Grant Category:	Fulbright-Nehru Student Research Program
Field of Specialization:	Creative Writing
Name:	Ms. Sneha Desai
Official Address:	At-Large, California
Indian Host Institution:	Centre for the Study of Developing Societies Delhi
Duration of Grant & Start Date :	Duration: 9 months August 2011

Brief Bio:

Sneha A. Desai completed her Master's in South Asian studies from UC Berkeley. Since then, she has been a Lecturer in Hindi at Stanford University and a practicing literary translator. Ms. Desai recently translated the poems of Sohan Prakash, a Rajasthani poet who is a member of a Scheduled Tribe, for anthropologist Professor Megan Moody. She has also published a translated short story in an anthology of Hindi-Urdu nationalist writing and completed poetry translation projects as a student of renowned literary translators at UC Berkeley, including Robert Alter, Robert Hass and Chana Kronfeld. As a poet in her own right, Ms. Desai has been selected twice to participate in the national Voices of Our Nations Writers of Color workshops, as well as for graduate poetry workshops by former US Poet Laureate, Robert Hass. Ms. Desai was awarded her undergraduate university's First Prize in Poetry. Upon her return from India, she will be commencing the Ph.D. program in English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University. As a Fulbright-Nehru scholar Ms. Desai during her research period in India will translate representative poems by emerging, young poets in Hindi and Urdu based in Delhi, as well as selections of the modern poetry that they regard as representative of their tradition. By using digital media to present this work, she will create a rich, living document of contemporary poetics in Hindi-Urdu. This project will also connect her permanently and deeply to Delhi's thriving contemporary literary culture, as a peer participating in the writing lives of living Indian poets and translators, and forging the rich bonds needed for fruitful collaborations in the future.