CRF Blog ? Blog Archive ? Science of Yoga

by Bill Hayes

In The Science of Yoga: The Risks and the Rewards, science journalist and life-long yoga practitioner William J. Broad examines the research on yoga.

From the New York Times Book Review:

Yoga?s bid for respectability began with its home country?s campaign for independence from Britain. In 1924, an Indian nationalist named Jagannath G. Gune established a sprawling compound dedicated to the scientific study of yoga. The goal was to give the ancient and often unsavory ritual ?a bright new face that radiated with science and hygiene, health and fitness? ? to present it as an indigenous practice that Indians could point to as proof of both their traditional wisdom and their swift modernization. The rebranding was a spectacular success. Yoga as a means to physical fitness and psychological equilibrium spread quickly around the world, and once it reached the United States in the early years of the 20th century, it changed yet again. Broad uncovers the fascinating fact that many of the practices we associate most closely with yoga, like the flowing series of poses known as the Sun Salutation, have no ancient pedigree, but are instead modern inventions. [more]

Below Broad is interviewed about his book.

Source: http://crfblog.org/?p=9136

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