Wendy Doniger is a professor of the history of religions at the University of Chicago. She is an expert on the mythology of Hinduism and has written about the origins of evil in Hindu mythology.

Brian K. Pennington is an associate professor of religion at Maryville College in Maryville, Tenn. He has written about Hindu-Christian relations and religious violence.

K.R. Sundararajan is a professor of theology at St. Bonaventure University in St. Bonaventure, N.Y. He is the co-editor of Hindu Spirituality II: Post-Classical and Modern.

B.V. VenkataKrishna Sastry is a professor at Hindu University of America in Orlando, Fla., where he teaches courses in Hindu practices and principles and Sanskrit.

Karen Pechilis is chair and a professor of comparative religions at Drew University in Madison, N.J. She edited The Graceful Guru: Hindu Female Gurus in the United States, which covers the American movements behind Ammachi, Anandamayi Ma, Gauri Ma, Gurumayi, Jayashri Ma, Karunamayi Ma, Ma Jaya Sati Bhagavati, Mother Meera, Shree Maa and Sita Devi.

Leslie C. Orr is a professor of religion at Concordia University in Montreal. One of her areas of specialty is Hinduism in the West. She is the author of the book Donors, Devotees and Daughters of God: Temple Women in Medieval Tamilnadu.

June McDaniel is a professor of religious studies at the College of Charleston in Charleston, S.C. She focuses on Hindu women’s religious rituals and mysticism and contributed a chapter about Jayashri Ma to The Graceful Guru: Hindu Female Gurus in India and the United States.

Corinne G. Dempsey is an associate professor of religious studies at Nazareth College and the author of The Goddess Lives in Upstate New York: Breaking Convention and Making Home at a North American Hindu Temple, a profile of a South Indian community in Rush, N.Y.

Loriliai Biernacki is an assistant professor of religious studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Her research interests include Hinduism in the diaspora, and the interface between religion, science, and gender.