I am a Professor in the South Asia Program, the Comparative Religion Program, and the International Studies Program at the University of Washington’s Jackson School of International Studies, where I hold a College of Arts and Sciences Endowed Professorship. I also serve as the Associate Director of the Jackson School and the Director of the Center for Global Studies.

I teach and write about religion, history, and culture in South Asia, as well as theoretical issues in the study of religion in general and its intersection with historiography. I work with Marathi and Hindi materials, including textual, ethnographic, and visual/filmic sources. I work across time periods, from the contemporary to the medieval.  My fields of publication include performance studies, film studies, religious studies, history, and contemporary politics. I specialize in the study of Maharashtra from the second millennium CE to the present, ranging from the medieval period, through the colonial and modern periods, to the postcolonial era. 

My books include: Religion and Public Memory (Columbia University Press, 2008);  Amar Akbar Anthony: Bollywood, Brotherhood, and the Nation (with Andy Rotman and William Elison, Harvard University Press, 2016); and The Quotidian Revolution: Vernacularization, Religion, and the Premodern Public Sphere in India (Columbia University Press, 2016).

The “Preface” and “Introduction” of The Quotidian Revolution is available for download here.

I am also writing a book with Professor Sunila S. Kale on Yoga as a Political Idea to be published by Columbia University Press. You can read a few pieces we’ve written on the Wire.