However, it was not always like this in the yoga discourse of the West. The difference between the modern hyper-specialised scholar and the Orientalist writer around 1900 seems to be that the Orientalist discourse did manage to become a part of cultural elitist public circuits. Their writings were filtered down to a broader elitist yoga discourse. The Orientalists were indeed insiders’.
However, too many contemporary scholars really deserve their own label outsiders’. Not in the understanding of being neutral observers, but instead in the meaning of having lost touch with popular yoga discourses of society. The result is two separate communication circles, each ignoring the other. The modern cultural field of yoga is divided in two: an intellectual field and a popular field. Each of them is structured by different external power fields (the state and the market) and each has it own dynamic, discourses and institutions.
Position yourself onto the bolster, with your right leg in Yoga words front and left leg behind. Bend your right knee out to the side. Stretch your Yoga words left leg straight back, with the kneecap and toes facing down. Support yourself with your forearms in the chair seat. Check that your pelvis is facing straight forward. Pull your left hip forward if necessary to achieve it. Firm your leg muscles. Isometrically abduct your upper thighs away from the midline.
