Kristin Bloomer, 
Associate Professor of Religion and Coordinator of South Asian Studies, has been awarded a Senior Research Fellowship from the American Institute of Indian Studies (AIIS) and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) for her project “Kula Teyvam: Family Gods and Changing Places in Tamil Nadu.” The 9-month fellowship, granted to “superior Indologists in the humanities,” will allow Prof. Bloomer to conduct research on women in a patrilocal, patrilineal society in South India. In particular, Prof. Bloomer will examine the adaptation of certain Hindu rituals that allow gender-bending possibilities as women and men seek answers to questions about their intimate relations to place and one another: identity, loyalty, family, love, belonging, and home.