Contrary to the expectations of prominent twentieth century sociologists who predicted that religion would gradually disappear in the foreseeable future, it persists to be a significant component in personal and social life of an overwhelming majority of people (84%) in the world in the twenty-first century. Yet, religious life has taken some unexpected turns in all parts of the world in recent history. A few of these turns, such as its links to identity politics and communal violence, have received tremendous media and scholarly attention. The changes that have imperceptibly filtered into everyday experience of religion in the context of globalization, especially through media and business however, remain little examined. Looking at commercials for three spiritual healers/miracle workers on Indian TV channels in the United States during 2004-2009, this talk will explore the changing dynamics of religion, media, and business in a contemporary diaspora context.  


Neelima Shukla-Bhatt is an Associate Professor and Director of South Asia Studies at Wellesley College, Wellesley, MA, USA. She studies religion in South Asia with a focus on devotional literature of medieval north India with a focus on its performative aspects as platforms for community building. The other areas of her research and publications cover goddess traditions in Gujarat, women poets of medieval India, South Asian models of religious pluralism, Gandhi’s thought, and South Asian religions in the context of globalization, especially as they traverse popular media. She is the author of Narasinha Mehta of Gujarat: A Legacy of Bhakti in Songs and Stories (New York: Oxford, 2015) and co-author (with Surendra Bhana) of A Fire that Blazed in the Ocean: Gandhi and the Poems of Satyagraha in South Africa, 1909-1911 (Delhi: Promilla, 2011). Her forthcoming book – Hinduism, the Basics – will be published by Routledge, UK. She has worked for over fifteen years for the award-winning Pluralism Project directed by Diana Eck, first as a researcher and then as a faculty consultant.