Ep. 309 How History shapes what we learn | Vinay Lal on Indian Education

Summary

In this episode, historian Vinay Lal challenges our conventional ideas of learning, moving beyond schooling, exams, and rote memorization. He explores how history, politics, memory, and media shape what we learn and why. If you're a student, parent, educator, or simply someone questioning the purpose of education today, this conversation offers a refreshing and thought-provoking lens on how to truly learn, unlearn, and grow.

About the guest

Vinay Lal is a historian, writer, and professor at UCLA, known for his deep and critical explorations of Indian history, culture, and politics. His work spans topics like the politics of knowledge, colonialism, Gandhi, popular culture, and the Indian diaspora. With a sharp eye on how power shapes narratives, Vinay Lal invites us to question what we think we know—and why.

Questions

• What do you mean by learning?

• How does one learn?

• At what point does an event enter into history?

• When did we start compartmentalizing knowledge into disciplines?

• What is the core idea behind each social science discipline, like history, geography, anthropology?

• Is history a slice of time, or is it always a moving window?

• Why do most countries adopt the same tripartite division of history—ancient, medieval, modern?

• Can there be a unified way for an entire nation or civilization to learn?

• Is there a common framework for why we should learn?

• How do politics and history shape what we’re taught?

• Can you give an example of how politics rewrites history and affects learning?

• What happens when historical narratives are actively revised by the state?

• What’s the impact of new media, like Instagram, YouTube, on learning?

• How do we build meaningful learning habits amid distractions and shrinking attention spans?

• Are platforms like podcasts a valuable form of learning?

• Why is rote learning criticized, and is there anything valuable in it?

• What role does memorization play in poetry, culture, and oral traditions?

• What’s lost when we forget to use certain faculties, like memory?

• How does one remain grounded and keep learning in the chaos of modern life?

• What is the ultimate purpose of learning?

People mentioned in the episode

• Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

• Immanuel Kant

• Socrates

• Plato

• Donald Trump

Reference links

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vinay_Lal

2. https://www.international.ucla.edu/apc/person/488

3. https://www.youtube.com/user/dillichalo

4. https://vinaylal.wordpress.com/about/

5. https://sofheyman.org/persons/vinay-lal

6. https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=yEi6QmEAAAAJ&hl=en

7. https://philpeople.org/profiles/vinay-lal

8. https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B001HD18TG?ccs_id=dfca3229-4bfa-483f-b79f-19f072934be7

9. https://culturahistorica.org/vinay-lal/

10. https://indianexpress.com/profile/columnist/vinay-lal/

11. https://openthemagazine.com/author/vinay-lal/

12. https://ucla.academia.edu/VinayLal

You can watch the video of this episode on YouTube

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