Testimonials

Dr. Valérie Gillet
I am an Indologist specializing in first-millennium material culture—particularly temples and inscriptions—of South India, with a special focus on Tamil Nadu. I am a permanent member of the École française d’Extrême-Orient and am posted in Paris. I was invited to deliver a paper at the 10th annual SARII/SMU (Southern Methodist University) conference on 10 October 2015…. Read more

Dr. Robert E. Frykenberg
Since 2006, when it was founded, SARII has organized and hosted a series of most interesting and productive conferences and seminars on a range of topics each of which explored a range of important topics related to the cultural and religious history of South Asia that, as the same, were contextually linked to questions of contemporary significance. These day-long events have addressed such issues as religious pluralism in South India and the interplay of various institutions with reference to how cultures and religions of India, as manifest in universities and temples, influence and are influenced by political processes, whether local, national, or international…. Read more

Dr. Gajendran Ayyathurai
I was awarded a PhD in Anthropology from Columbia University, New York, in 2011 for my study of Tamil Buddhism in modern India. My research themes focus on Tamils, particularly those who were ostracized and categorized as untouchables, and their literary and social movements. Over the years through such studies I have found that the oppressed Tamils rejected not only pejorative categories of caste, such as Pariah / Paraiyan / Depressed Classes / Weaker sections, but also claimed such people to be descendants of Tamil Buddhists of ancient times, whose forms of community were neither based on nor organized by caste; but had been historically casteless….Read more

Dr. Amrit Srinivasan
I have known Dr S. Palaniappan, the President ofthe South Asia Research and
Information Institute (SARII) since 2007 and have watched him sustain its activities
over the years, both through personal example and a capacity for identifying important
trends and themes in the global scholarship on the region. The academic and community
network SARII has built up through his efforts goes a long way towards justifying its
ultimate mission ofcreating a permanent structure, where scholars on South Asia can
affiliate themselves, avail ofresearch archives and have more regular conversations
with one another across disciplines…. Read more

Dr. Rupa Viswanath
I am a Professor of Indian Religions at the University of Göttingen’s Center for Modern Indian Studies. I received my PhD with Distinction in 2006 from the Department of Religion at Columbia University in New York. I have since taught at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom, and at the University of Pennsylvania’s South Asia Studies Department. I have secured financial support for my research through a number of competitive fellowships in the United States, including from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Association of University Women, the Social Science Research Council and the American Institute of Indian Studies. Since taking up my current position in Germany in 2011, I have received competitive funding from the Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF) and the Max Weber Foundation… Read more

Dr. N. Ramanathan
Coming from the discipline of Music, I have experienced that generally it is not very easy to get research students to recognise authenticity in data, accomplish a critical analysis and achieve precision in expression. When I participated in a seminar organised by SARII, I had the pleasure and honour of meeting Dr. Palaniappan and since then I have been greatly impressed and inspired by the quality of research perceptible in his articles, for instance, on Pāṇars and on Vaiṣṇava Saint-Poets….Read more

Dr.FrankClooney
I received my PhD in 1984 from the Department of South Asian Languages and Civilizations at the University of Chicago, on the Pūrva Mīmāṃsā of Jaimini in relation to the earliest strata of commentary on the Sūtras attributed to him. Through the decades I have done further study of the Mīmāṃsā tradition, and of the related Vedānta (or Uttara Mīmāṃsā) traditions, most particularly of Śaṅkara and Rāmānuja. In addition, since I began my study of Tamil as a student in SALC, …. Read more

DR.VasudhaNarayanan

I had the privilege of participating in a SARII symposium in 2015 and can honestly say that this institution has carved an exemplary and unique space for itself in the study of Indian history and culture. In these SARII conferences, there is a cordial and mutually beneficial coming together of independent scholars and scholars in academic institutions with the participation of an engaged community that has people in many professions.. Read more