Samskrita Bharati USA is organizing “Samskrita abhiyānam 2012”, a series of 108 Samskrit (Sanskrit) workshops all across the United States and major cities of Canada during September -November. The word “abhiyānam” in Sanskrit denotes a purposeful movement toward a goal -- our goal is to promote Samskrit learning among all.

The list of workshops may be found on the website - www.samskritabharatiusa.org.

WHY LEARN SAMSKRIT

Samskrit is unique in that it is the vehicle of ancient philosophies of the Dharmic traditions (Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh and Jain) even today. Knowledge of Samskrit opens up familiar texts like Bhagavad Gita, Upanishads and Yogasutras of Patanjali in their original form. The great epics Mahabharata and Ramayana are in Samskrit. There are also the wonderful poetry and dramas of Kalidasa, Bhāravi, Māgha, Bānabhaṭṭa and many others.

Various classical dance traditions of India like Bharatanatyam, Mohiniattam, Odissi, Kuchipudi, Kathak etc. all are based on the Samskrit work by Sage Bharata called Nāṭyashāstra. A renewed interest in these dramatic arts is proving very popular in Indian theater today - if packed and overflowing auditoriums are an indication!

INTELLECTUAL TRADITION IN SAMSKRIT

Among the world’s oldest texts, the Vedas and allied knowledge systems called Vedāngas have been transmitted orally and faithfully over several millennia. The method of transmission itself has several remarkable techniques to ensure that transmission remains reliable and free from corruption. Moreover, the knowledge contained in the Vedas span an immense range of spiritual and worldly fields of study such as geometry, information encoding and arithmetic.

The intellectual traditions in Samskrit find noteworthy expression in works like Tantra-sangraha -- a mathematical treatise by Nilakantha which discusses an early calculus, Līlāvatī -- a mathematical work by Bhāskara discussing arithmetic, algebra and geometry, Chandas sutra -- a work on prosody by Pingala who recognized the significance of binary representation and used it to construct mind-blowing patterns, Ashṭādhyāyī -- a work on grammar by Pāṇini. On a bittersweet note, it may be seen that the world would recognize the genius in many of these works hundreds or thousands of years later. For instance, Pāṇini’s grammar from the first millennia BCE has been recognized to be the precursor to Chomsky’s modern formalization of grammar in the 20th century. In recent years, medical researchers, neuroscientists and psychologists have gained new insight into holistic techniques contained in Samskrit texts of medicine, arts and science.

FOUNTAINHEAD FOR OTHER LANGUAGES

Samskrit has a characteristic method of using verb-roots, prefixes and suffixes in etymology. The underlying organization has had a direct impact in the evolution of several Indian languages.  Moreover, Samskrit has provided the vocabulary and structure to languages not only in the Indian subcontinent, but to those in lands beyond such as Thailand and Malaysia.

IS SAMSKRIT DIFFICULT TO LEARN?

Over the past three decades, Samskrita Bharati has continued to refine its direct teaching approach to make the learning process easy and effective. The direct approach derives its strength from a child's natural ability to learn native languages. A child is first exposed to the language(s) spoken by people around it. Through this immersion, he/she becomes familiar with the sounds and words of the language. As familiarity with words and constructions increases, the child begins to utter its first broken sentences. Before long fluent sentences follow naturally. Over time, he/she acquires the ability to read and write. The direct approach to language learning is thus a four-step process: listen-speak-read-write. Samskrita Bharati's teaching methodology is structured around this principle. The effectiveness of this approach hardly needs any mention. Our individual experience in learning our native language is itself a testament.

FUN WHILE LEARNING

Any speaker of an Indian language, ranging from Malayalam to Kashmiri or Gujarati to Assamese, already possesses a good vocabulary of Samskrit.  The teaching method of Samskrita Bharati leverages this latent knowledge to learn the language. Samskrit is introduced through simple conversation and this makes it fun and easy to learn for everyone. At the end of the 2-day workshop, participants are able to understand stories -- and to everyone’s delight, show off their newly learned ability by staging a skit or two!

All people who are interested in Samskrit are encouraged to utilize this opportunity to learn a new language.

ONLINE RESOURCES:

Details of the Samskrita abhiyānam program and other activities of Samskrita Bharati may be found here -  www.samskritabharatiusa.org

For more information or to schedule interviews, please contact us at boston@samskritabharatiusa.org.     

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