According to a Pew survey from 2023, 15% of Americans practice yoga at least a few times a month. While most of these folks do yoga for health-related reasons, a small but not insignificant sliver does so in order to feel connected to their “true self” or with “something bigger than themselves.” This group constitutes 4% of Americans, which is more than 13 million people. In many cases, these are people who, having initially gotten into yoga for a whole host of reasons, find themselves wanting to “go deeper” into their practice. Overwhelmingly white, female, and metaphysically allergic to labels, this loosely-knit community tends to “go deeper” by way of drawing from a seemingly-inexhaustible well of potential texts, practices, and philosophies (much, but not all of which come from South Asia). Despite appearances to the contrary, such cultural borrowing or appropriation is rarely as hodgepodge as it initially seems. Rather, there is a guiding principle that shapes the contours of individual choice: authenticity. That is, spiritual seekers in the yoga world “go deeper” both by adopting “authentic” practices, and by choosing practices that feel personally “authentic.” But what does this mean? Authentic to what? And to whom? In this paper, I explore how the effort of “going deeper”–both its associated practices, and the rhetoric around it–is navigated through a multi-faceted discourse about what counts as “authentic.”
My work here is based on multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork conducted since 2016. For eight years, I have visited yoga festivals, gone on yoga retreats, stayed in an ashram, sung kirtan, become a certified Vedic astrologer, and much more. As such, I situate my research in a particular corner of yoga studies, namely, the subfield that approaches the topic from an ethnographic angle. The ethnographic approach has shown (among many other things) that the global yoga community is filled with people for whom “yoga” includes much more than postural practice. As Amanda Lucia (2020) and Christopher Jain Miller (2024) have both detailed in their recent ethnographies—White Utopias and Embodying Transnational Yoga, respectively—the study of yoga can, and indeed should, address the larger spiritual and religious context in which practitioners live. This is a context of not only postural practice, but also mantra, devotional singing, festival-going, astrology, and murti-puja. Importantly, yoga practitioners who partake in these practices rarely conceive of them as separate from yoga, but rather as part of an assortment of acts that contribute to a life-long effort of spiritual integration.
For yoga practitioners who are not South Asian–or more broadly, for those who have no affiliation with South Asian or Hindu religious traditions–the actual content of “going deeper” is entirely open and unrestricted. Without guru, gotra, sampraday, lineage, etc., seeking can start from scratch. And it is here that the idea of “authenticity” appears in its most slippery state. Such slipperiness relates, I argue, to a similar fluidity in which the idea of “going deeper” is conceptualized. Here, depth has two distinct qualities: the first relates to cultural or historical depth, to “go deeper” by way of connecting to South Asian ways of being; the second relates to personal depth–what is inside, what is behind the mask–to “go deeper” by way of connecting to one’s self. As such, “authenticity” too carries a dual identity. One can find authenticity in a cultural or historical sense; this is authentic to tradition, accessed by reading the right texts, by performing the right rituals in the right way, or by finding an authentic teacher. But one can also find authenticity in a personal sense; this is authentic to each individual, accessed by inner reflection, and by living life in a way that resonates as honest and true to self. In this paper, I will use ethnographic examples to highlight the implications that emerge from this slippery, complex, and potentially-problematic sense of “authenticity.”
Based on multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork, this paper explores American spiritual seekers who, having started doing yoga for any number of reasons, decide to “go deeper” into their practice. This is a context of not only postural practice, but also mantra, devotional singing, festival-going, astrology, and murti-puja, among others. Despite appearances to the contrary, such cultural borrowing or appropriation is rarely as hodgepodge as it initially seems. Rather, there is a guiding principle that shapes the contours of individual choice: authenticity. That is, spiritual seekers in the yoga world “go deeper” both by adopting “authentic” practices, and by choosing practices that feel personally “authentic.” But what does this mean? Authentic to what? And to whom? In this paper, I address how the effort of “going deeper”–both its associated practices, and the rhetoric around it–is navigated through a multi-faceted discourse about what counts as “authentic.”