Sondra Hausner is Associate Professor in Study of Religion, University of Oxford; trained in public policy (Princeton 1991) and sociocultural anthropology (Cornell 2002). Sondra joined the CNSUK as a member in 2007. Her research and teaching interests include religion and religious experience, migration, pilgrimage, space, time, embodiment, and gender and sexuality. Doctoral work focused on Hindu ascetic practice and discipline in South Asia; post-doctoral research looked at women’s mobility in Nepal, and the rhetoric of international and national development organizations. She has consulted for the UN, the World Bank, Save the Children, and the Asia Foundation, and she was a co-curator of an exhibition on Art and Culture of Nepal at the Rubin Museum of Art, New York City. Her current research is on Nepali migrant religion in the UK and US. A member of the Faculty of Theology, she is also affiliated with the School of Anthropology, the Centre for Migration, Policy, and Society (COMPAS), and Brown University’s Population Studies and Training Centre.
AB Princeton MA and PhD Cornell,
Religion and religious experience, migration, pilgrimage, space, time, embodiment, and gender and sexuality.
Publications:
Books:
2015 (in press). Religion in Diaspora: Cultures of Citizenship (edited with Jane Garnett). Migration, Diasporas, & Citizenship series, Robin Cohen, series editor. London and New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
2013. Durkheim in Disciplinary Dialogue: A Centenary Celebration of The Elementary Forms of Religious Life. New York & Oxford: Berghahn Books.
2007. Wandering With Sadhus: Ascetics in the Hindu Himalayas. Bloomington: Indiana University Press (also 2011 Delhi: Foundation Books [Cambridge]).
2006. Women’s Renunciation in South Asia: Nuns, Yoginis, Saints, and Singers (edited with Meena Khandelwal and Ann Grodzins Gold). New York: Palgrave Macmillan (also 2007 Delhi: Zubaan Books).
Peer-reviewed articles and book chapters:
2015 (in press). The Performance of Ritual Identity among Gurungs in Europe. Journal of Ritual Studies, special issue editor Geoffrey Samuel.
2014. Belonging and Solitude among Nepali Nurses in Great Britain. In Facing Globalization in the Himalayas: Belonging and the Politics of the Self, Joanna Pfaff-Czarnecka and Gérard Toffin, eds. Delhi: Sage Publications.
2013. The Category of the Yoginī as a Gendered Practitioner. In Yoginī: History, Polysemy, Ritual, Istvan Keul, ed, pp. 32-43. London: Routledge.
2013. On the Way to India: Nepali Rituals of Border Crossing (with Jeevan Raj Sharma). In Borderlands in Northern South Asia, David N. Gellner, ed. Durham: Duke University Press.
2013. Is Individual to Collective as Freud is to Durkheim? In Durkheim in Disciplinary Dialogue: A Centenary Celebration of The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, Sondra L. Hausner, ed. New York & Oxford: Berghahn Books.
2013. Buddhist, Hindu, Kiranti, or Something Else? Nepali Strategies of Religious Belonging in the UK and Belgium (with David N. Gellner and Bal Gopal Shrestha). In Migration and Religion in Europe: Comparative Perspectives on South Asian Experiences, Ester Gallo, ed., pp. 131-153. London: Ashgate.
2013. Multiple versus Unitary Belonging: How Nepalis in Britain deal with ‘Religion’ (with David N. Gellner). In Social Identities between the Sacred and the Secular, Abby Day, ed. London: Ashgate
2012. Category and Practice as Two Aspects of Religion: The Case of Nepalis in Britain (with David N. Gellner). Journal of the American Academy of Religion 80 (4) December: 971-997.
2011. Nepali Nurses in Great Britain: The Paradox of Professional Belonging: Centre on Migration, Policy, and Society (COMPAS) Working Paper WP-11-90.
2007. Pashupatinath at the End of the Hindu State. Studies in Nepali History and Society. 12(1) June (Asar 2064): 119-140
2006. Introduction: Women on Their Own, with Meena Khandelwal. In Women’s Renunciation in South Asia: Nuns, Yoginis, Saints, and Singers, Meena Khandelwal, Sondra L. Hausner, and Ann Grodzins Gold, eds., pp. 1-40. New York: Palgrave Macmillan (also 2007 Delhi: Zubaan Books).
2006. The Erotic Aesthetics of Ecstatic Ascetics. In Holy Madness: Portraits of Tantric Siddhas, pp. 164-177. New York: Rubin Museum of Art and Serindia Publications.
2005. Staying in Place: The Social Actions of Hindu Yoginîs. European Bulletin of Himalayan Research 28(Spring): 54-66.