Lecture: Matylda Ciołkosz

28. Oktober 2022, von AAI Webmaster

Foto: Matylda Ciołkosz

Lecture: "Moving Patañjali: Kinaesthesia and the Interpretation of the Pātañjalayogaśāstra in Modern Postural Yoga"

Dr. Matylda Ciołkosz, Assistant Professor at Jagiellonian University (Poland) 

Friday, October 28, 2022, 4:15 pm 

Venue: Lecture Hall (Hörsaal) H, Edmund-Siemers-Allee 1, Main Building (Hauptgebäude)

Strands od modern postural yoga (MPY) are focused predominantly on the practice of yogic postures. These same strands, however, seek to legitimise their existence by referring to the yoga system of Patañjali, although postural practice has marginal significance in it. While the so-called Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali are viewed as the most authoritative text on yoga, its interpretations shared in MPY milieus are usually very idiosyncratic and far removed from its critical readings. They often seem vague, unsystematic, and somewhat arbitrary, and are usually informed by no or very little knowledge of Sanskrit.
In my talk, I will discuss MPY interpretations of selected categories derived from pātañjalayoga. I will also argue for the coherence and systematicity of these interpretations and suggest what some their sources are. I will show that, although MPY specialists may have had a very superficial knowledge of Patañjali, they were able to reinterpret his system by drawing from their own kinaesthetic experience of yoga practice.

Matylda Ciołkosz is an Assistant professor (Institute for the Study of Religions) at Jagiellonian University: Kraków (Poland). She earned her PhD in  Culture and Religion for research on the meaning-creating role of kinesthetic experience in the practice of modern postural yoga from the same University in 2019.  Her current monograph, Thinking in Āsana, is an exploration of three popular lineages of modern postural yoga - Viniyoga, Iyengar Yoga, and Ashtanga Yoga. The book describes in detail the different styles of yoga practice advocated within the three lineages, and traces the influence of this practice on the corresponding yoga philosophies.