Professor
she/her
Jyoti Puri is a feminist sociologist whose research and teaching are enriched by the intersections of sociology, sexuality and queer studies, critical death studies, and postcolonial, decolonial, and anticolonial theories. Her work primarily focuses on the structural and institutional forms of regulation from the perspectives of marginalized subjects. Through her books and numerous essays, she explores how states and nations govern bodies, genders, sexualities, and death; examines the transnational aspects of governance shaped by colonial histories and postcolonial legacies; and strives to decenter Eurocentric theory and perspectives.
Puri’s scholarly contributions include Sexual States: Governance and the Struggle Against the Antisodomy Law in India’s Present, published by Duke University Press in 2016, which received the Distinguished Book Award from the Sociology of Sexualities Section of the American Sociological Association (ASA) in 2018. Her earlier works include Woman, Body, Desire in Post-colonial India (Routledge, 1999) and Encountering Nationalism (Blackwell Publishers, 2004). Additionally, she co-edited a special issue on “Feminist Mournings” with Dr. Kimberly Juanita Brown for Meridians: feminism, race, transnationalism (November 2022). Puri has published numerous articles and book chapters and has co-edited special issues on gender, sexuality, state, and nation for Gender & Society (April 2005) and on sexuality and the state for Rethinking Marxism (October 2012).
Her current research investigates how South Asian migrants, particularly Sikhs and Muslims, manage death in the U.S. and Canada, a project for which she received a Guggenheim Fellowship for 2022-2023. She is also working on a co-edited volume on anticolonial, decolonial, and postcolonial sociologies and a special issue on the sociology of death and mourning.
Puri has served on the editorial collective for the interdisciplinary journal Foucault Studies, as deputy editor for Gender & Society, and is currently on the editorial board for the journal SIGNS. Her involvement with ASA includes past roles such as Chair of the Section on Sex and Gender, and she is currently Chair-Elect for the Global and Transnational Sociology Section.
In recognition of her contributions to the field, Puri has been honored with the prestigious Jessie Bernard Award (ASA) in 2021 and the Simon-Gagnon Lifetime Achievement Award (Sexualities Section, ASA) in 2023.