Vinay Lal is a Professor of History and Asian American Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). His interests include South Asian history, comparative colonial histories, the Indian diaspora, public and popular culture in India, cinema, cultures of sexuality, the global histories of nonviolence and the thought of Mahatma Gandhi. His 14 authored and edited books include the two-volume “Oxford Anthology of the Modern Indian City” (Oxford, 2013), “Deewaar: The Footpath, the City, and the Angry Young Man” (HarperCollins, 2011), “Political Hinduism” (Oxford, 2009), “Of Cricket, Guinness and Gandhi” (Penguin, 2005), “The History of History” (Oxford, 2003), and two books co-edited with Ashis Nandy. He was elected to the World Academy of Art and Science in 2001.