Our Faculty

Namita N. Manohar

Profile

Namita Manohar is a qualitative feminist sociologist with broad interests in sociology of families, (im)migration and the intersections of gender, race and ethnicity. Her emerging interests, connected to her ongoing research on Catholic interfaith marriages in Mumbai, India, include the sociology of religion, and secularism & the state.

She has researched extensively on Indians in the United States. Some of her previous projects include a gendered ethnic perspective on partnering among Indian-Americans, an ethnographic study of immigrant Indian professional women’s gendered subjectivities around work and mothering in the US., and on scholarship on teaching and learning in sociology.

Manohar teaches courses in gender; work; work and family; religion; introductory sociology and senior seminar. She served as the Director of the Women’s and Gender Studies Program (2009-12), as the Graduate Advisor in Sociology (2013-17), and as the Undergraduate Advisor in Sociology (2020-2023).

Education

B.A., University of Mumbai, India (Sociology), 2001

M.S.W., University of Mumbai, India (Social Work), 2003

M.A., University of Florida (Sociology), 2006

Doctor of Philosophy, University of Florida (Sociology, with Ph.D. concentration in Women's and Gender Studies), 2009

Selected Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity
Books and Publications

Manohar, Namita N. (2025) "'Cautioners, Defenders of Faith, Accompaniers: Catholic Priests' 'Living Catholicism' and Interfaith Marriages in Mumbai, India." Pp. 50-64 In Asian Catholicism & the Remaking of Contemporary Families edited by M. Chambon and J. Pooniah. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.

Manohar, Namita N. (2019). "Gendered Agency in Skilled Migration: The Case of Indian Women in the United States." Gender & Society, 33(6): 935-960.

Manohar, Namita N. (2018). Review of Beyond Chrismukkah: The Christian-Jewish Interfaith Family in the United States. By Samira K. Mehta. eSocialSciences. August 1, http://www.esocialsciences.org/Articles/Show_Article.aspx?qs=Q9lVWWbSwFtVGoJFoqmz5cYDWipblkDn/jbJGZXULq8yqp4UmKhERQ4Zf9QWJGQC/dfoBZ2yI4wAFMDXoa7V3Q==

Killian, Caitlin, and Namita N. Manohar (2016). "Highly-Skilled Immigrant Women?s Labor Market Access: A Comparison of Indians in the United States and North Africans in France." Social Currents, 3(2): 138-159.

Manohar, Namita N. (2016)."Families in India." Pp. 1-7 The Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Family Studies. Ed. C. Shehan. New York: Wiley-Blackwell.

Manohar, Namita N. and Pallavi Banerjee (2016). "H-1B Visas." Pp. 162-168 in People of Color in the United States: Contemporary Issues in Education, Work, Communities, Health and Immigration. Eds. A. Heurta, N. Iglesias-Prieto, and D.L. Brown. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press.

Manohar, Namita N. and Pauline E. Bullen (2015). "In the Web of the 21st-century American Academy: Reflections of a Black and an Indian Female Faculty." Pp. 231-251Intersectionality in Educational Rearch. Eds. D.J. Davis, R. Brunn-Bevel and J. Olive. Sterling, Va.: Stylus Publishing.

Manohar, Namita N. (2013)."'Yes You're Tamil, But Are You Tamil Enough?' An Indian Researcher Interrogates 'Shared Social Location' in Feminist Immigration Research." International Journal of Multiple Research Approaches, Special Issue on Mixed Methods in Genders and Sexualities Research 7.2: 189-203.

Manohar, Namita N. (2013)."Support Networks, Ethnic Spaces, and Fictive Kin: Indian Immigrant Women Constructing Community in the United States." AAPI (Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders) Nexus Journal 11.1&2: 26-51.

Manohar, Namita N. (2013)."Mothering for Class & Ethnicity: The Case of Indian Professional Immigrants in the United States." Pp. 161-187 Advances in Gender Research: Notions of Family. Eds. M. Kohlman, D. Krieg and B. Dickerson. Bingley, United Kingdom: Emerald Group Publishing Limited. 161-87.

Manohar, Namita N., Dana Berkowitz, JeffriAnne Wilder and Justine E. Tinkler (2012). "Photovoice: A Critical Pedagogical Activity in the Sociology Classroom." Currents in Teaching and Learning 5.1&2: 36-51.

Manohar, Namita N. (2011)."Introduction: Women and Economics -- A Study of the Economic Relations Between Men and Women as a Factor in Social Evolution by Charlotte Perkins Gilman." People, Power and Politics 11th ed. Boston: Pearson.

Manohar, Namita N. and Erika Busse-Cardenas (2011). "Valuing 'Good' Motherhood in Migration: The Experiences of Indian Professional Wives in America and Peruvian Working-Class Wives Left Behind in Peru." Journal of the Motherhood Initiative 2.2: 176-96.

Berkowitz, Dana, Namita N. Manohar and Justine Tinkler (2010). "Walk Like a Man, Talk Like a Woman: Teaching the Social Construction of Gender." Teaching Sociology 38, April: 132-43.

Manohar, Namita N. (2009)."Arranged Marriages, Semi-Arranged Marriages, and Love Marriages." Battleground: The Family. Ed. K. Brackett. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press. 33-40.

Manohar, Namita N. (2008)."'Sshh . . .!!! Don't Tell My Parents': Dating Among Second-Generation Patels in Florida." Journal of Comparative Family Studies 39.4: 571-88.

Manohar, Namita N. (2008)."Gender & Ethnicity in Union Formation: The Case of Second-Generation Patels." The International Journal of Sociology of the Family, Special Issue on Intersectional Analyses of the Family for the 21st Century, 34.2.

Awards, Honors and Fellowships

Kitch Foundation Research Assistant Stipend, Brooklyn College. "Interfaith Marriages among Catholics in Mumbai, India." Principal Investigator. 2022 ($2000)

Wolfe Research Fellowship, Ethyle R. Wolfe Institute for the Humanities, Brooklyn College. "Catholic Interfaith Marriages in Mumbai, India." Principal Investigator.

Claire Tow Distinguished Teacher Award. Brooklyn College CUNY.

Kurz Chair Undergraduate Research Assistant Scholarship, Brooklyn College. "Riding the Subway: An Intersectional and Place-Based Approach To Developing Introduction to Sociology." Co-principal Investigator. 2019-2020 ($2000).

PSC-CUNY Enhanced Research Award, City University of New York. "Interfaith Marriages among Catholics in Urban India." Principal Investigator. 2017-2018 ($12,000)

Tow Faculty Research Travel Fellowship, Brooklyn College. "Interfaith Marriage among Catholics in Urban India." Principal Investigator. 2017-2018. ($1400)

Kurz Chair Undergraduate Research Assistant Scholarship, Brooklyn College. "Interfaith Marriage among Catholics in Urban India." Principal Investigator. 2022-2023 ($2000); 2015-2016 ($1500); 2014-2015 ($1500); 2013-2014 ($1500).

PSC-CUNY Research Award, City University of New York, for "High Tech and Undocumented Workers, Comprehensive Immigration Reform-A Content Analysis." Co-principal investigator. 2014-15. ($3499)

William Stewart Travel Award, CUNY Academy.

Faculty Fellowship Publications Program. Office of the Dean for Recruitment and Diversity. CUNY.

Faculty Travel Award, Office of Research and Graduate Studies, Brooklyn College. 2010-14.

New Faculty Fund Grant, for "Life at the Crossroads: Queering South Asian-ness in America." Co-Investigator. 2010. ($800)

Conferences, Seminars and Symposiums

"Cautioners, Defenders of Faith, Accompaniers: Catholic Priests' 'Living Catholicism' and Interfaith Marriages in Mumbai, India. Invited Paper for Conference on "Catholicism, Family and Asian Societies." Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore.

"Public Seminar on Catholic Interfaith Marriages in India." Irish Institute for Catholic Studies, Mary Immaculate College, University of Limerick, Ireland.

Catholic Interfaith Marriages in Mumbai, India." Invited Panel on 'Studies in Contemporary Religion.' Studies in Religion Program, Brooklyn College - CUNY. Brooklyn, NY.

"Living Religion, Embodying 'Interfaith': Catholic Interfaith Wedding Ceremonies in Mumbai, India." Pop-Up Recorded Podium; Lived Catholicism Online Conference, Center for Catholic Studies, Durham University and the London School of Economics, UK.

"The 'Politics' of Wedding Ceremonies: The Case of Catholic Interfaith Couples in Mumbai, India." Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, St. Louis.

"Three Weddings and So Many Emotions: Wedding Ceremonies & Boundary Marking by Catholic Interfaith Couples in Mumbai, India." Mini-Conference on Contemporary South Asia, Eastern Sociological Society, Boston.

Killian Caitlin, and Namita N. Manohar. "Barriers and Pathways to Skilled Immigrant Women's Labor Market Access: A Comparison of Indians in the U.S. and North Africans in France." Invited Panel on "Gender Through a Global Lens." Southern Sociological Society, Atlanta, GA.

"Family Bargains, Playing House & Becoming Professionals: Gendered Strategizing of Family Migration by Indian Women in the U.S." Invited Workshop on ?Problematization of Family Migration. University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

"Mothering Culture in the Context of Immigration: The Case of First-Generation Immigrant Women." Invited Panel on the 'Politics of Cultural Production in Post-1965 Migrant Communities.' Immigrant America Conference: New Immigration Histories from 1965 to 2015, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis.

"Highly Skilled Immigrant Women's Labor Market Access: A Comparison of Indians in the United States and North Africans in France." International Sociological Association. Yokohama, Japan.

"Social and Economic Incorporation of Indian Immigrants at the Nexus of Gender and Visa Regime: Focus on H-1B Visas." Invited Panel on 'A Foot in Each World: South Asian Diaspora Communities in the United States and Their Interactions with Their Homeland.' Columbia University, School of International and Public Affairs, New York, NY.

"'Yes You're Tamil, But Are You Tamil Enough': An Indian Research Interrogates 'Shared Social Location' in Feminist Migration Research." American Sociological Association. New York.

"Photovoice: A Critical Pedagogical Activity in the Sociology Classroom." Eastern Sociological Society. Boston.

"Mothering for Class & Ethnicity: The Case of Indian Professional Immigrants in the United States." 1st International Family and Consumer Sciences Congress. Antalaya, Turkey.

"Support Networks, Cultural Spaces, and Fictive Kin: Indian Immigrant Women Constructing Community in the United States." Eastern Sociological Society. New York.

"'Oh! At Home, It?s All Based on Skills, Or Is It?' Gender and Household Dynamics in Professional Indian Immigrant Families in America." Invited Panel on 'Transnational Approaches to Gender.' Eastern Sociological Society, New York, NY.

"Resistance and Reconfigurations: A Gendered Settlement Narrative of Tamil Immigrant Women in Atlanta." American Sociological Association. Las Vegas.

"Bargaining for Migration: The Gendered Strategizing of Migration by Tamil Women in Atlanta." Panel on Gender & Immigration. American Sociological Association. Atlanta.

"Professional, Wife, Mother: The Three Faces of Femininity of Immigrant Tamil Professional Women in Atlanta." Eastern Sociological Society. Boston.

"Dreaming of America: A Gendered Migration Narrative of Tamil Women." Invited Symposium on 'Perspectives of Women in South Asia.' Faculty Day: Brooklyn College-CUNY, Brooklyn, NY.

"Food, Music & Dance: Reinterpretations of Motherhood by Tamil Immigrant Professional Women in Atlanta." Invited Panel on 'A Gender Lens on Cultural Contradiction and Change Among Globalized South Asians.' Annual Conference on South Asia at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

"Emotion Work in Researching Your Own," Invited Panel on 'Researching Your Own: Engaging Difficult Dialogues on Power, Emotions, Ethics and Reflexivity.' National Women?s Studies Association, Atlanta, GA.

Brooklyn. All in.