Editor’s note: Joseph Albertson is spending this summer studying Hindi in Jaipur, India, with a fellowship from the American Institute of Indian Studies. This is his second fellowship from the institute, which funded his studies in Jaipur last summer as well. Albertson is pursuing his master’s degree in religious studies at UNC Charlotte. He earned his bachelor’s degree magna cum laude in religious studies, also from UNC Charlotte.
Why are you interested in India and learning Hindi?
As an undergraduate, I was really drawn towards classes about religion. I was especially drawn toward the aesthetics and the mythology of Indian culture. I first began learning to read in Sanskrit in the Religious Studies Department at UNC Charlotte. I learned about this fellowship from another student and became interested in learning Hindi. The North India culture, that’s what I have been writing about as a graduate student. Hindi was an avenue for me to more deeply explore the themes that I have been studying in the graduate program.
What has learning a new language in a foreign country been like for you?
It’s a very humbling experience to go to India with very little knowledge of Hindi and try to get by because you just feel like you’ve regressed so far in your ability to communicate with people. Learning how to do that lets you gain a different understanding of yourself and who you are and how you fit into the world. Our department and university particularly emphasize that students have to go out into the world and start applying the ideas they study in class.
How had your studies prepared you for last year’s fellowship?
I think what I’ve learned in the Religious Studies Department and in liberal arts more broadly is that we learn to find ways of rendering the strange familiar and the familiar strange. What I mean by that is, I went to India with a whole concept of what it was like. I had spent a lot of time reading about it. I was very drawn to it. But, once I got there, I think I was prepared to find all these ways to complicate my notion of what India really was or what it was supposed to be like. (In liberal arts) we try to give people a more complex view of what they are looking at.
How do you think your fellowship last year changed you?
I know what it’s like to live in two different symbolic systems. In a general way, that’s a good thing to bring back to people. I think I give an avenue for people to think about a different system of living, a different culture. I also bring back ways for people to turn that around and think about themselves and their own situation. It is important to study Indian culture so that we can have a better understanding of what goes on in India and for better relationships with people in India and with people from India. I also think it brings different perspectives of our own lives, of our own cultures, that we can then begin to engage with our own cultures in a more critical way. One thing that has changed about me is that I am more vested in pushing people to go outside their comfort zones to try to achieve their goals even though they may seem unreachable at the time.
