Denison University's Goodspeed Lecture series will present speaker Rachel Fell McDermott at 7:30 p.m., Thursday (April 3) in Slayter Auditorium. McDermott's talk is titled "God as Mother of the Universe: Studying the Hindu Goddess." This event is free and open to the public.

McDermott is associate professor of Asian and Middle Eastern cultures at Barnard College and the author of three books,Encountering Kali: In the Margins, At the Center, In the West, Mother of My Heart, Daughter of My Dreams: Kali and Uma in the Devotional Poetry of Bengal, and Singing to the Goddess: Poems to Kali and Uma from Bengal, and numerous articles on Hindu goddess traditions. She earned a bachelor's degree summa cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania where she was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa, and a master's and doctorate from Harvard University in religion, as well as a master of divinity degree from Harvard Divinity School.

Winner of numerous fellowship and grant awards, McDermott has lectured at Boston College, Mt. Holyoke College, Oxford University, the Freer Gallery of Art and the Arthur M. Sackler gallery in Washington D.C., and at other conferences in the United States and Europe. McDermott also is a member of the American Academy of Religion, the Association of Asian Studies, and the Society for Hindu-Christian Studies.

She has traveled to Calcutta on numerous occasions.

About Denison:

Denison University, founded in 1831, is an independent, residential liberal arts institution located in Granville, Ohio. A highly selective college enrolling 2,100 full-time undergraduate students from all 50 states and dozens of foreign countries, Denison is a place where innovative faculty and motivated students collaborate in rigorous scholarship, civic engagement and the cultivation of independent thinking.

For press inquiries:

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Barbara Stambaugh

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(740) 587-8575