Academic Appointment
Assistant Professor, Department of English, University of Mississippi, 2016 – present
Education
University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA
Ph.D. in English, 2016
Certificate in Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies
Certificate in College and University Teaching
Dissertation: Imagining Bharat: Romance, Heroism, and Hindu Nationalism in the Bengali Novel, 1880-1920
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
M.A. in English Language and Literature, 2009
M.A. in South Asian Studies, 2009
Emory University, Atlanta, GA
B.A. in English and Political Science, Summa Cum Laude, Minor in Philosophy, 2004
Publications
Book Manuscript
Imagining Bharat: Colonialism, Nationalism, and the Politics of Form in the Indian Novel, 1880-1920. This monograph examines how the early Indian novel formed a rich and generative space within which Indian authors often linked their qualified acceptance of British colonialism to unique imaginings of the country as a primordial Hindu homeland.
Peer-Reviewed Articles
“The Mughal Past and the Politics of Memorialization in Ahmed Ali's Twilight in Delhi.” The Journal of Commonwealth and Postcolonial Studies. Vol. 7, No. 2 (2019): http://dx.doi.org/10.5744/jcps.2019.1002
“‘A Grand Asiatic Empire’: Swadeshi Transnationalism and the Expanse of Bharat in the Early Indian Anglophone Novel.” Verge: Studies in Global Asias. Vol. 5, No. 1 (2019): http://doi.org/10.5749/vergstudglobasia.5.1.0182
“Nation After World: Rethinking ‘The End of Postcolonial Theory’” in “From Postcolonial to Global Anglophone: South Asia as Test Case,” with Nasia Anam, Gaurav Desai, Roanne Kantor, Akshya Saxena, Ragini Tharoor Srinivasan, and Rebecca Walkowitz. Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies, Vol. 20, No. 3 (2018): https://doi.org/10.1080/1369801X.2018.1452625
Essay
“Deen and Eunice Gupta: Intimate Alignments in the Non-Aligned Era.” TIDES: Magazine of the South Asian American Digital Archive, 2021: https://www.saada.org/tides/article/deen-and-eunice-gupta
Book Review
Rev. of Realism in the Twentieth-Century Indian Novel: Colonial Difference and Literary Form, by Ulka Anjaria. South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, Vol. 37, No. 1 (2014): http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00856401.2014.890163
Conference Panels Convened
Co-organizer, “Rethinking the Historical Novel: Histories, Controversies, Futures.” American Comparative Literature Association Annual Conference, June 2022.
Organizer, “Rethinking the Historical Novel: Histories, Controversies, Futures.” American Comparative Literature Association Annual Conference, March 2020. (cancelled due to COVID)
Co-organizer, “Global Terrorism and the Contemporary South Asian Novel." American Comparative Literature Association Annual Conference, March 2018
Co-chair and Discussant, “India as Bharat: Gendered and Classed Bodies of the Nation." The 45th Annual Conference on South Asia, UW-Madison Center for South Asia, October 2016
Selected Conference Papers, Roundtables, and Presentations
“The Tragedy of the ‘Last’ Hindu King in K.K. Sinha’s Sanjogita, or the Princess of Aryavarta.” Exploring the Intersection of History and Literature. The 49th Annual Conference on South Asia, UW-Madison Center for South Asia, October 2021. (postponed from October 2020)
"Pulping India in Imperial Britain: Sarath Kumar Ghosh's Short Fiction." Image-Text Encounters in South Asian Graphic Narratives Panel, The Annual Convention of the Modern Language Association, January 2019
"Dystopic Disruptions: Ressentiment in Mohsin Hamid's Exit West." Global Terrorism and the Contemporary South Asian Novel Panel, American Comparative Literature Association, March 2018
“Rethinking Confederate Monuments After Charlottesville.” Activism in Academia Conference, The Center for the Humanities, The Graduate Center, City University of New York, February 2018
“Making India Hindu: Imagining Bharat in the Bengali Historical Novel.” History, Fiction, and Historical Fiction Panel, American Comparative Literature Association Annual Conference, July 2017
“‘A Grand Asiatic Empire’: Swadeshi Transnationalism and Ideas of Hindu India in the Early Indian Anglophone Novel.” Yale Modern South Asia Workshop, March 2017
“South Asia in English: From ‘Postcolonial’ to ‘Global Anglophone’” Roundtable. The 45th Annual Conference on South Asia, UW-Madison Center for South Asia, October 2016
“Hindu Heroism in Indian Nights’ Entertainment.” Adventures in Colonial and Postcolonial Literature Panel, The 44th Annual Conference on South Asia, UW-Madison Center for South Asia, October 2015
“Sarath Kumar Ghosh as Scheherazade: Hindu Heroism in Indian Nights’ Entertainment.” Latitudes Graduate Reading Group, Department of English, University of Pennsylvania, April 2015
“Imagining Bharat: Bankim Chattopadhyay’s Challenge to British Historiography in Anandamath.” Beyond Waverley: Writing Historical Fiction in the Periphery During the Long Nineteenth Century Panel, American Comparative Literature Association Annual Conference, March 2015
“The Cosmopolitan Outsider: Richard Wright’s Fraught Internationalism in The Color Curtain.” Intersections: A Conversation between African American and Asian American Studies, University of Pennsylvania, November 2011
“The Realism Debate in Mulk Raj Anand’s Untouchable.” Re-envisioning South Asian Literatures: South Asian Literatures in Comparative and World Literature Panel, American Comparative Literature Association Annual Conference, April 2011
“The Realism Debate in Mulk Raj Anand’s Untouchable.” Directions of Realism Graduate Conference, The Johns Hopkins University Humanities Center, February 2011
“The Controversy Surrounding ‘Leading-Strings’: Shifting Utilitarian Thought regarding British India.” The Center Cannot Hold: The Movement of Ideas Between Imperial Centers and Peripheries Graduate Conference, University of Notre Dame, October 2009
“The Duty to Remember and the Refusal to Forget: Revenge in Partition Literature.” Comparative Literature Intra-student Faculty Forum on Revenge, University of Michigan, March 2008
Selected Fellowships and Awards
University of Mississippi, College of Liberal Arts Summer Research Grant
University of Mississippi, Office of Global Engagement
Awarded an International Collaboration Grant to conduct archival research for Imagining Bharat at the National Library of India and the British Library
University of Pennsylvania, Department of English
William Patrick Day Essay Contest, Fall 2015. Honorable Mention for the essay, “Sarath Kumar Ghosh as Scheherazade: Hindu Heroism in Indian Nights’ Entertainment”
U.S. Department of State, Critical Language Scholarship Program
Awarded a Critical Language Scholarship to study Urdu at the American Institute of Indian Studies in Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh in Summer 2013. Participated in an intensive cultural immersion program focusing on reading, writing, speaking, and oral comprehension skills of Urdu at the advanced level.
University of Pennsylvania, South Asia Center
Awarded a Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) Fellowship for the study of Hindi at the advanced level in AY 2009-2010
University of Michigan, Center for South Asian Studies
Awarded a Summer Research Travel Grant to perform archival research for master’s thesis on Mulk Raj Anand at the University of Regina Archives and Special Collections in Summer 2009
Awarded a FLAS Fellowship for the study of Hindi at the advanced level in AY 2008–2009
Teaching
University of Mississippi
Graduate Seminar: “The Historical Novel Across Space and Time” (Fall 2019, Spring 2023)
Advanced Seminar: “India in English” (Spring 2023)
Advanced Seminar: “The Modern Indian Novel” (Spring 2021)
Advanced Seminar: “Globalization and Migration in Cinema” (Spring 2020, Fall 2020)
Advanced Seminar: “Living Hyphenated: South Asian American Literature and Film” (Spring 2018)
General Education UM Honors College Seminar: “World Literature Since 1650” (Fall 2016, Spring 2018, Fall 2021 [2 sections])
Advanced Seminar: “Writing Empire” (Fall 2017)
General Education Survey: “World Literature Since 1650” (Fall 2017, Spring 2020 [two sections], Spring 2021 [two sections])
Advanced Seminar: “Narrative Across Cultures” (Spring 2017)
Advanced Seminar: “The Novel and Postcolonialism” (Spring 2017)
University of Pennsylvania
Advanced Seminar: “Writing Empire” (Fall 2015)
Critical Writing Seminar: “Postcolonial Writers” (Fall 2011, Spring 2012)
Service
To the Profession
National Endowment for the Humanities, Peer Reviewer for Summer Stipends in Asian Literature and Studies, Fall 2021
University of Mississippi
Ph.D. Committee Member, 2022–present
Ph.D. Committee Member, 2022–present
MA Committee Member, 2022–present
MA Committee Member, 2021–2022
MFA Committee Member, 2020–2022
MFA Committee Member, 2018–2019
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee, 2021–2022, 2022–2023
Undergraduate Studies Committee, 2017–2018, 2019–2022
Long-Term Hiring Committee, Spring 2017
Hiring Committee, Spring 2017
Edith T. Baine Young Scholars and Writers Lecture Series Committee, Fall 2016
University of Pennsylvania
Graduate Mentor, Penn Undergraduate Mentoring Program, 2010–2016
Secretary and Vice President, Graduate English Association, 2011–2013
Co-coordinator, Department of English, Latitudes Graduate Reading Group, 2011–2012
University of Michigan
Co-coordinator, Kitabmandal (South Asia Reading Group), 2007–2009
Member, Center for South Asian Studies Graduate Student Programming Committee, 2007–2009
Other Professional Experience
Paralegal Specialist, U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, Outstanding Scholars Program, Washington, D.C., 2004–2006
Languages
Hindi (intermediate proficiency in reading and writing; advanced proficiency in speaking)
Urdu (intermediate proficiency in reading and writing; advanced proficiency in speaking)
Latin (reading knowledge)
Professional Memberships
American Comparative Literature Association
Modern Language Association
Association for Asian Studies
Society for Novel Studies
South Asian Literary Association
South Asian American Digital Archive (SAADA)
University of Pennsylvania South Asia Center
References available upon request.