George Pati, Ph.D.

Professor of Religious Studies

Contact

ASB 310

(219) 464-6110

Ph.D.

Boston University

About

George Pati, Ph.D., joined Valparaiso University in 2006 after earning a Ph.D. in Religious Studies and South Asian Languages and Cultures from the University Professors Program at Boston University, MA. He is a professor of anthropology of South Asian religions and cultures, Surjit S. Patheja Endowed Chair in World Religions and Ethics, and Department Chair. His commitment to excellence in teaching was recognized with numerous teaching awards, including the Valparaiso University Excellence in Teaching Award in 2016-2017.

His research and teaching interests include the anthropology of South Asian religions and cultures; ethnography; Hindu devotional traditions; religion and the body; popular languages and cultures; ritual and performance; Malayalam and Sanskrit literary traditions; and the history and culture of Kerala. He also teaches Chinese and Japanese religious and cultural traditions, as well as Christianity. His research languages are Malayalam, Sanskrit, Tamil, and Hindi, and he has studied several others.

He is the author of The Routledge Handbook of Religion and the Body (Routledge, 2023, with Yudit K. Greenberg); Transformational Embodiment in Asian Religions: Spatial Bodies, Subtle Bodies (Routledge, 2020, with Katherine C. Zubko); and Religious Devotion and the Poetics of Reform: Love and Liberation in Malayalam Poetry (Routledge, 2019). He has also published several scholarly articles, chapters, and entries. His current book project, Ritualizing Devotion: An Ethnography of Embodiment, Space, and Materiality in Festivals of Kerala, explores the production of sacredness through festivals, spaces, and materials in Kerala. He has also curated an exhibition titled Sacred Spaces and Objects at the Brauer Museum of Art at Valparaiso University, Indiana.

Currently, he is the president of the Association for Asian Studies—Midwest Conference on Asian Affairs, co-chair of the Arts, Literature, and Religion Unit of the American Academy of Religion, and book series editor for the Springer Nature/Palgrave Macmillan series on Arts, Literature, and Religions.

SELECT ARTICLES, CHAPTERS, AND ENTRIES

Performance, Procession, and Place: The Production of Sacredness During the Uthra Śīvēli Festival at Śrī Vallabha Temple, Kerala. The Journal of Hindu Studies. 2025. https://doi.org/10.1093/jhs/hiaf001.

Kaḷarippayaṭṭu. In Knut A. Jacobsen, ed., Brill’s Encyclopedia of Hinduism. Volume 7. Leiden, Netherlands; Boston, MA: E. J. Brill, 2023, pp. 299–305.

“Performing Kṛṣṇa’s Body in Kerala.” In Yudit Greenberg and George Pati, eds., The Routledge Handbook of Religion and the Body. London and New York: Routledge, 2023, pp. 333–344.

Movements, Miracles, and Mysticism: Apotheosis of Sree Narayana Guru of Early Twentieth Century Kerala. In Diana Dimitrova and Tatiana Oranskaia, eds., Divinization in South Asian Traditions. London and New York: Routledge, 2018, pp. 115–130.

Sacred Spaces and Objects: The Visual, Material and Tangible. Valparaiso: Valparaiso University, 2016 (Curated exhibit).

“Feet like Lotus Powder.” In Wendy Doniger, ed., Hinduism: Norton Anthology of World Religion. Vol. 1. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2015, pp. 370–372.

Nambūtiris and Ayyappan Devotees in Kerala. In P. Pratap Kumar, ed., Contemporary Hinduism. London and New York: Routledge, 2014, pp. 204–216.

Narayana Guru. In Knut A. Jacobsen, ed., Brill’s Encyclopedia of Hinduism: Symbolism, Diaspora, Modern Issues. Volume 5. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2013, pp. 559–565.

Temple and Human Bodies: Representing Hinduism. International Journal of Hindu Studies. Vol. 15, No. 2, 2011, pp. 191–207.

“Kaḷari and Kaḷarippayaṭṭu of Kerala, South India: Nexus of the Celestial, the Corporeal, and the Terrestrial.” Contemporary South Asia. Vol. 18, No. 2, 2010, pp. 175–189.

Regional Tradition, Kerala. In Knut A. Jacobsen, ed., Brill’s Encyclopedia of Hinduism: Texts, Rituals, Arts, Concepts. Volume 2. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2010, pp. 606–614.

Mohiniyāṭṭam: An Embodiment of the Aesthetic and the Religious. The Journal of Hindu Studies. Vol. 3, No. 1, 2010, pp. 91–113.

Body as Sacred Space in Kaḷaricikitsā of Kerala, South India. Religions of South Asia.Vol. 3, No. 2, 2009, pp. 235–250.

Kerala. In Knut A. Jacobsen, ed., Brill’s Encyclopedia of Hinduism: Regions, Pilgrimage, and Deities. Volume 1. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2009, pp. 221–231.

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