Eve Eats the Apple Again: An exploration of Fear of the East through SAADA

Digital archives are spaces where knowledge dissemination is democratized. Put simply, digital archives ‘are collections of numerical data, texts, images, maps, videos, and audio files that are available through the Internet’ (Bollick 122). Digital archives are mostly free and accessible to everyone on the internet. They act as carefully curated collections of artefacts that are united by at least one common theme. Digital archives make open to the public, knowledge that was previously hard to access, or at the risk of being forgotten. 

The South Asian America Digital Archive (SAADA) is an identity based cultural archive started by Michelle Caswell and Samip Mallick of the University of Chicago. It is a non-profit movement that collects South Asian diasporic experiences in North America. After the USA opened its borders to the non-European world in 1965, it saw an influx of a large number of immigrants from various South Asian nations arriving there to pursue their American Dream. SAADA records stories of immigration, experiences with anti-immigration riots, political involvement, labour, student and religious organizations, queer experiences, and art in all its forms. It collects not only stories of triumph, but also stories of struggle, neglect and discrimination. SAADA has no physical location; it digitizes data and returns it to its owners. It functions as a repository for immigrant experiences in the US and does so in line with postcolonial and globalization theory. 

A common experience of migration is that of discrimination. Discrimination happens on the basis of skin colour, language, cultural habits, and religion, to name a few. This essay explores the theme of discrimination based on religious beliefs, through an article from the November 1911 issue of Current Literature, titled The Heathen Invasion of America. This article which was published in the US, provides the West’s perspective to the inclusion of a multiplicity of religions to their society. In a time when we see an increased resistance against immigrants, all over the world, it seems fit to revisit some early examples of this discrimination. The article by an unnamed author is a cautionary piece against the infiltration of Eastern religions- Islam, Hinduism, Zoroastrianism and Buddhism- in America, especially through the World Congress of Religions, Chicago (1893). This essay discusses the points put forth by the anonymous writer in context of Swami Vivekananda’s phenomenal speech at the aforementioned Congress. 

Edward Said, in his Orientalism, argues that the West construes the East as an exotic, irrational, mysterious, inferior mass, by which it is able to place itself at a higher position of power. The Heathen Invasion of America is a representation of this tendency of the West. The essay opens with the writer mentioning how American missionaries ‘are travelling to the ends of the earth to make converts to Christianity’ (Heathen 538), while ‘insidious “heathen” propaganda’ (Heathen 538) infiltrates the American spiritual borders, specifically through its women. The writer goes as far as to quote Mabel Potter Daggett’s writing in the Hampton-Columbian Magazine, where she says ‘Eve is eating the apple again’ (Heathen 538). The essay names many spiritual leaders such as Swami Vivekananda, Swami Abhedananda, Baba Bharti, and Abdul Baha, and calls them ‘Oriental propagandists’. They also mention institutions such as the Vedanta Society, the Buddhist temples in Seattle and the Zoroastrian temples of Chicago, Lowell and Massachusetts, and see them as visible manifestations of the propaganda. The essay goes as far as to cite stories of various American women who had been apparently infected by the propaganda, and had begun to part with their wealth to fund the propagandist activities. Through the stories, and the references to practices of the spiritual leaders, and to their speeches, the article provides a glimpse into the anti-immigrant sentiments present in the US at the time. Additionally, it also embodies Said’s observation in Orientalism, that the West tends to imagine the East as barbaric and therefore, inferior to themselves. It is from this position of power that the writer describes the ‘artistic’ ways in which ‘paganism [is] presented to persuade a Christian audience’- actions that lead to ‘domestic infelicity and insanity and death’ (Heathen 540).

If one looks at the speeches given by one of the ‘propagandists’- Swami Vivekananda- at the World Congress of Religions, one will find that he speaks against this same fanaticism and prejudiced approach to other religions and followers of other faiths. In his response to the welcome address, he says. ‘I fervently hope that the bell that tolled this morning in honour of this convention may be the death-knell of all fanaticism’ (Vivekananda). In another speech titled Why We Disagree, he thanks America for its attempt to ‘break down the barriers of this little world’ (Vivekananda). One will notice that there is a stark contrast between the perspectives of Vivekananda and the unnamed writer. For the writer, Vivekananda and the others are ‘heathens’ who are silently but boldly invading their space. For Vivekananda, the opportunity of speaking in America is a step towards tolerance, a revolt against discrimination happening on the basis of religion, inside and outside his own country. 

Thus, The Heathen Invasion of America  becomes a representation of the fear, mistrust and contempt felt by the West towards the East. The inclusion of this in SAADA implies that this ideology would have been used as grounds for Americans to think differently of those belonging to other cultures and faiths. In a time when the world finds innovative ways to form factions and groups, it is pertinent to critically analyse the tools that further this attitude. 

References

Bolick, Cheryl Mason. “Digital Archives: Democratizing the Doing of History.” International Journal of Social Education, vol. 21, 2006, pp. 122–34. 

Caswell, ML. “Inventing New Archival Imaginaries: Theoretical Foundations for Identity-Based Community Archives.” Identity PaIimpsests: Archiving Ethnicity in the U.S. and Canada, 2013, pp. 35–52, https://escholarship.org/uc/item/8gv0v69b.

Said, Edward W. Orientalism. Vintage Books, 1979.

Vivekananda, Swami. “Swami Vivekananda’s Speeches at the World’s Parliament of Religions, Chicago, 1893.” Belur Math - Ramakrishna Math and Ramakrishna Mission, 13 Sept. 2025, belurmath.org/swami-vivekananda-speeches-at-the-parliament-of-religions-chicago-1893/.  

Vivekananda, Swami. “Why We Disagree?” Ramakrishna Vivekananda, www.ramakrishnavivekananda.info/anecdotesweb/42.html. Accessed 8 Dec. 2025. 

“‘The Heathen Invasion of America’ (1911).” Current Literature, Nov. 1911, South Asian American Digital Archive, pp. 538–40.