Gary Tubb, professor in South Asian Languages and Civilizations, has been appointed faculty director of the new University of Chicago Center in Delhi.
With preparations underway to open the Center in March 2014, Provost Thomas F. Rosenbaum appointed Tubb to a three-year term. Tubb served on the faculty committee that originally recommended the University create a center in India.
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“Gary’s knowledge and long experience in collaborating with scholars and institutions throughout South Asia will enable us to establish the Center in Delhi as a model for international scholarly endeavors,” Rosenbaum wrote in announcing the appointment. “He will work with the faculty steering committee and the University community to develop and oversee the implementation of a broad and ambitious Center agenda, and at the same time, foster strong partnerships with Indian and regional colleagues and engage area alumni.”
Tubb has served as the chair of South Asian Languages and Civilizations as well as its director of Graduate Studies, and as the chair of the Indian Ministry of Culture Vivekananda Visiting Professor search committee.
He earned a PhD in Sanskrit and Indian Studies from Harvard University (1979) and previously taught at Harvard University, where he was chair of Sanskrit and Indian Studies and editor of the Harvard Oriental Series. He also was taught at Brown University, Vassar College and Columbia University before joining the University of Chicago faculty in 2007.
“The Center in Delhi will enable us to expand opportunities for UChicago scholars to partner with academics, institutions, and cultural organizations in India and throughout the region,” said Tubb. “With support from the Center, we believe these partnerships will spark important research collaborations, and generate new knowledge, for the benefit of present and future generations.”
A leading Sanskrit scholar, Tubb examines the tradition’s poetics, grammatical forms and commentarial traditions and draws insights across the culture’s philosophy, religion and literature. Speaking Sanskrit, German, Hindi and Urdu and familiar with Marathi, French, Latin, Spanish and Prakrit, Tubb is the author of Scholastic Sanskrit: A Handbook for Students. He is an editor and primary contributor in the book Innovations and Turning Points: Toward a History of Sanskrit Kavya Literature (Oxford University Press, Delhi). Another book, On Poets and Pots: Essays on Sanskrit Poetry, Poetics, and Philosophy, is also forthcoming from Oxford University Press.
He has held visiting appointments as a scholar-in-residence at the Institute for Advanced Studies at Hebrew University and has been recognized as a Research Fellow of the International Association of Sanskrit Studies.
—Prof. Jacqueline Stewart
