Advaita Vedanta

===Historiography===
The historiography of Advaita Vedanta is coloured by Orientalist notions,{{sfn|Nicholson|2010|p=24-25}}{{refn|group=note|name=Orientalist|In the Orientalist view, the medieval Muslim period was a time of stagnation and cultural degeneration, in which the original purity of the Upanisadic teachings, systematized by philosophers like Shankara, was lost. In this view, "the genuine achievements of Indian civilization" were recovered during the British colonial rule of India, due to the efforts of western Indologists, who viewed Advaita Vedanta as the authentic philosophy of the Upanishads, and Shankara as its greatest exponent.{{sfn|Nicholson|2010|p=24-25}}<ref group=note>See also Devdutt Pattanaik (August 30, 2020), [https://mumbaimirror.indiatimes.com/others/sunday-read/who-is-a-hindu-what-they-dont-tell-you-about-advaita/articleshow/77829600.cms ''Who is a Hindu? - What they don't tell you about Advaita''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211219134850/https://mumbaimirror.indiatimes.com/others/sunday-read/who-is-a-hindu-what-they-dont-tell-you-about-advaita/articleshow/77829600.cms |date=19 December 2021 }}, Mumbai Mirror.</ref> While this view has been criticised by postcolonial studies and critiques of Orientalism, "in some corners of the academy, the Orientalists' understanding of premodern Indian history has so far escaped thorough reexamination."{{sfn|Nicholson|2010|p=24}}}} while [[Neo-Vedanta|modern formulations of Advaita Vedānta]], which developed as a reaction to western [[Orientalism]] and [[Perennial philosophy|Perennialism]]{{sfn|King|2002|pp=136–138, 141–142}} have "become a dominant force in Indian intellectual thought."{{sfn|King|2002|p=135}} According to Michael S. Allen and Anand Venkatkrishnan, "scholars have yet to provide even a rudimentary, let alone comprehensive account of the history of Advaita Vedānta in the centuries leading up to the colonial period."{{sfn|Allen|Venkatkrishnan|2017}}