Yoga in Britain - Stretching Spirituality and Educating Yogis - Suzanne Newcombe

Yoga in Britain - Stretching Spirituality and Educating Yogis - Suzanne Newcombe

The Self-Taught Yogis, Adult Education and the Wheel of Yoga

Yoga in Britain - Stretching Spirituality and Educating Yogis - Suzanne Newcombe

Suzanne Newcombe [+-]
Open University and Inform, King's College London
Suzanne Newcombe is a senior lecturer in religious studies at the Open University and honorary director of the charity Inform, based in theology and religious studies at King’s College London. From 2015 to 2020, she was part of the European Research Council– funded project “Ayuryog: Entangled Histories of Yoga, Ayurveda and Alchemy” in South Asia, which examined the histories of yoga, Ayurveda, and rasaśāstra (Indian alchemy and iatrochemistry) from the tenth century to the present, focusing on the disciplines’ health, rejuvenation, and longevity practices. She is the coeditor of The Routledge Handbook of Yoga and Meditation Studies (Routledge, 2021) and the author of Yoga in Britain: Stretching Spirituality and Educating Yogis (Equinox Publishing Ltd., 2019).

Description

This chapter focuses further on the nature of autodidactic traditions of yoga in the early twentieth century including the role of physical culture journals such as Health & Strength, as well as the postal courses on Yogism offered by Desmond Dune from his ‘World Headquarters’ in Surrey. It goes on to consider the world of adult education in Britain and how the founder of the British Wheel of yoga, Wilfred Clark was a product of this tradition. Wilfred Clark went on to establish a network of self-educated yoga teachers prepared to popularize yoga in adult education venues across the country. Clark and early Wheel members argued that yoga should be taught primarily in philosophy departments, and should consist of philosophical lectures, breathing exercises, postures, meditation and relaxation. The yoga enthusiasts and practitioners of this environment formed distinctive (if often idiosyncratic) assumptions about the nature and purpose of yoga.

Notify A Colleague

Citation

Newcombe, Suzanne. The Self-Taught Yogis, Adult Education and the Wheel of Yoga. Yoga in Britain - Stretching Spirituality and Educating Yogis. Equinox eBooks Publishing, United Kingdom. p. 40-74 Jun 2019. ISBN 9781781796603. https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/view-chapter/?id=33787. Date accessed: 22 Mar 2025 doi: 10.1558/equinox.33787. Jun 2019

Dublin Core Metadata