Prashad is Director of the International Studies Program at Trinity College. He is on the Board of the Center for Third World Organizing (Oakland), a co-founder of Forum of Indian Leftists (FOIL, at www.proxsa.org), an editor of Amerasia Journal, a monthly columnist for Little India and ZNET, a weekly contributor to www.truthindia.com, and a frequent contributor to Frontline (Chennai), ColorLines (Oakland), and Himal South Asia (Kathmandu).

He is also the author of Untouchable Freedom: A Social History of a Dalit Community (Oxford University Press, in the US May 2000).

About The Karma of Brown Folk

If WEB Du Bois asked black Americans "how does it feel to be a problem?," Vijay Prashad asks South Asians, "how does it feel to be a solution?" In a kaleidoscopic critique, Prashad looks into the complexities faced by the members of a "model minority" -- one, he claims, that is constantly deployed as a weapon in the war against black America. The book traces the impact of American Orientalism, the immigrant history of South Asian Americans, anti-Black racism and, crucially, the fight for social justice.

Robin Kelley (NYU) calls Karma "one of the most stunning, wide-ranging, powerful books I've read in years. Prashad is truly heir to Du Bois." The Village Voice (www.villagevoice.com/issues/0013/hsiao.shtml) says that Karma is 'both a fascinating genealogy of the idea of India in America and a love/hate letter to his fellow desis.'