751 research outputs found
Science Studies Yoga: A Review of Physiological Data by James Funderburk, PhD
No full textScience Studies Yoga: A Review of Physiological Data by James Funderburk represents a significant scholarly contribution to the scientific understanding of yoga. The book critically examines yoga not as a spiritual or philosophical system, but as a subject of empirical investigation grounded in modern physiology. Drawing on experimental studies, clinical observations, and laboratory measurements, Funderburk reviews physiological data related to yogic breathing, meditation, relaxation, and physical postures. The work systematically analyzes the effects of yoga on key physiological systems, including respiration, cardiovascular function, metabolism, and neural activity, with particular attention to indicators such as heart rate, blood pressure, oxygen consumption, brain wave patterns, and autonomic nervous system responses. Emphasizing methodological rigor, the author carefully discusses the limitations of existing studies, including small sample sizes and lack of standardization, thereby presenting yoga research as an evolving scientific field. By integrating perspectives from physiology, psychology, and neuroscience, the book bridges Eastern contemplative practices and Western biomedical science and anticipates later developments in mind–body medicine. Overall, the work establishes yoga as a legitimate area of physiological research and provides a foundational reference for scholars and healthcare professionals interested in evidence-based approaches to mind–body practices
Being on the mat: Quasi-sacred spaces, ‘exotic’ other places, and yoga studios in the ‘West’
No full textThe chapter, "Being on the mat: Quasi-sacred spaces, ‘exotic’ other places, and yoga studios in the ‘West’" was written by Lisa Smith (Douglas College Faculty). Book description: This volume considers the phenomenon of yoga travel as an instance of a broader genre of ‘spiritual travel’ involving journeys to places ‘elsewhere’, which are imagined to offer the possibility of profound personal transformation. These imaginings are tied up in a continued exoticization of the East, but they are not limited to that. Contributors identify various themes such as authenticity, suffering, space, material markers, and the idea of the ‘spiritual’, tracing how these ideas manifest in conceptions and fetishizations of ‘elsewhere.’ To deepen its analysis of this phenomenon, the book incorporates a wide range of disciplines including architecture, sociology, anthropology, philosophy, women’s studies, religious studies, and history. While the book’s primary focus is yoga and yoga travel, contributors offer up an array of other case studies. Chapters delve into the complex questions of agency and authenticity that accompany the concept of ‘spiritual travel’ and ideas of ‘elsewhere.’
Chapter abstract: While most Westerners might not be able to provide an in-depth explanation of what exactly it is, yoga is a familiar word, even if it looks significantly different from practices that one might find in India. This chapter draws on a mini ethnography of two yoga studios in Montreal in order to better understand and examine yoga in the ‘West’. The author argues that yoga studios can reveal some of the particularities of self-formation in the West as it relates to the construction of the spiritual and religious subject. Most contemporary yoga studios house all manner of religious and spiritual objects that refer to exotic other places; indeed, it is this connection to ‘other’ places that lends the studio its legitimacy as a sacred space.book chapterPublished.Religious and spiritual objectsEthnography of yoga studiosYoga and self-formation in the 'West
The effect of yoga on interference control in a predictive context: a school-based intervention research proposal.
No full textopenLe funzioni esecutive rivestono un ruolo importante in tutti gli ambiti della vita (scolastico,lavorativo, relazionale, amoroso) e sono fondamentali per una salute mentale e fisica ottimale. In questo elaborato parleremo di Funzioni escutive in termini di controllo cognitivo prendendo come riferimento il modello Teorico dell'autrice Diamond. Questo elaborato si inserisce all'interno di un progetto di ricerca più ampio che consisteva nel sommistrare una batteria di compiti a un campione di 200 bambini tra i 5 e i 7 anni di età nelle scuole pre-post un'intervento yoga di 8 settimane. In particolare questo elaborato esamina il risultati di uno dei task, l'Attentional Network Task, e di come il controllo cognitivo adattivo in particolare il controllo dell'interferenza subisca un miglioramento grazie alle pratiche di Yoga e Mindfulness.Executive functions play an important role in all areas of life (school, work, relationships, love) and are essential for optimal mental and physical health. In this paper we will talk about executive functions in terms of cognitive control taking as reference the theoretical model of the author Diamond.
This paper is part of a larger research project that consisted of administering a battery of tasks to a sample of 200 children between the ages of 5 and 7 in schools pre-post an 8-week yoga intervention. In particular, this paper examines the results of one of the tasks, the Attentional Network Task, and how adaptive cognitive control in particular interference control undergoes improvement through the practices of Yoga and Mindfulness
The Swami Circuit: Mapping the Terrain of Early American Yoga
No full textThis article provides an overview to what the author has termed “early American yoga”: yoga as it was understood in the United States from the late-nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century. Using a combination of primary sources, archival materials, and popular writing from the period, it offers a detailed and data-based understanding of the first half of yoga’s history in the United States by detailing what yoga was, where and how it was taught, and who its teachers and students were during this period. It argues that early American yoga was not physical or postural, but primarily mental and magical. Early American yoga was not centered on books or specific figures, but rather upon an active and widespread network of travelling teachers who gave tiered levels of instruction through public lectures, private classes, and dyadic relation-ships. Teachers of yoga were overwhelmingly of a type— educated, cultured, and professionally savvy— and students were largely female, affluent, and invested in American metaphysical religion. The article concludes with a reappraisal of the historical importance given to the figures of Vivekananda and Yogananda and suggests that their careers and legacies in the United States are best understood within this larger context of early American yoga
Yoga for Musicians: A Practical Guide to Using Common Yoga Techniques for Performing Musicians
No full textabstract: As research on injuries, performance anxiety, and general wellbeing of performing musicians broadens, many institutions and orchestra have begun to integrate health and wellness programs into their curriculums. Music is both a physical and mental discipline and the systemic practice of yoga may aid in developing good habits and body awareness, help musicians maintain proper posture, strengthen commonly injured parts of the body, remove stiffness, and combat performance anxiety.
While the musical world is recognizing the need to implement programs that preserve health and wellbeing, very few performing musicians are actually trained and certified to provide guidance in the area, particularly yoga. This document explores the history of yoga, since the studies used along with the authors experience encompass multiple schools and aspects of the yoga practice.
The author lays out the aspects of a successful performance: mental well-being, physical well-being, and preparedness of music. Studies are explored to provide understanding of the physical and mental challenges musicians frequently face. To aid in preventing and coping with these challenges, physical postures, breathing exercises, and meditation are the tools explored within this document.
The author utilizes scientific studies, research, anatomical knowledge, and yoga teaching experience to lay out the many ways that yoga may benefit musicians. This document concludes by to laying out sequences of postures for the reader. The postures, breath practices, and meditations suggested within these sequences are explained within the documents so that the reader may practice safely and correctly. The intention is that any performing musician is able to participate in the postures and sequences and benefit from the practice of yoga, without any yoga experience. The integration of yoga and performing musicians by qualified professionals could shift a readers experience with performance anxiety or performance injuries.Dissertation/ThesisDoctoral Dissertation Performance 202
Dog Yoga
No full textIncorporating yoga with your pet offers huge benefits for both dog owner and dog!Fall 201
The Effects of Yoga on Cardiovascular Measures
No full textabstract: Objective: The purpose of the present study was to compare cardiovascular responses of two different types of yoga (Vinyasa Flow and Meditative).
Methods: 9 female college students (age 18-24) were assigned to two yoga sessions, Vinyasa Flow and Meditative yoga. Each participant attended one session of each type of yoga, where their cardiovascular responses were measured both pre and post yoga session. Heart rate, Rate of Perceived Exertion (RPE), and blood pressure were all measured.
Results: Meditative yoga showed a significant difference in the acute response of systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, and RPE. Vinyasa Flow yoga showed a significant difference the acute response of systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, and RPE. Heart rate was significantly different when comparing measurements before each yoga session. Systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, heart rate, and RPE were all significantly different when comparing acute measurements after each respective session. Significance was set to p < 0.05.
Conclusions: Overall, the hypothesis was supported that there was a difference in cardiovascular measurements. Meditative yoga was better at significantly decreasing blood pressure acutely, whereas Vinyasa Flow yoga increased blood pressure acutely. This suggests that Meditative yoga could be suggested over Vinyasa Flow yoga for certain individuals with hypertension. Differences between the yoga practices were found and the cardiovascular effects of different yoga practices can be better understood due to this research
A treatise on yoga ...
No full textOn cover: A treatise on yoga; 1000 questions answered in dialogue form.Mode of access: Internet
How Yoga Became “White:” Yoga Mobilities, Race, and the U.S. Settler Nation (1937-2018)
No full textabstract: My Critical Yoga Studies investigation maps from the early 20th century to present day how yoga has become white through U.S. law and cultural productions, and has enhanced white privilege at the expense of Indian and people of color bodies. I position Critical Yoga Studies at the intersection of Yoga Studies, Critical Race Theory, Indigenous Studies, Mobilities Studies, and transnational American Studies. Scholars have linked uneven development and racial displacement (Soja, 1989; Harvey, 2006; Gilmore, 2007). How does racist displacement appear in historic and current contexts of development in yoga? In my dissertation, I use yoga mobilities to explain ongoing movements of Indigenous knowledge and wealth from former colonies, and contemporary “Indian” bodies, into the white, U.S. settler nation-state, economy, culture, and body. The mobilities trope provides rich conceptual ground for yoga study, because commodified yoga anchors in corporal movement, sets billions of dollars of global wealth in motion, shapes culture, and fuels complex legal and nation building maneuvers by the U.S. settler state and post-colonial India. Emerging discussions of commodified yoga typically do not consider race and colonialism. I fill these gaps with critical race and Indigenous Studies investigations of yoga mobilities in contested territories, triangulating data through three research sites: (1) U.S. Copyright law (1937-2015): I chart a 14,000% rise in U.S. yoga copyrights over a century of white hoarding through archival study in Copyright Public Records Reading Room, Library of Congress; (2) U.S. popular culture/music (1941-1967): I analyze twentieth-century popular song to illustrate how racist tropes of the Indian yogi joined yoga’s entry into U.S. popular culture, with material consequences; (3) Kerala, India, branded as India’s wellness tourism destination (2018): I engage participant-observation and interviews with workers in yoga tourism hubs to document patterns of racialized, uneven access to yoga. I find legal regimes facilitate extraction and displacement; cultural productions materially segregate and exclude; and yoga tourism is a node of racist capitalism that privileges white, settler mobility at the expense of Indian people, land, culture.Dissertation/ThesisDoctoral Dissertation Justice Studies 201
Kinesisk yoga? Sinificering af yoga-begrebet i sinologiske, terapeutiske og nyreligiøse sammenhænge
No full textThis article provides a conceptual history (Begriffsgeschichte) of the use of the word yoga in the context of both scientific, therapeutic, and religious approaches to Chinese cultural history, with a focus on somatic practices commonly associated with Daoist traditions. Under the heading Chinese yoga, the author investigates how historical practices such as neidan, daoyin, kaimen, zhanzhuang, gusha, fangzhongshu as well as new therapeutic innovations are referred to as types of yoga such as Taoist yoga, meridian yoga, yin yoga, and sexual yoga. The article traces the origins of variations of the concept of Chinese yoga to the 1920s and 1930s in publications by Richard Wilhelm and C. G. Jung, Cary F. Baynes, and Arthur Waley, follows its reception in the hippie milieu of the 1960s and 1970s, and demonstrates how references to various forms of Chinese yoga have been, and are still being used in both academic research, and therapeutic and new religious milieus
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