Aryan race

The Aryan race was a racial grouping commonly used in the period of the late 19th century to the mid-20th century to describe peoples of European and Western Asian heritage. It derives from the idea that the original speakers of the Indo-European languages and their descendants up to the present day constitute a distinctive race or subrace of the putative Caucasian race.

While originally meant simply as a neutral ethno-linguistic classification, from the late 19th century onwards the concept of the Aryan race has been used as a form of Scientific racism, a pseudoscience used by proponents of ideologically motivated racism and supremacism such as in doctrines of Nazism and neo-Nazism. Aryanism developed as a racial ideology that claimed that the Aryan race was a master race.

Origin of the term

The term Aryan originates from the Sanskrit word ārya (Devanāgarī: आर्य), in origin an ethnic self-designation, in Classical Sanskrit meaning "honourable, respectable, noble".

In the 18th century, the most ancient known Indo-European languages were those of the ancient Indo-Iranians. The word Aryan was therefore adopted to refer not only to the Indo-Iranian peoples, but also to native Indo-European speakers as a whole, including the Romans, Greeks, and the Germans. It was soon recognised that Balts, Celts, and Slavs also belonged to the same group. It was argued that all of these languages originated from a common root—now known as Proto-Indo-European—spoken by an ancient people who were thought of as ancestors of the European, Iranian, and Indo-Aryan peoples. The ethnic group composed of the Proto-Indo-Europeans and their modern descendants was termed the "Aryans".

Aryan

"Aryan" (/ˈɛəriən, ˈɛərjən, ˈær-/) is a term meaning "noble" which was used as a self-designation by ancient Indo-Iranian people. The word was used by the Indic people of the Vedic period in India to refer to the noble class and geographic location known as Āryāvarta where Indo-Aryan culture was based. The closely related Iranian people used the term as an ethnic label for themselves in the Avesta scriptures, and the word forms the etymological source of the country Iran. It was believed in the 19th century that it was also a self-designation used by all Proto-Indo-Europeans, a theory that has now been abandoned. Scholars point out that, even in ancient times, the idea of being an "Aryan" was religious, cultural and linguistic, not racial.

Drawing on misinterpreted references in the Rig Veda by Western Scholars in the 19th century, the term "Aryan" was adopted as a racial category through the work of Arthur de Gobineau, whose ideology of race was based on an idea of blonde northern European "Aryans" who had migrated across the world and founded all major civilizations, before being degraded through racial mixture with local populations. Through Houston Stewart Chamberlain, Gobineau's ideas later influenced the Nazi racial ideology, which also saw "Aryan peoples" as innately superior to other putative racial groups. The atrocities committed in the name of this racial aryanism caused the term to be abandoned by most academics; and, in present-day academia, the term "Aryan" has been replaced in most cases by the terms "Indo-Iranian" and "Indo-European", and "Aryan" is now mostly limited to its appearance in the term of the "Indo-Aryan languages".

Aryan (disambiguation)

Aryan is a term expressing various ethno-linguistic or racial concepts.

In meaning

Aryan: Unbreakable

Aryan: Unbreakable (Hindi: आर्यन, translation: Noble) is a 2006 India action-drama film written and directed by Abhishek Kapoor and produced by Poonam Khubani and Vipin Anand. It tells the story of Aryan (Sohail Khan) who has to choose between his career and his family. The film was declared an above average grosser at the box office

Movie synopsis

Aryan (Sohail Khan) is the college champion in boxing. He is training under Ranveer Singh (Puneet Issar) with his friend Ranjeet (Inder Kumar) in order to achieve his dream: winning the national championship. His girlfriend Neha (Sneha Ullal) supports him unconditionally and he relies heavily upon her. However, after his life turns unexpectedly into another direction, he gives up boxing and marries instead. He becomes a father and takes up a job as a sports commentator. Despite this, he is not happy.

When Ranveer Singh offers him a chance to get back into the ring, Aryan accepts. However, his wife leaves him away.

Cast