Leah Kalmanson is associate professor and Bhagwan Adinath Professor of Jain Studies in the Department of Philosophy and Religion at the University of North Texas. She is the author of Cross-Cultural Existentialism: On the Meaning of Life in Asian and Western Thought (2020) and coauthor of A Practical Guide to World Philosophies: Selves, Worlds, and Ways of Knowing (2021).

Local Gods reimagines the contours of the philosophy of religion to include an array of spiritual traditions historically discounted as primitive or pagan. Kalmanson combines memoir, philosophical analysis, and cultural critique to produce novel methodologies that avoid cultural appropriation and exoticization while at the same time producing an eminently readable text infused with her own personal vulnerability.

• AcknowledgmentsIntroduction: A Visit to the Local God1. Ancestry and Locality2. Manifestation and Liberation3. Transmutation and Deification4. Diaspora and Globalization5. Nations Under GodsConclusionNotesBibliographyIndex

Leah Kalmanson is associate professor and Bhagwan Adinath Professor of Jain Studies in the Department of Philosophy and Religion at the University of North Texas. She is the author of Cross-Cultural Existentialism: On the Meaning of Life in Asian and Western Thought (2020) and coauthor of A Practical Guide to World Philosophies: Selves, Worlds, and Ways of Knowing (2021).

Local Gods reimagines the contours of the philosophy of religion to include an array of spiritual traditions historically discounted as primitive or pagan. Kalmanson combines memoir, philosophical analysis, and cultural critique to produce novel methodologies that avoid cultural appropriation and exoticization while at the same time producing an eminently readable text infused with her own personal vulnerability.

• AcknowledgmentsIntroduction: A Visit to the Local God1. Ancestry and Locality2. Manifestation and Liberation3. Transmutation and Deification4. Diaspora and Globalization5. Nations Under GodsConclusionNotesBibliographyIndex

Leah Kalmanson is associate professor and Bhagwan Adinath Professor of Jain Studies in the Department of Philosophy and Religion at the University of North Texas. She is the author of Cross-Cultural Existentialism: On the Meaning of Life in Asian and Western Thought (2020) and coauthor of A Practical Guide to World Philosophies: Selves, Worlds, and Ways of Knowing (2021).

Local Gods reimagines the contours of the philosophy of religion to include an array of spiritual traditions historically discounted as primitive or pagan. Kalmanson combines memoir, philosophical analysis, and cultural critique to produce novel methodologies that avoid cultural appropriation and exoticization while at the same time producing an eminently readable text infused with her own personal vulnerability.

• AcknowledgmentsIntroduction: A Visit to the Local God1. Ancestry and Locality2. Manifestation and Liberation3. Transmutation and Deification4. Diaspora and Globalization5. Nations Under GodsConclusionNotesBibliographyIndex