Romanticizing the Premodern: Positioning Yoga in the Context of Religious Exoticism

Amanda Lucia

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In her recently published book White Utopias: The Religious Exoticism of Transformational Festivals , Amanda Lucia analyzes the spiritual practices adopted in contemporary transformational festivals, like Bhakti Fest, Lightning in a Bottle, Wanderlust, and Burning Man. Noting the popularity of these festivals and their community-building and educational foundations, she argues that they form new institutions for those who identify as “spiritual but not religious” (SBNR). Building on conclusions drawn from her eight years of ethnographic research (2011-2019), Lucia focuses on the practice of yoga, particularly yoga classes, as a key nexus in the dissemination of SBNR values.

In this talk, Lucia unpacks the ways in which the predominantly white yoga practitioners in these festival spaces position yoga (among other non-Western ritual practices) as a potential salve for the crises of Western modernity, including the disenchanted and ungrounded self. In these fields, yoga becomes a tool used to further spiritual growth and an exploration into the non-Western cultures, frequently deemed “exotic.” Her research reveals how these communities privilege the non-Western and the premodern – often eliding the two – and how that develops into multifaceted forms of religious exoticism. She argues that this fundamental impulse toward religious exoticism is one of the primary reasons why contemporary yogis and SBNR adherents in transformational festivals are almost exclusively white – both whiter than their surrounding populations and attracting whites almost exclusively.

Speaker Biography

Amanda Lucia is Associate Professor of Religious Studies at the University of California-Riverside. Her research engages the global exportation, appropriation, and circulation of Hinduism. She is author of White Utopias: The Religious Exoticism of Transformational Festivals (2020), Reflections of Amma: Devotees in a Global Embrace (2014), and numerous articles. She is currently crafting a body of research on sexual abuse in guru-led religious communities.