What is Geo-sophia?

Wisdom goes by many names - in the Indo-European lexicon of Greek and Sanskrit alone: sophia, gnosis, prajna, jnana. In the west those who 'love wisdom' are known as philosophers, but western philosophers have tended to limit their interests to thoughts that derive from ancient Greece and what became known subsequently as "the European classical tradition". Today, "philosophy" generally refers to specific traditions of systematic thought that occurs according to the prescribed parameters of that particular imagined tradition (the Anglo-American and Euro-Continental traditions). Wisdom (sophia), however, occurs wherever human beings have taken the time to reflect upon the conditions of their existence and knows no such geo-political or cultural boundaries. Hence the coining of the neologism " GEOSOPHIA".

This site is devoted to musings reflecting upon this fact - the plurality of expressions of wisdom (I am not an advocate of the perennial philosophy or of bulldozing cultural differences). Not all wisdoms are the same. What they share in common is an attempt to understand humanity, the cosmos and, what two very different thinkers Pierre Hadot and Friedrich Nietzsche might call, "the living of an authentic life". To explore these diverse wisdom traditions however requires that we also reflect upon the occidentalism that has supported hegemonic constructions of "wisdom". Along the way perhaps we might also consider why these particular knowledge-constructions are coming under increasing fire. Some might call this contemporary unravelling of Occidental power, "globalization" (more on that later), others might say that it reflects the fact that we now live in an apparently "postcolonial" era. There are good reasons to be sceptical about both of these claims, as we shall see.