Join Mukunda as he speaks with Dr. Edward Butler, Caitlin Storm Breaker, Jim Two Snakes,

Join Mukunda and Shahada Hasan of the Brown Pundits, as they speak to Dr. Seema

Join Mukunda as he speaks with Sri Rama Ramanuja Achari, also known as Rami Sivan,

Join Mukunda and Krishna as they speaks to Professor Bibek Debroy. Prof. Debroy is a polymath, polyglot and a man for all seasons. He is currently the Chief Advisor to the Prime Minister of India on the Economic Advisory Council. He is additionally a translator of the Vedas, Puranas, Bhagavad Gita and now the Mahabharata. In this episode, we discuss a host of topics including: 00:01:10 Introduction to Professor Bibek Debroy and his background and how he went from economics to translating...

Join Mukunda as he speaks to Professor Raj Balkaran, Oxford Centre of Hindu Studies. He is a scholar of the Puranas and Narratives and the author of The Goddess and the King in Indian Myth. He is also the host of an amazing podcast called New Books in Indian Religions. In this episode, we discuss a host of topics including: 00:01:10 Introduction to Professor Balkaran and his background, unique journey into Hinduism and academia 00:20:00 The experience of being Hindu and Brown in the West...

Join Mukunda and Krishna as we speak to Professor Archana Venkatesan, Professor of Religious Studies at University of California, Davis. She is an expert and translator of Tamil Bhakti poetry specifically the poetry or pasurams of the Azhwars, a group of saints, poets and mystics from what is now Tamil Nadu from the 6th to 9th centuries of the common era.

Join Mukunda as he speaks to Professor Sthaneshwar Timalsina, Professor of Religious Studies at San Diego State University. He is also a qualified Acharya and has been trained in Sanskrit and Shastras since he was a child. He is an expert on Tantra and Abhinavagupta, a 10th century polymath genius who worked on philosophy, drama, math, music, aesthetics, and other areas. Acharya Sthaneshwar is also Founder of the Vimarsha Foundation, a 501c(3) non-profit that engages in expounding and...

Join Mukunda Raghavan and Krishna Parthasarathy as they speak with Dushyanth Sridhar, a Pauranika scholar,

Join Mukunda as he speaks to Professor Lavanya Vemsani, Professor of Religious Studies and History at Shawnee State University in Ohio. She holds 2 Phd.s, one in History and the other in Religious Studies. She is also the Editor in Chief of the American Journal of Indic Studies. She has written extensively on comparative iconology, history, legends, and ideas between Hindu and Jaina thought, especially related to Krishna and Balarama in Jaina and Hindu thought. In this episode, we discuss a...

Join Mukunda as he speaks to Neha Srivastava, Founder and President of Shaktitva Foundation. Neha and Shaktitva are focused on feminism, feminity, women's issues, advocacy, and Hindu issues. In this episode, we discuss a host of topics including: 0:01:20 Introduction to Neha and her background 0:04:20 Overview of the Sabarimalai Issue 0:12:40 Women and Sabarimalai 0:18:00 Formation of Shaktitva 0:24:45 Discussion on the Nature of Hindu Temples and Government Control 0:32:20 Discussion on...

Join Mukunda as he speaks to Prof. Guru Prakash, Professor of Law at Patna University in Bihar. Prof. Prakash is a Dalit scholar and activist, who writes, studies and speaks on Dalit Issues in India and Hindu society. In this episode, we discuss a host of topics (listed broadly with approximate timestamps): 1 min 20 seconds: Introduction and Background of Professor Guru Prakash 6 min 55 seconds: Civil Rights of African Americans and the comparison with Dalit movement in India 10 min:...

Join Mukunda as he speaks to Indu Viswanathan and Parth Parihar. Both Parth and Indu are Phd. candidates, Indu in Education at Teachers College and Parth in Economics at Princeton. Indu and Parth are involved deeply in engaging with Hindu traditions/ideas with the modern world. In this episode, we discuss far-reaching and diverse topics including what it means to be a Hindu in the West, the colonialism of the mind vs indigenous knowledge, Racism versus Caste, Abrahamic world view vs. Dharma...

Join Mukunda as he speaks to Brahmachari Vrajavihari Sharan, Director for Hindu Life at Georgetown University and Adjunct Professor of Theology and Linguistics. In this episode, we talk about the West Indian Hindu experience, Nimbarkacharya (a philosopher, Vedantin and Guru of the Kumara Sampradaya) and his philosophy, the nature of Radha and Krishna, Varna, Jati and Caste in the ascetic life, Dharma, the experience of Hinduism in the diaspora and other topics. Join us for another dive into...

Join Mukunda as he speaks to Dr. Edward Butler, Phd. Dr. Butler specializes in ancient Greco-Roman philosophy particularly Platonism and Neo-Platonism along with expertise in Polytheistic thought and philosophy. We speak at length about polytheism and monotheism, the theory of Henadology, Proclus, Hindu Thought, and other forms of polytheism and a host of other topics. You can find Dr. Edward Butler at: https://henadology.wordpress.com/ Twitter: @epbutler Purchase his books...

Join Mukunda as he speaks to Father Francis X. Clooney, Professor of Comparative Theology at the Harvard Divinity School. Father Clooney is a scholar of Hinduism specifically Visisthadvaita Vedanta and SriVaishnavism, he is equally a practicing Catholic in the Jesuit Order. In this dialogue, Father Clooney and I discuss Catholicism, Ramanujacharya, Visistadvaita Vedanta, the nature of comparative theology, Bhakti tradition, and other topics.

Join Mukunda as he speaks to Professor Stephen Phillips of the University of Texas at Austin. Professor Phillips is an academic in Philosophy with a wide area of expertise in the Indian/Hindu Philosophical systems particularly Nyaya, Vedanta, and Yoga. In this dialogue, we discuss Prof. Phillips journey into Hindu thought, his experiences living in India, learning Sanskrit, studying Indian Philosophy directly from indigenous experts, the concept of Pramanas, the idea of soul-making, Yoga...

Join Mukunda as he talks to Jodh Singh (Twitter@jungnihang) about Sikhism. We go through a detailed history of 10 Gurus, the socio-political environment in that period, the practices of the Sikhi Dharm and other topics. If you want to learn and understand Sikhism, this is the podcast episode for you.

Join Mukunda as he talks to Gopi Shankar Madurai, Founder of Srishti Madurai and an LGBTQIA Hindu Activist. They discuss biological sex, gender identity, sexual preference, the treatment of LGBTQIA people across history and in Indian traditions, the role of spirituality and Hindu thought in these communities, indigenous movements in opposition to American and European notions of LGBTQIA and a host of other topics. This was a fascinating topic and I learned a lot from Gopi. We have added...

Join Mukunda as he talks to Prof. Nicholas Sutton, Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies. They discuss Prof. Sutton’s journey into Hindu thought and his life of studying Dharma, Philosophy, Bhagavad Gita, Mahabharata and other texts/traditions. They delve into morality and ethics, the idea of Dharma, deontological morality, virtue ethics, diversity in Hindu thought, the conundrum of God in the world vis-a-vis Krishna and numerous other ideas. You can check out Prof. Sutton’s lectures and...

We are launching a new series called Meru Manthan: The Churning of Ideas, where we engage with thinkers, ideas and viewpoints from all traditions and religions. This series focuses on similarities, differences, and points of contention between the Dharma traditions themselves and also in regards to other world traditions. In this inaugural episode, I speak to Rabbi Alan Brill, Professor of Jewish Studies at Seton Hall University and the author of many books including Rabbi on the...

Join Mukunda as he speaks to Shambhav Sharma, the host and creator of the Sham Sharma show. In this atypical Meru podcast, (we focus more on social and political issues), we discuss a myriad of topics including Sham’s life in India, my time in India, free speech, feminism and misogyny in cultures, ideas about the Truth, Muslimphobia, Tulsi Gabbard and Hinduphobia (starts around 58 min 45 second mark), discussion about Pieter Friedman (author of the hit piece on Tulsi), Kashmir, social and...

Join Mukunda as he speaks to Suhag Shukla, Esq., the Executive Director of the Hindu American Foundation (HAF), a non-profit and non-partisan Hindu advocacy group in the United States. In this podcast, we discuss a myriad of topics including growing up as part of the Indian and Hindu diaspora in the US, the issues that Hindus in the US have to deal with, diversity in thought in Hinduism and its traditions, the role that HAF plays in the US, education controversies that arose regarding...

Join Mukunda and Racchit, as we speak to Dr. Prakash Shah, Department of Law at Queen Mary University of London, about the Caste System and its conceptual foundations in the Western world. We discuss the idea of Caste and the Caste System and how much of it was developed through the lens of the West’s engagement with India by imposing their ideas and concepts of what they thought was the social fabric of India was like into their own world views. Even today there is not an intelligible...

Join Racchit and I as we trialogue with Prof. Vamsee Juluri, Professor of Media Studies at the University of San Francisco. We discuss the media on the whole. depiction of Hindus in the media, Hinduphobia, Prof. Juluri’s books and many other topics. Meru Media www.meru.media [email protected] ...

Join Mukunda as he speaks to Razib Khan and Omar Ali of the Brown Pundits.You can check out Meru Media at: [email protected] https://twitter.com/themerumedia https://www.facebook.com/themerumedia https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/meru-media/meru-podcast https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/meru-media/id1393232694 https://podcasts.google.com/?feed=aHR0cHM6Ly9tZXJ1Lm1lZGlhL2ZlZWQvcG9kY2FzdA%3D%3D&hl=en Subscribe to get new weekly content You can check out the Brown...