Join us as we welcome Bhakti Mamtora, Emily Mariola, and Susan Lehman for their talk: Perspectives on Yoga: History, Practice, and Physics.

A discussion of yoga from multiple perspectives, ranging from religious histories to the physics of asana practice. We will discuss the significance of yoga in the religious traditions of South Asia, as well as how yoga continues to inform current religious practices. How do the physical poses relate to the broader practice of yoga? And what physics and forces are we using when we practice, whether we are working on a simple warrior pose or in a challenging balance pose?

Bhakti Mamtora is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at the College of Wooster. She has taught courses on the history of yoga at the College and collaborates with Flex Yoga Studios to host trainings book clubs on the Bhagavad Gita and Yoga Sutras. Her research examines the genesis and reception of oral teachings, sacred texts, and digital applications in the Swaminarayan Sampraday. Broadly, her interests include book history and print culture, religious subjectivity, and community formation in nineteenth-century Gujarat.

Susan Lehman is the Victor J. Andrew Professor of Physics at the College of Wooster. She is an experimentalist who has worked broadly in the field of condensed matter, ranging from elasticity of polymers to the growth of quantum dots. Currently, her research focuses on the dynamic behavior in granular materials, particularly the avalanches that occur as new grains are slowly added to the top of a pile. During her practice of yoga, she has become interested in the physics of the human body and how unique each person’s yoga practice must be.