Balmurli Natrajan Professor • Community and Social Justice Studies Website Dr. Balmurli Natrajan is Professor of Anthropology in the Department of Community Development and Social Justice at William Paterson University of New Jersey, USA. An anthropologist, marine engineer, and software developer by training, his research and teaching is on Group formation, Identity & Inequalities (caste, race, community, culture, diversity, cognition, variation, and transmission); Globalization and International development (sanitation, domestic work, indebtedness, livelihoods); India and South Asia. Dr. Natrajan's book "Culturalization of Caste in India: Identity and Inequality in a Multicultural Age" (2011) is on the new modes of persistence of caste in India, and his co-edited volume "Against Stigma: Studies in Caste, Race and Justice Since Durban" (2009) is on the global discourse of 'race' and caste. His current work is on sanitation practices and development policy in India. For more information visit his website (see link above). Degrees PhD Anthropology, University of Iowa Iowa City, IA MS Computer Science, Southern Polytechnic State University Marietta, GA MA Anthropology, Iowa State University Ames, IA BE Marine Engineering, Marine Engineering Research Institute (DMET) Kolkata, India Specialization Group formation; Caste, Race; Identity & Inequality; Culture & Transmission; Development; India Representative Publications The culturalization of caste in India: Identity and inequality in a multicultural age; Routledge; 2011 https://www.routledge.com/The-Culturalization-of-Caste-in-India-Identity-and-Inequality-in-a-Multicultural/Natrajan/p/book/9780415857864 Racialization and ethnicization: Hindutva hegemony and caste; Ethnic and Racial Studies; Volume 44, 2021 https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01419870.2021.1951318 ‘Why don’t they use the toilet built for them?’: Explaining toilet use in Chhattisgarh, Central India; Volume Contributions to Indian Sociology, 55(1), 2021 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0069966720972565 Cultural Identity and Beef Festivals: Toward a ‘Multiculturalism Against Caste’; , Contemporary South Asia; Volume 26, 2018 https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/ccsa20/current Against Stigma: Studies in Caste, Race, and Justice Since Durban; Orient BlackSwan; 2009 Representative Presentations Castes Without Casteism? The Real Beef with Caste and ‘Culture’ British Association of South Asian Studies Nottingham, 2017 “Caste as Political Identity: Difference, Hegemony, Solidarity” Rethinking Difference in India: Racialization in Transnational Perspective American University, D.C. Washington D.C, VA 2019 Awards and Honors Fulbright-Hays Group Project Abroad grant Fulbright-Hays 06/01/2006 Media The myth of the Indian Vegetarian Nation http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-43581122 A news article based on my co-authored publication 'Provincializing vegetarianism" An interview podcast on "What is Hindutva" at the Polis Project https://www.thepolisproject.com/billionaires-are-being-produced-at-the-same-time-that-people-are-actually-dying-from-lack-of-food-in-conversation-with-balmurli-natrajan/#.XvUDHWhKg2y In this Podcast, Suchitra Vijayan (polis Project) speaks to Prof. Balmurli Natrajan about the political and cultural history of Hindutva - ultranationalist authoritarian populism in India. Anthropology Course Explores the Life Cycle of, Say, Your Pen https://www.chronicle.com/article/Anthropology-Course-Explores/129572/ The Chronicle did a piece on Dr. Natrajan's course on "Global Transformations and the Human Condition" at William Paterson University of New Jersey in which students do a project about the 'social life of everyday objects' to learn about globalization and development. Fellowships, Grants and Research Senior Fellowship Grant Grant Worlds of Work: Meeting the Challenge of Teaching Asia in the 21st century" for K-12 teachers Grant Notable Courses Taught Global Transformations and the Human Condition (course on long and short history of globalization and making of the 'third world')Culture, Identity, and Cognition (course on formation of identities and sense of belogning, boundary making, and inequalities)Language Matters (course on fundamentals of language as a biocultural human capacity, relation to thought and culture, theories of representation, and socio/racio linguistics)Research Methods (qualitative and quantitative methods esp for community-based research))Foundations of Community Development (key issues in community development such as housing, poverty, health, education, employment, violence, youth, environmental devastation, and state policies and programs) Email 973 720 3869 104 Atrium By appointment