Vanita Reddy
  • Associate Professor
Scholars@TAMU

Biography

Vanita Reddy is Associate Professor of English and Core Faculty in Women’s and Gender Studies at Texas A&M. Her research focuses on the intersections of race, gender, and sexuality in diasporic and transnational contexts. Her past and current publications include books, journal articles, and book chapters in the fields of critical fashion and beauty studies; comparative race and diaspora studies; and gender-based violence.

Research Interests

  • Theory
  • Transnational Literatures
  • Race and Ethnicity Studies
  • African American and African Diaspora Literature
  • Contemporary
  • Asian American and Asian Diaspora
  • Gender and Sexuality
  • Multi-Ethnic Literature
  • 20th-Century American

Educational Background

  • Ph.D., University of California-Davis, 2009
  • M.A., University of California-Davis, 2002
  • B.A., Trinity University, 1998

Awards & Honors

  • 2025 – 2028 Arts and Humanities Fellow ($5,000/year for 3 years), Visual Economies of Sexual Violence, TAMU, Division of Research
  • 2024 Glasscock Publication Support Grant ($1,000, with Chaitanya Lakkimsetti, for #MeToo and the Politics of Transnational Feminism: An Anthology )
  • 2024 STRP Grant, Aesthetic Justice: Social Change through Feminist Art, College of Arts and Sciences, TAMU ($10,000, with Chaitanya Lakkimsetti)
  • 2023 English Department One-Time Merit Award
  • 2023 APVA Grant,  Aesthetic Justice: Raising Social Consciousness for Sexual Assault Survivors through Community Art, TAMU ($7,500, with Chaitanya Lakkimsetti
  • 2019-22 Glasscock Three-Year Seminar Grant, “#MeToo and the Transnational Politics of Social Media Feminism” ($3,000/year for 3 years)
  • 2018-21 Arts and Humanities Fellow ($5,000/year for 3 years/extended through 2022 due to COVID restrictions on travel), Global Intimacies, Division of Research
  • 2018-2021 Arts and Humanities Fellow ($5,000/year for 3 years)
  • Glasscock Internal Faculty Fellow (two-course teaching release for Fall 2018)
  • Collaborative Grant, Lead Author, Glasscock Center for the Humanities, Fall 2016, $1,500 (with Chaitanya Lakkimsetti, Sociology, and Jyotsna Vaid, Psychology)
  • Aggie Allies Rainbow Award for Accountability, Climate, and Equity (ACE) (TAMU, Department of Multicultural Services), 2016
  • TAMU ADVANCE Scholar, 2015-2017
  • Postdoctoral Fellowship, Indiana University, Bloomington, Department of Gender Studies, 2013-14
  • Program to Enhance Scholarly and Creative Activities Grant, TAMU Division of Research, 2011-2012 academic year, 2011

Selected Publications


  • Reddy, Vanita.  Fashioning Diaspora:  Beauty, Feminity, and South Asia American Culture. Temple University Press, 2016


    Link to Book 



    Recent Publications

    • Co-editor, Feminist Formations, “#MeToo and the Transnational Gender Justice,” with Chaitanya Lakkimsetti, vol. 33, no. 3, 2021
    • Co-editor, Scholar and Feminist Online, “Afro-Asian Feminist and Queer Formations,” with Anantha Sudhakar. vol. 14, no. 3, 2018.
    • “Fashion Modeling, Risk, and Muslim Chic in Kavita Daswani’s Salaam, Paris” (in production for Fashion and Literature, Cambridge UP, Critical Concepts Series 2026)
    • “Afro-Asian Femme Aesthetics in Anti-Colorism Campaigns” Verge: Studies in Global Asias. Vol. 10, 2021, Issue 1: 25-51.
    • “Beauty, Colorism, and Anti-Colorism in Transnational India.” Beauty Politics, edited by Maxine Craig, Routledge, 2021, pp. 94-102.
    • "Femme Migritude: Shailja Patel’s Afro-Asian Poetics.” the minnesota review, vol. 94, 2020, pp. 67-84.
    • “Beauty, Colorism, and Anti-Colorism in Transnational India.” Beauty Politics, edited by Maxine Craig, Routledge, 2021, pp. 94-102.
    • “Queer South Asian Desire, Blackness, and the Apartheid State.” Queer and Asian 2.0, edited by Kale Fajardo, Alice Hom, and Martin Manalansan, Temple UP, 2021, pp. 112-122.
    • “Family Togetherness, Affect Aliens, and the Ugly Feelings of Being Included.” Feminist and Queer Theory Reader, edited by L. Ayu Saraswati and Barbara Shaw, Oxford UP, 2020, pp. 271-275.

    Other Publications

    • “Femme Migritude: Shailja Patel’s Afro-Asian Poetics,” The Minnesota Review 94 (2020): 67-84.
    • “Feminine Vulnerability and Toxic Masculinity: A Comparative Feminist Analysis of #MeToo,” Rejoinder 4 (Spring 2019) (with Chaitanya Lakkimsetti).
    • “Family Togetherness, Affect Aliens, and the Ugly Feelings of Being Included,” Feminist and Queer Theory Reader, eds. L. Ayu Saraswati and Barbara Shaw. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2019.
    • “Introduction: Feminist and Queer Afro-Asian Formations,” The Scholar and Feminist Online (March 2018), with Anantha Sudhakar
    •  “Affect, Aesthetics, and Afro-Asian Studies,” Journal of Asian American Studies 20.2 (June 2017): 289-294.
    •  “Diasporic Beauty and Fashionability,” Routledge Handbook of the Indian Diaspora, eds. Radha Hedge and Ajaya Sahoo. New York and London: Routledge, 2017: 183-199.  
    • “Afro-Asian Intimacies and the Politics of Cross-Racial Struggle in Mira Nair’s Mississippi Masala. Journal of Asian American Studies.18.3 (Fall 2015): 233-63.
    • “Jhumpa Lahiri’s Feminist Cosmopolitics and the Transnational Beauty Assemblage.” Meridians: feminism, race, transnationalism. 11.2 (Spring 2013): 29-59.
    • “Beauty and the Limits of Belonging in Bharati Mukherjee’s Jasmine,” Contemporary Literature. 54.2 (Summer 2013): 337-68.
    • “Come for the Saris, Stay for the Politics.” Migritude. Shailja Patel. Kaya Press: New York, 2010. 141-47.
    •  “The Nationalization of the Global Indian Woman: Geographies of Beauty in Femina,” Journal of South Asian Popular Culture (Spring 2006): 61-85.

     

    Other Publications (Selected)

    • MeToo and the Politics of Transnational Feminism: An Anthology (NYU Press 2025), with Chaitanya Lakkimsetti: 
    • "MeToo and Transnational Gender Justice," with Chaitanya Lakkimsetti, Special Dossier for Feminist Formations vol 33, no. 3 2021
    • "Feminist and Queer Afro-Asian Formations," with Anantha Sudhakar, a special issue of The Scholar and Feminist Online (2018): https://sfonline.barnard.edu/feminist-and-queer-afro-asian-formations/
    • Fashioning Diaspora: Beauty, Femininity, and South Asian American Culture (Temple UP, 2016)
    • “Afro-Asian Femme Aesthetics in Anti-Colorism Campaigns” Verge: Studies in Global Asias (forthcoming)
    • “Fashion Modeling, Risk, and Muslim Chic in Kavita Daswani’s Salaam, Paris” (forthcoming for Fashion and Literature, Cambridge UP, Critical Concepts Series 2024)
    • “Beauty, Colorism, and Anti-Colorism in Transnational India.” Beauty Politics, edited by Maxine Craig, Routledge, 2021, pp. 94-102.
    • Dossier for Feminist Formations, “#MeToo and the Transnational Gender Justice,” with Chaitanya Lakkimsetti, vol. 33, no. 3, 2021. “Queer South Asian Desire, Blackness, and the Apartheid State.” Queer and Asian 2.0, edited by Kale Fajardo, Alice Hom, and Martin Manalansan, Temple UP, 2021, pp. 112-122.
    • “Family Togetherness, Affect Aliens, and the Ugly Feelings of Being Included,” Feminist and Queer Theory Reader, eds. L. Ayu Saraswati and Barbara Shaw. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2019.
    • Special Issue of Scholar and Feminist Online on “Afro-Asian Feminist and Queer Formations,” with Anantha Sudhakar. vol. 14, no. 3, 2018: https://sfonline.barnard.edu/feminist-and-queer-afro-asian-formations/
    • “Affect, Aesthetics, and Afro-Asian Studies,” Journal of Asian American Studies 20.2 (June 2017): 289-294.
    • “Diasporic Beauty and Fashionability,” Routledge Handbook of the Indian Diaspora, eds. Radha Hedge and Ajaya Sahoo. New York and London: Routledge, 2017: 183-199.
    • “Afro-Asian Intimacies and the Politics of Cross-Racial Struggle in Mira Nair’s Mississippi Masala. Journal of Asian American Studies.18.3 (Fall 2015): 233-63.
    • “Jhumpa Lahiri’s Feminist Cosmopolitics and the Transnational Beauty Assemblage.” Meridians: feminism, race, transnationalism. 11.2 (Spring 2013): 29-59.
    • “Beauty and the Limits of Belonging in Bharati Mukherjee’s Jasmine,” Contemporary Literature. 54.2 (Summer 2013): 337-68.
Scholars@TAMU