeing their presence in everyday discourses and practices does help us to overcome

another overstated dualism that of the often assumed cultural and philosophical

separation between East and West. Ultimately, he concludes, the deep-rooted

nature of cultural biases in the East-West dialogue make an especially urgent

demand on our capacity for critical self awareness (Clarke, 2000: 14). However,

for some, such recognition renders even the use of the term Eastern semantically

problematic as it suggests a distinctive category, in which other categories (i.e.Western) are set in logical opposition, and this would close down any analysis of

relationships between Eastern and Western physical culture. Therefore, in accord

with Campbell (2007), we would urge a degree of caution regarding such a radical

critique, as for the purposes of analysis the category of Eastern (as in a historically

indigenous movement form operating in relation to a different paradigm), can

largely, until the onset of late modernity, be traced to Eastern roots. Subsequently,

certain key aspects of the dialogue can be further clarified by drawing on a socio-

logical notion of reflexive modernization. It is towards this topic we now turn.

Reflexive Modernization and the (Western) Forcefor Scientific Validation

No period in history has been more penetrated by and more dependent on the nat-

ural sciences than the 20th century. Yet no period, since Galileos recantation, has

been less at ease with it (Hobsbawm, 1994: 522).

This section addresses the issue of emerging relationships between Eastern movement

form practices and Western science. The cultural contours and contrasts of todays

epoch have been debated intensively in contemporary sociological literature (see for

example, Appadurai, 1996; Bauman, 2000; Gellner, 1992; Giddens, 1990, 1991;

Habermas, 1987; Harvey, 1990; Robertson, 1992). While debate continues over the

precise nature of what kind of modernities we are now inhabiting (e.g. multiple, late,

post, reflexive, risk, liquid, hyper etc.) and while further debates are emerging over

the question of whether some of modernitys key consequences (e.g. globalization and

its reflexivity) are in fact as new or as unique to thinking in the late modern epoch as

previously considered (see for example, Inglis and Robertson, 2005; Mazlish, 2005),

most thinkers in this field seem to agree that the radicalization of the reflexivity of sci-

ence is one of the principal drivers having a rapid and profound impact upon all indi-viduals and cultures who directly or indirectly come into contact with it. According

to the structurationist accounts offered by Giddens (1990, 1991), science in late

modernity extends to the core of the self because:




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The reflexivity of modernity actually undermines the certainty of knowledge, even

in the core domains of natural science. Science depends, not on the inductive

accumulation of proofs, but on the methodological principle of doubt. The integral

relation between modernity and radical doubt is an issue which, once exposed to

view, is not only disturbing to philosophers but is existentially troubling to ordinaryindividuals. (Giddens, 1991: 21)

Therefore, scientific reflexivity, driven by and through expert and abstract

systems of the knowledge/technology institutions, serves to irrationalize indige-

nous, local culture and sweep away (disembed) many premodern (and early

modern) or traditional ways of living and engaging with the world. These

include religion, family, working, leisure and health practices, particularly it

would seem those in direct relation to the body (Shilling, 2005).14 In such a cul-

turally unstable and rapidly changing social world, old ways of living rapidly

become redundant, and one of the unintended consequences of this process isthat a condition of existential anxiety or ontological insecurity is heightened for

many individuals caught up by the juggernaut of late modernity because, as

Jones (2003: 181) puts it, our only course of action is to constantly monitor

our circumstances and shape ourselves constantly in relation to these changes.

In other words, the embodied self has become a reflexive project that is an

ongoing process of self-actualization. As Giddens observes:

The body itself has become emancipated the condition for its reflexive restructur-

ing. It has, as it were, a thoroughly permeable outer layer through which the reflex-

ive project of the self and externally formed abstract systems routinely enter Inthe conceptual space between these, we find more and more guide-books and prac-

tical manuals to do with health, diet, appearance, exercise, lovemaking and many

other things. (Giddens, 1991: 218)

One of the more direct consequences of this process of destabilization of

self has been the widespread rise of therapy as an increasingly legitimate social

practice. The arguably related viewpoint of Eastern movement forms as therapy

for life is apparent in our data, as the following comments by Alan,15 Fiona and

Peter16 illustrate:

Ultimately I think meditation is like a medicine, it almost sounds like: medi-tation,

its the medi, you know, and then after a while if we get to the level of medi-tation

and weve all taken it we shouldnt need it because hopefully, the connection is built

so we have the awareness not to react. (Alan)

We can become strong and become aware of our own body, so that we can be like

our own physician, because we can take care of our body and because our mind is

quieter. (Fiona)

I have become aware that if there is disease in the body then its going to come

through to my mind, so I want my mind to be calm so I try to look after my body...

I am going to feel less diseased like that. I am not going to put things inside myself

which are going to... that I know they are going to cause me... like alcohol... theyre

going to cause problems in my mind. (Peter)




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That the idea of therapy has penetrated the discourses of the practitioners

themselves is less surprising when set in their broader Western context. On

Gestalttherapy Clarke (1997: 159) comments: Buddhist meditation practices

of bare attention and mindfulness in particular have provided powerful

models for the development of contemporary psychotherapy. A good exampleof this is provided by recent psychotherapeutic research reports, which suggest

that mindfulness meditation has been used successfully in the treatment of a

number of addictive behaviours like alcohol and drug dependence, binge eating

and smoking (Chandiramani et al., 2000; Marlatt and Ostafin, 2005). Other

reports conclude that mindfulness meditation is shown to reduce anxiety

scores (Kabat-Zinn et al., 1992). Elsewhere, the Cyrenian House, one of the

leading drug rehabilitation centres in Australia that has treated over 1000 addicts,

implements a therapeutic programme for drug addicts that includes Yoga

and meditation. In our view, the quest for scientific validation of these practicesas/for therapy is increasing17 and carries with it a powerful legitimizing discourse

of science in Western culture. A further illustration of this trend in relation to

meditation is provided by Murphy et al.s (1997) exhaustive review of research

into the physical and psychological effects of meditation between 1931 and

1996. In the conclusion to their overview they state:

The results of scientific research on the subject of meditation are accumulating now,

forming a publicly accessible body of empirical data that can serve generations to

come. Unfortunately, however, these data are derived mainly from beginning prac-

titioners of meditation and taken as a whole do not reflect the richness of experi-ence described in traditional contemplative teachings. They are also limited by the

conventional scientific insistence that results are repeatable. Certain important

experiences occur only rarely in meditation, and a science that disregards them loses

important empirical results. For these reasons, contemporary research does not illu-

mine the full range of experience described in the contemplative scriptures and the

oral traditions from which they come. (Murphy et al., 1997)

While we would agree that the quest for scientific validations (using the

Western positivistic paradigm) such as those described above may well be positive

in certain ways, we do agree with Murphy et al.s assertion that the model forvalidation, which is based upon repetition and falsification, does tend to obfuscate

and close down the exploration of certain, possibly unique, and randomly occur-

ring aspects of these practices. In sociological terms, Western science constitutes a

powerful disembedding force that can lead to the Westernized reappropriation of

many Eastern movement forms asprincipally functioning as a therapeutic, onto-

logically stabilizing practice in a late, reflexive modernity.

Moreover, as Ozawa-De-Silva (2002: 32) reminds us, the Eastern notion of

self cultivation was not originally designed as a therapy, but it can be applied in

the context of clinical medicine. Therefore, although often these practices may be

compared to, or used as therapies, in their Eastern interpretation many of these

movement forms are distinctive because they typically focus on self-cultivation

and improvement, rather than the correction of illness, disease or disorderper se.

There is an important difference in Western and Eastern imaginaries here, which




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is often underplayed by Western scientific pragmatism. While Western forms of

therapy are typically designed to restore normative states in individuals (in

relation to cultural expectations of the general population), engagement with

Eastern forms of self-cultivation has tended to be more associated with attempts

to go beyond normal states of being (Ozawa-De-Silva, 2002; Yuasa, 1987).Furthermore, these cultural practices are often informed by Eastern philosophies

that generally treat mind-body unity as an achievement rather than an essential

relation (Kasulis, 1987, cited in Yuasa, 1987: 1). In addition, these movement

forms also provide a well-trodden pedagogical pathway (of cultivation) towards

this achievement. The achievement itself contains the promise of a transformed,

fully embodied (or rather bodily-aware) self, living in harmony (and therefore

health) with ones environment, which, as Yuasa (1987: 27, 223) points out, is

usually seen as a revised ontology, a transformed reality for the practitioner at the

level of bright (surface/intellectual) and dark (deep psychological/physiological)consciousness. For many, particularly those who have felt their own indigenous

religious beliefs undermined, or who have rejected them, the promise of such

ontological security is understandably appealing and perhaps represents an allure

towards providing what Giddens (1990) calls an ontological cocoon, or to

use Bergers (1990) metaphor, a reconstructed sacred canopy with alternative

plausibility structures for individuals. Clarke (2000) appears to concur, when he

comments on the growing popularity of Daoist knowledge and practice:

Daoisms rising profile in the West is evident across a whole spectrum of domains

ranging from the popular to the scholarly, from the spiritual to the philosophical But this new literary fashion, along with the burgeoning interest in Daoist health

techniques, represents a cultural phenomenon that tells us much about our contem-

porary concerns and anxieties, and is undoubtedly an expression of a growing pre-

occupation with self-cultivation and the quest for alternative means of personal and

spiritual fulfilment. (Clarke, 2000: 3)18

The shift from self-cultivation to corrective therapy has been one distinc-

tive feature, and forms a prominent part of what Campbell (2007) refers to as

the New Age movements adoption and inventing of Eastern cultural traditions.

On another level, reflexive modernization has given many leaders, teachers andadvocates of Eastern movement forms the opportunity to validate, and there-

fore attempt to legitimize, their claims to the beneficial/transformative effects of

practice through embracing the opening of their practices to be studied by

Western science. An important distinction is required here. We are not referring

to the actual practice of scientific validation itself, nor indeed the conclusions

of such studies, something we have addressed briefly earlier in this article;

rather, we are referring to the use of scientific studies to support and legitimize

the social practices by those involved in their development in the West (and

East). Some of these uses can be quite sophisticated.

An example is provided by Cohen (1997: 478), who as a Qigong practitioner,

academic and advocate claims: Qigong has also been rigorously tested according

to the standards of Western science, producing measurable, statistically significant

and replicable results. In substantiating this claim Cohen catalogues scientific




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research on the human body, including that into electrical and biochemical systems,

bioluminescence and consciousness, and makes connections between this and

Chinese understandings of Qi. He then reviews a range of scientific research into

Qigong as a health improving practice. Elsewhere, the work of Kabat-Zinn (1996)

is another illustration of a leading practitioner-teacher-researcher who draws onclinical psychology and psychotherapy, in an attempt to demonstrate and scientifi-

cally legitimize the value of his adapted forms of Vipassana meditation (adapted

into mindfulness meditation) for relieving pain in chronic diseases by reducing the

experience of suffering through cognitive reappraisal.

To recapitulate, the sociological point we wish to make here is not whether

or not the research on Qi, Qigong or meditation is accurate and does demon-

strate the healing powers of the art form but rather how this evidence is being

usedby teacher-practitioner advocates to appeal to a potentially international

cosmopolitan audience for whom Western science carries a powerful legitimat-ing force. Moreover, potentially positive in their therapeutic and transformative

impact, these appeals to Western scientific validations can induce at least two

further transformations, as we explore briefly below.

The first of these concerns the transformation of cultural authority. Those

in charge of the movement forms who pursue claims for legitimation through

Westernized science must also risk sacrificing a significant degree of their own

claim to authority, authenticity and mysticism that can be made following such

objective scrutiny. The leadership of so many of these movement forms can

be characterized by what Weber (in Eisenstadt, 1968: 77) has articulated inideal typical terms as either charismatic authority or traditional authority,

summarized from Weber (in Eisenstadt, 1968) and Parkin (1982) respectively

in Table 1.

More specifically, the strategic appeal to Western scientific authority has the

unintended consequence of disembedding these forms of charismatic and tradi-

tional authority and gradually replacing them with a scientifically validated

authority that moves the form of authority much closer to Webers idea of legal-


Table 1 Webers ideal types of authority (and domination)

Ideal Type Definition

Traditional Authority Obey me because this is what people have always done.

Resting on an established belief in the sanctity of immemorial traditions

and the legitimacy of the status of those exercising authority under them.

Charismatic Authority Obey me because I can transform your life.

Resting on devotion to the specific and exceptional sanctity, heroism or

exemplary character of an individual person, and of the normative patterns

or order revealed or ordained by him [sic].

Legal-Rational Authority Obey me because I am your lawfully appointed superior.

Resting on the belief in the legality of patterns of normative rules and the

right of those elevated to authority under such rules to issue commands.



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rational or bureaucratic authority (Brown et al., 2008; Villamn et al., 2004; see

also Turner, 2003). As a consequence, the authority in and of the teachers

themselves can more easily be called into question. Ironically, perhaps even the

movement form itself is also questioned as its practices become scrutinized,

demystified and secularized through the gazes of the Western scientific paradigm.At a qualitative level these points are further illustrated by the experience

of one of the meditators in the study, John,19 who came to realize that the influ-

ence of scientists (as a bureaucratic authority) in the Transcendental Meditation

(TM) organization he originally belonged to was having (for him) a negative

impact on the tradition:

My friend, who told me after I gave up, who is very high up in the organization, it

is now the official policy of the TM organization enlightenment is impossible

And he, in his job in this university there is some very high level scientific bods who

are very, very high in the TM organization ... you know people who Maharishi isopen and available [to], people right at the top of the organization and this is their

official policy I said well that is ridiculous because I have met people who are

enlightened and he said no it is impossible they cant be telling the truth, he said

there are 40 criteria for enlightenment. (John)

Johns comment illustrates our point: the introduction of increasing num-

bers of criteria for enlightenment is driven by Western scientific scepticism, a

paradigmatic mode that is introduced in order to isolate, describe and thus

validate (through repetitive articulation) mystical experience, the consequence

of which is the construction of a schema so complex as to render it improb-able. TM has been characterized as another cult that can have adverse effects

on the people who meditate. It has also been increasingly criticized and often

discredited in the field of science (see Park, 2002). The shift towards a bureau-

cratic form of authority in the TM organization is also illustrated by the

words of Robert Kropinski, a former follower of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi

the leader of TM who quit in 1983 and filed a suit against the organization.20

The issue of the Western scientific impact on Eastern thought (from which

many Eastern movement forms have evolved) has become highly debated in a

number of contexts, including notably the Mind and Life Institute.21

From theperspective we are developing, these debates do reflect some interesting

intended and unintended consequences as well as indicating tensions in the

gradual convergence of the underlying epistemologies of these two grand

intellectual and cultural traditions.

Second, the process of validation through Western science often means (as

an unintended consequence) the application of a paradigm underpinned by

dualistic Cartesian notions of an essential relationship between the mind-body.

This kind of mind-body relationship is widely considered to be a philosophically

Westernized view and its universalization (through naturalization/essentialization),

while strongly championed by mainstream scientific and medical thought, is

strongly contested in contemporary Western sociological thought. A good

example of this is provided by Burkitt (1999) who argues:




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There is no such thing as the mind considered as something complete and contained

within itself: that is, as an entity or essence separate from the (non-mechanical) body

and its spatially and temporally located practices. Rather the mind is an effect of

bodily action in the world and of becoming a person from the recognition of ones

position in a diverse network of social relations. (Burkitt, 1999: 12)In contrast, positivistic Western science tends to define and position the practi-

tioners bodies (and their practices) as objects to be studied, surveyed, analysed,

corrected, and controlled, as if the body were some kind of separate entity that

is merely a mechanistic container for ourselves and which requires systemic

regulation. Of particular interest here are the notions of Eastern spirituality,

alternative holistic mind-body relationships that are subtly overwritten or

ignored to accommodate investigation by Cartesian dominated frameworks used

by such science for processes of validation.

Eastern Movement Forms as Consumer CommodifiedExperience and Lifestyle

The cultural impetus for change created by Orientalism and reflexive modern-

ization also interleaves substantially with the commodification of the Eastern

movement form experience. Giddens (1991) contends that commodity con-

sumer capitalism represents one of the preeminent reflexive institutions in late

modernity, commenting:

The capitalistic market, with its imperatives of continuous expansion, attacks

tradition ... Markets operate without regard for pre-established forms of behaviour,

which for the most part represent obstacles to the creation of unfettered exchange ...

Market governed freedom of individual choice becomes an enveloping framework of

individual self expression. (Giddens, 1991: 197)22

One of the consequences intended or otherwise of the process of

Western scientific validation of the transformative potential of Eastern

movement forms is the adoption of the latter by globalized fitness industries

which have drawn upon these very scientific validations to rationalize and

aesthetically commodify a plethora of Eastern movement forms for the

motive of commercial gain.23

In addition, the power of this commodification process to provide a plurality

of choices for the construction of self-identity is a key sensitivity that foregrounds

the social significance of lifestyle. Accordingly, Chaney (1996: 11) considers that

lifestyles can be seen as functional responses to modernity as a new means of

integration in the anomic worlds of suburbia, and as responses to the seculariza-

tion, and consequent loss of meaning in everyday life.24 However, as Fahlberg and

Fahlberg (1997) note, the perceived requirementto engage in highly prescriptive,routinized and rationalized active or healthy lifestyle practices can become both

sociologically oppressive and psychologically repressive. Individuals who sense

this will often search for something different, as Shilling (2005) describes:




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Yoga, Tai Chi Chuan, and other East Asian exercise (often mixed with elements of

Oriental spirituality such as Zen, Taoism or Tantra) have become increasingly popular

among those disillusioned with rationalized uses of leisure time. (Shilling, 2005: 124)

However, underpinning the seemingly endless varieties of consumer driven

Eastern movement forms there is a readily observable shift in the type of expe-rience being offered, from holistic to commodified experiences. By this, we

mean a shift from an open-ended syllabus, intuitively driven and personally

interpreted learning and teaching, towards criterion-referenced assessment of

small, discrete units of experience paid for prior to exposure. The shift is driven

by the rationalization of leisure via the interpenetration of market commodifi-

cation logics that many of these forms have been subjected to, particularly over

the last two generations of Western practice and expansion. This is ironic, given

how the development of many of these movement forms in the West has been

driven by the New Age movements fascination for holism and holistic practice(Campbell, 2007). Good examples of this shift are modern martial art belt

grading systems and beginners/intermediates/advanced classes in Yoga.25

These forms of commodified experience reach their zenith with the relatively

recent commercial packages now available that claim to be able to teach indi-

viduals to become a black belt in Karate through home training and watching,

learning with a DVD-Rom or book.26 Furthermore, the commodifications of the

martial experience are often combined with strong reinforcements of Orientalist

discourse for the purposes of making the movement form more commercially

appealing. Tan (2004) reminds us that Karatebecame part of a triumvirate of Japanese martial traditions (the others beingJudo and

Aikido) that virtually contributed in no small part toward a growing commercialized

Oriental martial mythology in North America. Investing in an auto-Orientalizing

discourse, these martial traditions of Japan often played up their associations to a

former golden cultural age, by evoking imageries of a glorious and noble but also

mystical past rooted in grand narratives of a valorized and morally infused notion of

Budo, often translated and formulaically repackaged as the Way of the Warrior

(Inoue, 1998) Once more in another interesting turn of cultural reimagination,

karate was represented and remythologized this time as an essentialized expression

of Japans historical legacy and cultural heritage. (Tan, 2004: 185)

It is not just in the martial arts and Yoga where this type of commercially

driven commodification has been recognized as occurring. A specific illustra-

tion is provided by John, who discusses his interpretation of his experiences of

a TM organizations very secretive promotion of the mantra:

Interviewer: Youre not allowed to say what mantra that is?

J: Its a big con yeah youre not supposed to.

I: How come you are not supposed to why?

J: Its to build up mystique in fact if you want the mantra you can

go on the internet and get them.

I: So the reason behind the fact that you cannot tell what the mantra is...

J: Well the reason given is that if you speak it out aloud it weakens the

effect of the meditation.




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I: Ah.

J: Ah! Thats rubbish! The reason is, I have since realized, is that the

TM Organization was very secretive about their mantras because

they wanted to build up a mystique that these are special mantras.

And apparently they are not at all. And also they are supposed toselect a mantra to suit your you as an individual and your partic-

ular lifestyle and your age and your whatever. It turns out that

depending on which teacher-training course the teacher went on

they were given mantras by different criteria. So that the particular

one I my teacher chose them just by age. Thats all it was. And if

you go on the internet and look up for that particular year, and look

down there is my mantra. By my age and so really it was just a

con to try and build up the mystique [that] this is something really,

really special.

John laments this type of commodification of experience as for him the mantrais merely a tool to facilitate practice, as he goes on to qualify:

The theory is that because this sound is meaningless, there is nothing to stimulate

your mind and so gradually your attention will go to deeper levels of consciousness,

and eventually will, what we call, transcend where there will be no thoughts and

no sensational body, and just what they call being. (John)

According to the long-term practitioners we have interviewed, some of the

consumer driven changes are also disembedding the core epistemological frame-

works historically central to many classic Chinese martial arts such as the devel-opment of Chi. Tai Chi instructors Ingrid and Marcelo27 exemplify this in the

following reflections:

I have spoken particularly to some youngsters I spoke to the parents of youngsters

who are learning the Martial Art, and I asked the parents... So do they talk about

Chi do they talk about energy? and they say no. They do not teach the use of

Chi in fact, I spoke to a 16-year-old girl only the other week who came to one

of my classes and a couple of 11-year-old boys who were doing some level of Kung

Fu, and there was no mention at all of Chi, and I said this is just a sacrilege because

that is the prime... its the prime mover in it all! (Ingrid and Marcelo)

In spite of their misgivings about these changes, Ingrid and Marcelo both tailor

their own Tai Chi teaching to what they see as the Western individuals own

project of self. However, they are constantly trying to temper this force for

change with one that promotes some of their own more traditional views on the

value of Tai Chi practice. The following comments indicate this tension:

Marcelo: And if you read Joseph Campbell he talks a lot about individual indi-

vidualized beings in the West whereas in the East they are all collective their cul-

ture is one of collectiveness And they do it all together and its all exactly the

same, all the same position, looks beautiful But of course what are the individu-als feeling? I dont know whereas I think in the West here people are doing it for

themselves to cultivate themselves their own individuality and express themselves

somehow.




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Ingrid: And we teach exactly that, we say we dont teach you in order to go in the

park and look beautiful or to go and do a competition just because we teach you

because we teach you a tool you can use, as you need.

Marcelo: Thats true we turn people away if they say they want a certificate at the

end of this.

If disembedding is pertinent to describe the Western impact on these

invented traditions, then what often becomes re-embedded is consistent with

Shillings (2005) interpretation when he observes:

The form these Eastern exercises take in the West, moreover, often involves a pro-

cess of translation in which they have become higher velocity and/or competitive

activities. For example, we have seen instances of the aerobicization of Tai Chi and

Yoga . (Shilling, 2005: 125)

An example that illustrates the now common use of the Western term aero-bicization as it is borrowed from the fitness industry to define modern Yoga

practice is the phenomenon of yoga asana competitions/olympics that take place

in many world cities today in India, Europe, South and North America.28 A more

overt illustration of commodification is provided by a perusal of the website for the

2006 London Yoga Show programme29 that depicts a variety of Yoga fusions like

yoga rave, yogabeats, Dru yoga dance, yoga ballet, iiyoga, yogawalking, Hi-Ki

yoga, Chi yoga, the Pyramid meditation system, and so on. In response to the com-

modification of the Yoga practice, Richs (2004: 39) report in the British newspaper,

the Independent on Sunday, likened Yoga in the UK to the new pizza. In thearticle Rich captures the popular view that Yoga has become commodified in the

name of adaptation and survival in the commercialized environment of the West,

and as a result Yoga now incorporates components such as African dance moves,

weight training, ballet, and has become a pursuit of many famous celebrities who

are then used to market the activity.30

Notwithstanding the potential benefits people may derive from the above

commodified practices, we do need to be sensitive to what those benefits are,

because we sense that Shilling (2005: 125) is correct to remind us that sug-

gestions that these alternative exercises may herald a new or non-rationalizedform of Western body culture, however, need critical scrutiny. Indeed,

Shillings concerns seem well founded when we consider some of the highly

individualized and instrumentalized translations of these activities that are

clearly intended to appeal to the Western (and modern Eastern) disposition, as

the following illustration depicts graphically:

CorePower Yoga is an intense practice that appeals to everyone from the working

professional to the stay-at-home mom. A secular practice, CorePower Yoga honors

the roots of Yoga without imposing the preconceived spiritual practices of other

programs. Our role is to guide students to make their practice their own and theirintention personal each student is encouraged to embark on their own spiritual

journey. As is often said in class, I am only here to be your guide. You know your

body best, listen to it and follow your intuition. (CorePower Yoga, 2008)




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While we in no way seek to single out this company, its form of organization

(a franchising LLC with its title a registered trademark), and its secular, indi-

vidualized and highly instrumentalized approach, do indicate a powerful shift

towards commodification that is overtly driven by commercial logics. Thus,

while individuals may perceive themselves to be pursuing some form of indi-vidualized pathway of self-cultivation (in the Eastern sense of the term) through

Eastern movement forms, we might remain sensitive as to the way in which the

commodification of these is, as Honneth (2004) contends, socially organized

and, through this, rationalized, instrumentalized and effectively Westernized.

Honneth continues:

The effort of self-realization throughout the course of ones own life begins to be struc-

tured by the cultural goods offered up to individuals by the advertising industry, with

its calculated feeling for the variations of age, class and gender. (Honneth, 2004: 473)

For Honneth (2004) such rationalized forms of lifestyle practices are a

paradox of Western individualization, where the pursuit of self-realization

becomes a pursuit of a synoptically mediated, consumerized illusion of a per-

fect state of Western selfhood. The inevitable failure of attainment of this (ide-

alized) state often leads to symptoms of inner emptiness, of feeling oneself to

be superfluous, and of the absence of purpose (2004: 463). Nevertheless, these

images can be quite alluring, as Martin,31 now a long-term meditator and Yoga

practitioner, confesses about his beginnings with meditation practice:

Yeah maybe I had just seen an image of someone sitting outside meditating Idont know it is really difficult to know and I might have been at that time

there was an advert on TV advertising like a muesli bar or something like that or

like a yoghurt drink and they used the image of someone meditating on a hillside

you know it could have been something like that that made me made me kind

of go with those kind of meditations. (Martin)

If Shilling and Honneth are right, and we find their arguments to be con-

vincing, then we might do well to remain conceptually sensitive to the possibil-

ity of this phenomenon spreading throughout the vast number of increasingly

commodified Eastern movement forms just as it has with other Western leisurepursuits. At the very least it is possible to say that the commercialized repre-

sentations of Eastern movement forms are being promoted as a panacea for

combating the embodied anomic dispositions induced by modern secular exis-

tence (Mellor and Shilling, 1997: 121). Ironically, while Western individuals

may well be seeking an alternative, their demands for secular, individualized

and conveniently packaged experiences drive the transformation of the move-

ment forms in the direction of the very activities and lifestyles they seek to lib-

erate themselves from. Indeed, as Campbell (2007) argues, there

appears to be a paradox lying at the heart of the New Age worldview ... the intrigu-

ing question that this gives rise to is whether the relationship between an episte-

mology that is inescapably individualistic and an ontology that demonstrably denies

individualism should be regarded as a paradox or not. (Campbell, 2007: 356)




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Campbells (2007: 360) solution to this paradox is that the New Age

movement (which he contends carries a deeply structured Eastern worldview)

actually contains the seeds of the final rejection of Western individualism. We

remain a little less certain that the amorphous, but ubiquitous New Age move-

ment is indeed subverting the epistemological individualism of the free-marketWest through Easternization or whether it is actually vice versa, as Dawson

(2006) argues. In our view, the resolution of this tension more often than not

seems to be composed of considerable concession to these powerful commer-

cial logics, which in turn has the effect of disembedding the cultural content of

earlier forms of the practice and introducing yet another invented form of the

tradition in question.

Concluding Comments

The conceptual sensitivities we have been developing here might be brought

together to suggest that for a number of historical reasons the cultural adapt-

ability of many Eastern movement forms has rendered many of these practices

especially susceptible to being invented in ways which align with the powerful

cultural forces of Orientalism, reflexive modernization and commodification. As

these disciplines are attempting to become acculturated in the West, they must

naturally interact with these forces, which are strong in the host culture. From

our data so far it appears that individual and collective responses to these forcestake the form of at least three broad dispositions: preservationist, conservation-

ist, and modernizing. The preservationist disposition, for whatever motive, seeks

to halt the development of these movement forms entirely (in terms of form, con-

tent and purpose), lock them in time, and attempt to close down change of any

part of their ritualized practice. The conservationist disposition is more progres-

sive in that it entertains development of what Chan (2000) refers to as the arte-

factual container (i.e. the physical practices) but attempts to retain some sense of

essence or core principles based on ideas and influences claimed to have been

passed down over generations by the abbot, guru, swami, sensei, or sifu of the

movement form in question. This disposition does appear to be emerging as very

prevalent in the voices of the long-term practitioners and teachers we have spo-

ken with so far and in the documentary data we have also gathered. Finally, and

also very familiar, is the modernizing disposition, which seeks to update any and

all aspects of the cultural practice to fit into the perceived prevailing cultural (sci-

entific and market-led) needs of the moment.

In articulating these dispositions (seen in terms of embodied orientations

towards Eastern movement form practices), we sense they can be seen as com-

plementary to other commentaries on this subject. For example, these disposi-

tions might be added to the analytical framework of immigrant versus convertBuddhism proposed by Baumann (2001) regarding the spread of Buddhism in

the West, as we sense such dispositions might be identified across Baumanns

categories. Similarly, they might be useful to further theorize and explain, for




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example, the embodied dispositions that can be found within the transformative,

adaptive, and modernizing trends that De-Michelis (2004), Strauss (2005) and

Alter (2004) describe in the case of Yoga, which have made the practice into a

transnational, globalized phenomenon. Finally, these dispositions would not be

exclusive to the Western context or its particular influence, but rather part ofthe increasingly mundialized flows of invented cultural traditions that these

Eastern movement forms now typify.

In conclusion, investigating the Western social forces working on Eastern

movement forms is just the first step in grasping a better structurationist under-

standing of this social phenomenon in the West. The next step must explore

practitioners lives in more detail, through a combination of documentary, life

history, and also ethnographic observation, bridging macro-meso-micro levels

(and thus situating the individual in society and the society in the individual).

This approach offers the possibility of better understanding what kinds oftransformational possibilities are being experienced through doing Eastern

movement forms over extended periods of time. We are also obliged by the

empirically driven stimulus of the theory behind Eastern self-cultivation prac-

tices to move to a situation where we begin to include Eastern theory in our

interpretations of practitioners lives (as practitioners become increasingly invested

in these practices, discourses and narratives as well). Remaining sensitive to

emergent interpretations might also help to provide alternative perspectives, not

just for the sociology of the body, as Ozawa-De-Silva (2002) argues, but also

for the sociology of (physical) culture.

Acknowledgements

An early draft of this article was presented at the AIESEP congress in Lisbon,Portugal (2005). We would like to thank the editorial team for their patience andpositive comments in the development of this article. We would also like to thankboth reviewers of this article, whose supportive and insightful comments encouragedus to develop our ideas on this topic.

Notes

1 While we contend that the expansion of Eastern movement forms in the Westhas been a silent revolution in terms of acceptance of the content and philoso-phy in general, it has not always been an uncontroversial journey in terms ofother socio-cultural factors associated with certain groups. There are a numberof movement forms that have been criticized and/or viewed with suspicion,either generally, or due to specific scandals or accusations. One example is Zenmeditation and the sexual scandals that involved teachers like Abbot RichardBaker (Kaza, 2004). Other examples include groups that belong to whatElizabeth De-Michelis (2004: 1879) calls Modern Denominational Yoga.Elsewhere, there is the Bhakti Yoga movement called The Sannyasins AKA




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Osho or Rajneeshism of the guru Bahagwan ShreeRajneesh or Osho, whowas accused of sex abuse, tax evasion and drug addiction among other crimes(Franklin, 1992). Also, the International society of Krishna Consciousness hasbeen accused of corruption, drug sales and child abuse (Muster, 1997). However,

when trying to get a sense of perspective on these kinds of scandals it is alsoworth noting that a number of Western religious movements have also been thesubject of similar forms of scrutiny and accusation.

2 Blooms article in the UKs Times Educational Supplementrefers to the use ofKarate at Key Stage 2 in the National Curriculum of England and Wales,along with a number of other activities, to attempt to foster enhanced self-esteem. A number of other examples of this transition are also illustratedthrough recent BBC News (Education) reports including: Class Starts withTai Chi (BBC News, 2000a); Yoga to Calm Pupil Stress (2000b); SchoolStarts Day Eastern Way (2001); Tai Chi Pupil Power (2002); Tai Chi

Improves Body and Mind (2004). All of these illustrations can be seen to bedrawing on Eastern movement forms for their perceived alternative benefitsto children, including self-esteem, concentration, and combating stress, inspite of the scientific position that there remains considerable uncertaintyabout these assumptions.

3 For example, in relation to Yoga, Pilkington et al.s (2005: 13) review of Yogaresearch and depression suggested that initial indications are of potentiallybeneficial effects of Yoga interventions on depressive disorders. Similarly,Kirkwood et al.s (2005: 884) review of studies of Yoga interventions with anx-iety sufferers concluded with the suggestion that there were encouraging

results, particularly with obsessive compulsive disorders. Additionally, Jayasinghe(2004) provided a positive assessment of the potential contribution of Yoga tocardiac rehabilitation programmes. Elsewhere, Whang et al.s (2004: 493)review of studies that have assessed the health benefits of Tai Chi with olderpeople stated that Tai Chi appears to have physiological and psychosocialbenefits and also appears to be safe and effective in promoting balance control,flexibility, and cardiovascular fitness in older patients with chronic conditions.In a similar vein, Mayers (1999) review of Qigong research and its potentialbenefits for hypertension concludes: The weight of evidence suggests thatpracticing qigong may have a positive effect on hypertension. Whether qigongalone can affect hypertension is not necessarily the most important question.Further research will be required to better assess and understand the effect ofadding qigong into an integrated, multifaceted program that selectivelyincorporates diet, moderate aerobic exercise, relaxation training, and socialand psychological dimensions (Mayer, 1999: 371). In allof these reviews, however,the review authors suggest that methodological discrepancy and inadequacywere key limitations to making more definitive statements about the positivetransformative capacity of these movement forms. This is significant because itrecalls the difficulties encountered when trying to evaluate practices whoseeffectiveness is based upon the epistemological tradition of other cultures.Beyond Tai Chi, research into the martial arts has attracted most attention fortheir supposedly positive psychological and psychotherapeutic effects on prac-titioners (see Cox, 1993; Lantz, 2002; Weiser et al., 1995). In particular, a focusupon these arts abilities to transform aggressive or violent conduct has consis-tently captured the interests of researchers (see for example Fuller, 1988; Lakes




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and Hoyt, 2004; Nosanchuk, 1981; Trulson, 1986; Twemlow and Sacco, 1998;Winkle and Ozmun, 2003; Zivin et al., 2001).

4 Our study is interested in transformation in terms of self, society and theseEastern movement forms themselves as social practice. Given this, the key inter-

est from our sample is evidence of self-change, in terms of everyday practices,modes of interaction, narratives of self and broad discursive shifts in worldviews.Secondly, practitioner insights can tell us a lot about how these activities arethemselves changing. We have taken the view that at least three years of regularparticipation in a form is sufficient to indicate long-term status in some of theseforms. We readily acknowledge that in all of our participants cases more long-term practitioners may exist, with more profound stories of change to tell.However, we are cautious not to fall into the neo-realist trap of thinking that suchstories will enhance the validity of our study methodology given that our purpo

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