Academic/Professional Information:
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Education
- 2002 Ph.D. in the History of Religions, University of Chicago
- 1993 J.D., Boalt Hall School of Law, University of California at Berkeley
Order of the Coif (class rank: 8 out of 300 (top 3%))
- 1988 A.B. in Philosophy, Harvard University, cum laude in General Studies
- 1984 Phillips Academy, Andover, Massachusetts, Cum Laude Society
Fellowships and Awards
- 2003-05 Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Toronto
- 2001-02 Committee on Southern Asian Studies Dissertation Fellow, University of Chicago
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2000-01 Martin Marty Center Junior Fellow, University of Chicago Divinity School
- 1999-00 Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad Fellow, Calcutta, India
- 1998 Social Science Research Council Predissertation Fellow, Dhaka, Bangladesh
- 1996-98 Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellow in Bengali
- 1996 Brauer Seminar Scholarship, University of Chicago Divinity School
- 1992-93 Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellow in German
- 1992 Scholarship to the Hague Academy of International Law from the Ford Foundation Program
in Public International Law at Boalt Hall School of Law
- 1990-93 Jurisprudence Awards (1st in class or section): Civil Procedure, Contracts, Comparative Law,
International Law, International Trade Law, Law and Modern Social Thought, Professional Responsibility
- 1990-93 Prosser Prizes (2nd in class or section): Conceptions of Punishment, Jurisprudence
1990-93
Professional Experience
Academic Service
- Consulting Editor, articles on Law and Religion, Encyclopedia of Religion, second edition ( New York: Macmillan Reference USA, forthcoming).
- Member, Steering Committee, Law, Religion, and Culture Consultation, American Academy of Religion, 2002-present.
Major Publication:
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Books
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Explaining Mantras: Ritual, Rhetoric, and the Dream of a Natural Language in Hindu Tantra
( London and New York: Routledge, 2003).
Excerpt from a review by David Gray in the Journal of Religion:
“Robert Yelle . . . in his short but ambitious monograph . . . starts from the relatively specialized issue of the mantra and expands to address theoretical issues of interest across multiple academic disciplines. . . . Yelle is interested in explaining the motivational force of ritual utterances, and he argues, convincingly, that the poetic structure of these utterances is deployed in order to create an illusion of correspondence between language and reality . . . He makes this case in the context of Tantric mantras by showing how
. . . mantras replicate the threefold cosmic processes of creation, stabilization, and dissolution, which are central features of the cosmologies that underlie these traditions. . . . Yelle concludes with a call for a semiotic approach in the discipline of religious studies. . . . [H]is call is provocative and worthy of serious consideration.”
(available at http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/JR/journal/issues/v84n3/84334/84334.html)
Articles and Book Chapters
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“Bentham’s Fictions: Canon and Idolatry in the Genealogy of Law.” Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities (forthcoming Winter 2005).
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“Images of Law and its Others: Canon and Idolatry in the Discourses of British India.” Culture and Religion (forthcoming 2005).
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“Gesturing at Nature: The Rhetoric of Gestures, Rituals, and Memory in Cross-Cultural Perspective.” Gesture (forthcoming).
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“Poetic Justice: Rhetoric in Hindu Ordeals and Legal Formulas.” Religion 32 (2002): 259-72.
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“Rhetorics of Law and Ritual: A Semiotic Comparison of the Law of Talion and Sympathetic Magic.” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 69 (2001): 627-47.
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“The Rebirth of Myth?: Nietzsche’s Eternal Recurrence and its Romantic Antecedents.” Numen 47 (2000): 175-202.
(With Frank E. Reynolds and Jason A. Carbine.) “Discord and Concord in Buddhist Perspective.” In Research in Human Social Conflict, ed. Joseph B. Gittler. Vol. 2, Ideas of Concord and Discord in Selected World Religions ( Stamford, CT: JAI Press, 2000), 21-58.
- “Mantrasamskara: Tantric Rites for Making Mantras Effective.” Journal of the Sanskrit Department of Rabindra Bharati University 9 (2000): 10-25.
Encyclopedia Articles
“Law, Religion, and Punishment.” In Encyclopedia of Religion, second edition ( New York: Macmillan Reference USA, forthcoming). -
(With Winnifred Fallers Sullivan.) “Law and Religion: An Overview.” In Encyclopedia of Religion, second edition ( New York: Macmillan Reference USA, forthcoming).
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“Ritual and Religious Language.” In Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, second revised edition (Elsevier, forthcoming).
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“Mantra.” In Encyclopedia of Religion, Communication, and Media, ed. Daniel Stout ( London and New York: Routledge, forthcoming).
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“Utilitarianism and J. S. Mill.” In Encyclopedia of Religious Freedom, ed. Catharine Cookson ( London and New York: Routledge, 2003), 497-99.
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“Mantra,” “Mandala,” and “Tantricism.” In Banglapedia: National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh, ed. Sirajul Islam (Dhaka: Asiatic Society of Bangladesh, 2003).
Book Reviews
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Review of Christians and Missionaries in India: Cross-Cultural Communication Since 1500, ed. Robert Eric Frykenberg. In Journal of Interdisciplinary History (forthcoming).
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Review of Critical Terms for Religious Studies, ed. Mark C. Taylor. In Journal of Religion 80 (2000): 360-61.
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Review of The Golden Yoke: The Legal Cosmology of Buddhist Tibet, by Rebecca Redwood French. In Journal of Religion 77 (1997): 343-44.
Manuscripts Submitted or in Preparation
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“Poetry on Trial: Law versus Literature, or Two Chapters in the History of Legal Literalism”
(in preparation).
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Legal Fictions: Genealogies of Law, Religion, and Rhetoric (in preparation).
Presentations:
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Conference Presentations
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“Rhetorical, Communicological, and Other Semiotic Approaches to Religion and Ritual.” North American Association for the Study of Religion, San Antonio, November 2004 (proposal accepted).
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“The Idolatry of Language: Max Müller’s Literalism and Monotheism.” American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting, San Antonio, November 2004 (proposal accepted).
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“Toward a Natural History of Rhetoric: Textual Economies and the Rise of the Literal in the Age of Globalization.” 8th Congress of the International Association for Semiotic Studies, Lyon, France, July 2004.
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“Gesturing at Nature: The Rhetoric of Gestures, Ritual and Memory in Cross-Cultural Perspective.” Gestures, Rituals and Memory: A Multidisciplinary Symposium on Patterned Human Movement Across Time. Victoria College, University of Toronto, May 2004.
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“Monological Gods, Dialogical Selves: Canon and Monotheism as Strategies for Interreligious Debate in 19th Century India.” American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting, Atlanta, November 2003.
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“Bentham’s Fictions: Canon and Idolatry in the Genealogy of Law.” American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting, Atlanta, November 2003.
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“Chanting the Cosmogony: Hindu Tantric Rituals for Making Mantras Effective.” American Oriental Society, Nashville, April 2003.
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“Images of Law and its Others: Law, Religion, and Idolatry in British India.” Association for the Study of Law, Culture and the Humanities, New York, March 2003.
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Respondent, Panel on “Multiplying and Dividing: Pluralism and Transformation in Law and Religion,” Law, Religion, and Culture Consultation. American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting, Toronto, November 2002.
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“What Makes a Mantra Effective?: Diagrams of Creation.” 30 th Annual Conference on South Asia, Madison, October 2001.
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“Poetic Justice: Magic and Rhetoric in Hindu Ordeals.” International Association for the History of Religions XVIIIth Quinquennial Congress, Durban, South Africa, August 2000.
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“Relativity Reconsidered: Whorf and the Structural Analysis of Mantras.” Society for Indian Philosophy and Religion, Calcutta, India, August 2000.
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“Rhetorics of Law and Ritual: A Semiotic Comparison of the Law of Talion and Sympathetic Magic.” American Academy of Religion Annual Meeting, Orlando, November 1998.
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“The Global Ethic Document and International Law.” Society for Buddhist-Christian Studies Conference, DePaul University, Chicago, July 1996.
Invited Presentations
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“Rhetoric on Trial: The Case for and against Rhetoric in the Law.” Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, Toronto, February 2004.
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“The Meaning of Mantras.” Semiotix Café, Toronto, December 2003.
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“Explaining Mantras.” Faculty Colloquium, Department for the Study of Religion, University of Toronto, November 2003.
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“Bentham’s Fictions: Canon and Idolatry in the Genealogy of Law.” Legal History Seminar, University of Toronto Law School, October 2003 .
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Respondent to Martha Minow, Engaging Cultural Differences. Brauer Seminar, University of Chicago Divinity School, May 2003.
- “Legal Fictions: Canon, Idolatry, and Rhetoric in the Genealogy of Law.” Department of Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought, Amherst College, November 2002.
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"An Emic Pragmatics of Mantra, Part Two: Diagrams of Creation.” History of Religions Workshop, University of Chicago Divinity School, May 2001.
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“What Makes a Mantra Effective?” Asiatic Society, Calcutta, India, May 2000.
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“Verbal Icons: A Comparative Semiotic Analysis of Mantra.” Center for Advanced Research in the Humanities, Dhaka University, Dhaka, Bangladesh, August 1998.
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Panelist, Conference on the Future of the History of Religions, University of Chicago Divinity School, November 1996.
Seminar and Workshop Participation
Participant, Erasmus Institute Summer Faculty Workshop on “Religious Hermeneutics and Secular Interpretation.” College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, June 2003.
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Participant ex officio, Brauer Seminar on “Western Legal Traditions and Religious Diversity.” University of Chicago Divinity School, Spring 2003.
Additional Information:
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Association Memberships
American Academy of Religion; Law and Society Association; Association for the Study of Law, Culture and the Humanities; International Roundtable for the Semiotics of Law; International Association for Semiotic Studies; American Association of University Professors; California State Bar Association
Languages
Sanskrit, German, French: reading knowledge
Bengali: elementary reading knowledge
References
Prof. Frank Reynolds
68 Prospect Street
Plainfield , MA 01070
(413) 634-2128
freynold@midway.uchicago.edu
Prof. Michael Silverstein
Department of Anthropology
Haskell Hall 313
The University of Chicago
Chicago , IL 60637
(773) 702-7713
m-silverstein@uchicago.edu
Prof. Wendy Doniger
The Divinity School
The University of Chicago
1025 East 58 th Street
Chicago , IL 60637
(773) 702-8232
don8@midway.uchicago.edu
Winnifred Sullivan, J.D., Ph.D.
Dean of Students and Senior Lecturer
The Divinity School
The University of Chicago
1025 East 58 th Street
Chicago , IL 60637
(773) 702-8217
wsulliva@uchicago.edu
Prof. Sheldon Pollock
Department of South Asian
Languages and Civilizations
Foster Hall 205
The University of Chicago
Chicago , IL 60637
(773) 702-6445
s-pollock@uchicago.edu
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