Deepa S Reddy
Biographic Data
| ID | 87559 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Deepa S Reddy |
| GIVEN NAMES | Deepa S |
| FAMILY NAME | Reddy |
| SIGNATURE | REDDY D S |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Houston - Clear Lake |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-0297-8630 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 21 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 109 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 21 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2003 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 6 |
Hindutva in Power
This essay is a follow up to three others published in Religion Compass in 2011 which survey research on Hindutva (Hindu nationalism or political hinduism), covering its seminal ideologies and its evolution into multiple modes of practice. I focus now on the period from 2014 to the present, when the BJP under Narendra Modi has been in political office. This essay therefore considers the forms that Hindutva assumes as a means and tool of governanc…
Tamil Nadu’s heritage rice, lost and found
Whither utopia
The universal township called Auroville, a few kilometres from the erstwhile seat of French rule in India, Pondicherry, has been much in the news since 2021. Internal squabbles over ecology and governance have claimed all recent attention, but prior to these upheavals, 2021 was marked by publication of two major books on Auroville: the first, a memoir of growing up through Auroville's early years by journalist Akash Kapur, and the second, a conve…
What is neo- about neo-Hindutva
What are the new characteristics of Hindu nationalism—now in a phase when Hindutva logics are percolating into various local practices, in India and in diaspora, and now that the BJP has assumed electoral office? This short ‘Post Script’ essay uses the cases represented in this special issue on ‘neo-Hindutva’ to think through overarching themes that distinguish present expressions of political Hinduism. I argue that while the vernacularization of…
Caught! The Predicaments of Ethnography in Collaboration
Lines in Water: Religious Boundaries in South Asia, by Eliza F. Kent and Tazim R. Kassam (eds.)
Lines in Water: Religious Boundaries in South Asia, by Eliza F. Kent and Tazim R. Kassam (eds.). Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2013. 412 pp. $49.95. ISBN 978-0-8156-3319-8
Mobile lives: Totems, cell phones, and symbolism in India
Much has been said and written about the role of the mobile phone in modulating social behaviours and cultural dynamics in India. Far less attention has been paid, however, to emerging cultural narratives about the phone which showcase the active, often troublesome and intrusive role the device plays in increasingly technologically inflected lives and landscapes. How are we to understand these new readings of the phone as itself a protagonist in …
Cut-pieces: Celluloid obscenity and popular cinema in Bangladesh
‘Cut-pieces’ are quick, illegal, sexually explicit scenes spliced into Bangladeshi action films, out of view of the Censor Board, but accessible nonetheless to viewing publics who either actively c
Citizens in the commons: Blood and genetics in the making of the civic
This essay is based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted with the Indian community in Houston, as part of a NIH/NHGRI-sponsored ethics study and sample collection initiative entitled 'Indian and Hindu Perspectives on Genetic Variation Research.' Taking a cue from my Indian interlocutors who largely support and readily respond to such initiatives on the grounds that they will undoubtedly serve 'humanity' and the common good, I explore notions of th…
An Indian summer: Corruption, class, and the Lokpal protests
In the summer of 2011, in the wake of some of India’s worst corruption scandals, a civil society group calling itself India Against Corruption was mobilizing unprecedented nation-wide support for the passage of a strong Jan Lokpal (Citizen’s Ombudsman) Bill by the Indian Parliament. The movement was, on its face, unusual: its figurehead, the 75-year-old Gandhian, Anna Hazare, was apparently rallying urban, middle-class professionals and youth in …
The didactic death: Publicity, instruction, and body donation
What value does death acquire when body organs are pledged for transplantation? Deaths may be made public by a stated desire to donate, and a matter of public debate precisely because the desire is denied. This essay explores two case studies from India of attempts to donate organs: one of a condemned prisoner, and the other of a former Marxist chief minister of West Bengal. One of these attempts was idealized and exalted, the other thwarted; bot…
Fascinating Hindutva: Saffron politics and Dalit mobilisation - By Badri Narayan
Hindutva: Formative Assertions
This article is the first of three in a series surveying research on Hindutva (Hindu nationalism or political hinduism), focusing on seminal articulations that set the stage for later debates, and define the directions of later politics. I review accounts of hindutva's ideological origins, from the pre-independence racialist articulations to the humanist emphases of post-independence years, to the strident culturalism of the 1990s. 'Hindutva' is …
Capturing Hindutva: Rhetorics and Strategies
This article is the second of three in a series surveying research on Hindutva (Hindu nationalism or political Hinduism). Here I review prominent rhetorical characterizations and strategies that scholars have used to come to terms with and politically oppose Hindu religious politics, both in India and transnationally. The essay suggests that this literature represents a distinct approach to the study of hindutva that needs to be separated from ot…
Hindutva as Praxis
This article is the third and last in a series of three surveying research on Hindutva (Hindu nationalism or political Hinduism), focusing on praxis: processes by which hindutva is mobilized, operationalized, and made relatable to specific contexts. As hindutva's influences expand to grassroots and diasporic contexts, mediated by discourses of rights, development, and cultures of multiculturalist ethnic assertions, hindutva becomes a mediating di…
Shiv Sena Women: Violence and Communalism in a Bombay Slum by Atreyee Sen
Blended boundaries: Caste, class, and shifting faces of 'Hinduness' in a North Indian city - Kathinka Frøystad
Caught in Collaboration
The Field in Pieces "Lecherous thoughts, marvelous sunset, walk around the island," amazon.comtells us are among the "statistically improbable phrases"-not keywords but the "most distinctive phrases in the text of books" identified by its Search Inside!TM program-by which to tag Malinowski's posthumously published Diary in the Strict Sense of the Term.Indeed, these seemingly unlikely tags are hardly off the mark: throughout the Diary, the lore an…
Good Gifts for the Common Good: Blood and Bioethics in the Market of Genetic Research
This article is based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted with the Indian community in Houston, as part of a NIH-NHGRI-sponsored ethics study and sample collection initiative entitled "Indian and Hindu Perspectives on Genetic Variation Research." At the heart of this research is one central exchange-blood samples donated for genetic research-that draws both the Indian community and a community of researchers into an encounter with bioethics. I co…
The Ethnicity of Caste
The category of "caste" has had a long history both in and out of the Indian subcontinent, one that is frequently intertwined with that of "race." From H. H. Risley's use of late-nineteenth century European race science in anthropometric research, to Max Müeller's articulation of the Aryan theory of race and pan-Africanist expressions of racial solidarity with the lower castes of India, caste has frequently been redefined and politicized by being…
Hindu Nationalism: Origins, Ideologies, and Modern Myths
Hindu Nationalism: Origins, Ideologies, and Modern Myths. Chetan Bhatt .Oxford: Berg,2001. viii. 232 pp., bibliography, index
Good Gifts for the Common Good: Blood and Bioethics in the Market of Genetic Research
This article is based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted with the Indian community in Houston, as part of a NIH-NHGRI-sponsored ethics study and sample collection initiative entitled "Indian and Hindu Perspectives on Genetic Variation Research." At the heart of this research is one central exchange-blood samples donated for genetic research-that draws both the Indian community and a community of researchers into an encounter with bioethics. I co…
The Ethnicity of Caste
The category of "caste" has had a long history both in and out of the Indian subcontinent, one that is frequently intertwined with that of "race." From H. H. Risley's use of late-nineteenth century European race science in anthropometric research, to Max Müeller's articulation of the Aryan theory of race and pan-Africanist expressions of racial solidarity with the lower castes of India, caste has frequently been redefined and politicized by being…
The didactic death: Publicity, instruction, and body donation
What value does death acquire when body organs are pledged for transplantation? Deaths may be made public by a stated desire to donate, and a matter of public debate precisely because the desire is denied. This essay explores two case studies from India of attempts to donate organs: one of a condemned prisoner, and the other of a former Marxist chief minister of West Bengal. One of these attempts was idealized and exalted, the other thwarted; bot…
Hindutva as Praxis
This article is the third and last in a series of three surveying research on Hindutva (Hindu nationalism or political Hinduism), focusing on praxis: processes by which hindutva is mobilized, operationalized, and made relatable to specific contexts. As hindutva's influences expand to grassroots and diasporic contexts, mediated by discourses of rights, development, and cultures of multiculturalist ethnic assertions, hindutva becomes a mediating di…
What is neo- about neo-Hindutva
What are the new characteristics of Hindu nationalism—now in a phase when Hindutva logics are percolating into various local practices, in India and in diaspora, and now that the BJP has assumed electoral office? This short ‘Post Script’ essay uses the cases represented in this special issue on ‘neo-Hindutva’ to think through overarching themes that distinguish present expressions of political Hinduism. I argue that while the vernacularization of…
An Indian summer: Corruption, class, and the Lokpal protests
In the summer of 2011, in the wake of some of India’s worst corruption scandals, a civil society group calling itself India Against Corruption was mobilizing unprecedented nation-wide support for the passage of a strong Jan Lokpal (Citizen’s Ombudsman) Bill by the Indian Parliament. The movement was, on its face, unusual: its figurehead, the 75-year-old Gandhian, Anna Hazare, was apparently rallying urban, middle-class professionals and youth in …
Hindutva: Formative Assertions
This article is the first of three in a series surveying research on Hindutva (Hindu nationalism or political hinduism), focusing on seminal articulations that set the stage for later debates, and define the directions of later politics. I review accounts of hindutva's ideological origins, from the pre-independence racialist articulations to the humanist emphases of post-independence years, to the strident culturalism of the 1990s. 'Hindutva' is …
Cut-pieces: Celluloid obscenity and popular cinema in Bangladesh
‘Cut-pieces’ are quick, illegal, sexually explicit scenes spliced into Bangladeshi action films, out of view of the Censor Board, but accessible nonetheless to viewing publics who either actively c
Caught in Collaboration
The Field in Pieces "Lecherous thoughts, marvelous sunset, walk around the island," amazon.comtells us are among the "statistically improbable phrases"-not keywords but the "most distinctive phrases in the text of books" identified by its Search Inside!TM program-by which to tag Malinowski's posthumously published Diary in the Strict Sense of the Term.Indeed, these seemingly unlikely tags are hardly off the mark: throughout the Diary, the lore an…
Capturing Hindutva: Rhetorics and Strategies
This article is the second of three in a series surveying research on Hindutva (Hindu nationalism or political Hinduism). Here I review prominent rhetorical characterizations and strategies that scholars have used to come to terms with and politically oppose Hindu religious politics, both in India and transnationally. The essay suggests that this literature represents a distinct approach to the study of hindutva that needs to be separated from ot…
Mobile lives: Totems, cell phones, and symbolism in India
Much has been said and written about the role of the mobile phone in modulating social behaviours and cultural dynamics in India. Far less attention has been paid, however, to emerging cultural narratives about the phone which showcase the active, often troublesome and intrusive role the device plays in increasingly technologically inflected lives and landscapes. How are we to understand these new readings of the phone as itself a protagonist in …
Shiv Sena Women: Violence and Communalism in a Bombay Slum by Atreyee Sen
Hindu Nationalism: Origins, Ideologies, and Modern Myths
Hindu Nationalism: Origins, Ideologies, and Modern Myths. Chetan Bhatt .Oxford: Berg,2001. viii. 232 pp., bibliography, index
Hindu Nationalism: Origins, Ideologies, and Modern Myths
Hindu Nationalism: Origins, Ideologies, and Modern Myths. Chetan Bhatt .Oxford: Berg,2001. viii. 232 pp., bibliography, index
The Ethnicity of Caste
The category of "caste" has had a long history both in and out of the Indian subcontinent, one that is frequently intertwined with that of "race." From H. H. Risley's use of late-nineteenth century European race science in anthropometric research, to Max Müeller's articulation of the Aryan theory of race and pan-Africanist expressions of racial solidarity with the lower castes of India, caste has frequently been redefined and politicized by being…
Good Gifts for the Common Good: Blood and Bioethics in the Market of Genetic Research
This article is based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted with the Indian community in Houston, as part of a NIH-NHGRI-sponsored ethics study and sample collection initiative entitled "Indian and Hindu Perspectives on Genetic Variation Research." At the heart of this research is one central exchange-blood samples donated for genetic research-that draws both the Indian community and a community of researchers into an encounter with bioethics. I co…
Caught in Collaboration
The Field in Pieces "Lecherous thoughts, marvelous sunset, walk around the island," amazon.comtells us are among the "statistically improbable phrases"-not keywords but the "most distinctive phrases in the text of books" identified by its Search Inside!TM program-by which to tag Malinowski's posthumously published Diary in the Strict Sense of the Term.Indeed, these seemingly unlikely tags are hardly off the mark: throughout the Diary, the lore an…
Shiv Sena Women: Violence and Communalism in a Bombay Slum by Atreyee Sen
Blended boundaries: Caste, class, and shifting faces of 'Hinduness' in a North Indian city - Kathinka Frøystad
Hindutva: Formative Assertions
This article is the first of three in a series surveying research on Hindutva (Hindu nationalism or political hinduism), focusing on seminal articulations that set the stage for later debates, and define the directions of later politics. I review accounts of hindutva's ideological origins, from the pre-independence racialist articulations to the humanist emphases of post-independence years, to the strident culturalism of the 1990s. 'Hindutva' is …
Capturing Hindutva: Rhetorics and Strategies
This article is the second of three in a series surveying research on Hindutva (Hindu nationalism or political Hinduism). Here I review prominent rhetorical characterizations and strategies that scholars have used to come to terms with and politically oppose Hindu religious politics, both in India and transnationally. The essay suggests that this literature represents a distinct approach to the study of hindutva that needs to be separated from ot…
Hindutva as Praxis
This article is the third and last in a series of three surveying research on Hindutva (Hindu nationalism or political Hinduism), focusing on praxis: processes by which hindutva is mobilized, operationalized, and made relatable to specific contexts. As hindutva's influences expand to grassroots and diasporic contexts, mediated by discourses of rights, development, and cultures of multiculturalist ethnic assertions, hindutva becomes a mediating di…
The didactic death: Publicity, instruction, and body donation
What value does death acquire when body organs are pledged for transplantation? Deaths may be made public by a stated desire to donate, and a matter of public debate precisely because the desire is denied. This essay explores two case studies from India of attempts to donate organs: one of a condemned prisoner, and the other of a former Marxist chief minister of West Bengal. One of these attempts was idealized and exalted, the other thwarted; bot…
Fascinating Hindutva: Saffron politics and Dalit mobilisation - By Badri Narayan
Citizens in the commons: Blood and genetics in the making of the civic
This essay is based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted with the Indian community in Houston, as part of a NIH/NHGRI-sponsored ethics study and sample collection initiative entitled 'Indian and Hindu Perspectives on Genetic Variation Research.' Taking a cue from my Indian interlocutors who largely support and readily respond to such initiatives on the grounds that they will undoubtedly serve 'humanity' and the common good, I explore notions of th…
An Indian summer: Corruption, class, and the Lokpal protests
In the summer of 2011, in the wake of some of India’s worst corruption scandals, a civil society group calling itself India Against Corruption was mobilizing unprecedented nation-wide support for the passage of a strong Jan Lokpal (Citizen’s Ombudsman) Bill by the Indian Parliament. The movement was, on its face, unusual: its figurehead, the 75-year-old Gandhian, Anna Hazare, was apparently rallying urban, middle-class professionals and youth in …
Lines in Water: Religious Boundaries in South Asia, by Eliza F. Kent and Tazim R. Kassam (eds.)
Lines in Water: Religious Boundaries in South Asia, by Eliza F. Kent and Tazim R. Kassam (eds.). Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2013. 412 pp. $49.95. ISBN 978-0-8156-3319-8
Mobile lives: Totems, cell phones, and symbolism in India
Much has been said and written about the role of the mobile phone in modulating social behaviours and cultural dynamics in India. Far less attention has been paid, however, to emerging cultural narratives about the phone which showcase the active, often troublesome and intrusive role the device plays in increasingly technologically inflected lives and landscapes. How are we to understand these new readings of the phone as itself a protagonist in …
Cut-pieces: Celluloid obscenity and popular cinema in Bangladesh
‘Cut-pieces’ are quick, illegal, sexually explicit scenes spliced into Bangladeshi action films, out of view of the Censor Board, but accessible nonetheless to viewing publics who either actively c
Caught! The Predicaments of Ethnography in Collaboration
What is neo- about neo-Hindutva
What are the new characteristics of Hindu nationalism—now in a phase when Hindutva logics are percolating into various local practices, in India and in diaspora, and now that the BJP has assumed electoral office? This short ‘Post Script’ essay uses the cases represented in this special issue on ‘neo-Hindutva’ to think through overarching themes that distinguish present expressions of political Hinduism. I argue that while the vernacularization of…
Whither utopia
The universal township called Auroville, a few kilometres from the erstwhile seat of French rule in India, Pondicherry, has been much in the news since 2021. Internal squabbles over ecology and governance have claimed all recent attention, but prior to these upheavals, 2021 was marked by publication of two major books on Auroville: the first, a memoir of growing up through Auroville's early years by journalist Akash Kapur, and the second, a conve…
Tamil Nadu’s heritage rice, lost and found
Hindutva in Power
This essay is a follow up to three others published in Religion Compass in 2011 which survey research on Hindutva (Hindu nationalism or political hinduism), covering its seminal ideologies and its evolution into multiple modes of practice. I focus now on the period from 2014 to the present, when the BJP under Narendra Modi has been in political office. This essay therefore considers the forms that Hindutva assumes as a means and tool of governanc…
Sociology (17 works) · Law (15 works) · Political science (15 works) · Anthropological Studies and Insights (13 works) · Law (12 works) · Politics (11 works) · Gender Studies (8 works) · Philosophy (8 works) · Indian History and Philosophy (7 works) · Religious studies (7 works)