About Us
Founded by like-minded activists, writers, and readers in 2006, DesiLit Magazine will be a biannual online magazine, publishing in Summer and Winter. We are committed to creating a forum for exceptional contemporary writing and art focused on South Asia* and the diaspora.
Our magazine will print essays, fiction, humor, poetry, reviews, and art. We plan to attract, nurture, and promote artists whose work breaks established molds attached to definitions of South Asia, and hope to showcase their material so that it is accessible to all audiences. We are also interested in pieces that celebrate traditional art forms.
For more info, please contact Sumita Sheth, Executive Editor.
DesiLit Magazine is run by a dedicated all volunteer staff which allows us to pay professional rates to our writers.
* South Asia is defined as Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, The Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka
Frequently Asked Questions
Staff Biographies
Sumita Sheth, Editor-in-Chief
Terrified of fish and thus unwilling to go into oceans and lakes, Sumita Sheth writes, reads, dances, paints, and sings (albeit mostly off-tune) around New York City as well as wherever else she finds herself.
In her free time, Sumita is actively involved in volunteer work, blogging, and a bit of editing.
Satya, Associate Editor
An artist/vocalist/engineer originally from Bombay, India and currently residing in Chicago. She has been active in the Chicago music scene performing, touring and has recorded with two groups Las Guitarras de España and the Matt Geraghty project. Her art is carried by the Blank Kanvas gallery and has been exhibited in Chicago. She does graphic and publicity material design work freelance, and has been involved with organizational activities of South Asian literary/arts festivals in Chicago.
Mary Anne Mohanraj, Consulting Editor
Mary Anne Mohanraj is the author of BODIES IN MOTION, a set of Sri Lankan-American linked stories, covering two families and three generations (HarperCollins). She teaches fiction at Vermont College and Roosevelt University, and is working on a follow-up book, THE ARRANGEMENT, a contemporary threesome novel. Mohanraj recently received an Illinois Arts Council Fellowship. She currently serves as the Executive Director of DesiLit (www.desilit.org), an organization that works to support S. Asian and diaspora literature, and also directs the Speculative Literature Foundation. Mohanraj was born in Colombo, Sri Lanka.Anjali Goyal, Fiction Editor
Anjali Goyal was born and raised in small-town Ohio and now lives in Brooklyn, New York. She is the programs coordinator at The Asian American Writers' Workshop in NYC, and is also organizing the South Asian Women's Creative Collective's annual literary festival taking place this November, this year titled Electric Ladyland. She likes thrifting, organic vegetables, and repainting her apartment.
Lakshmi Juneja, Fiction Editor
Lakshmi Juneja works full-time as a technology project manager at a Fortune100 company in the Chicago suburbs. When she has some time she likes to read, knit, and work on her yard. She was born in New Delhi and raised in Jamshedpur, India.
Pranav Jani, Non-Fiction Editor
Since immigrating to Columbus, Ohio from the desi homeland of northern New Jersey, Pranav Jani has been teaching and researching in postcolonial literature and culture at Ohio State, with a focus on South Asia and, recently, South Asian America. Though Gujarati, Pranav has managed to become a Marxist, too. He loves teaching his classes on "Imagining India" and "Henna and Hip-hop," for which movies like Slumdog are both a blessing and a curse. His work has appeared in Marxism, Modernity and Postcolonial Studies, Globalizing Dissent: Essays on Arundhati Roy, A Historical Companion to Postcolonial Writing in English, SAMAR, and other journals . Decentering Rushdie, a book on the postcolonial Indian novel in English, is in the works. Pranav is an active member of the International Socialist Organization and involved in contesting Obama's wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Palestine. Despite being completely non-experimental and the antithesis of fusion in his singing, Pranav is the proud creator of such hybrid cusinary delights as "Saag Tofu," "Spicy Pasta," and Gujarati "Dal Dhokli" made from lasagna noodles.Bushra Rehman, Humor Senior Editor
Bushra is a Pakistani from Queens, NYC. She is co-editor of Colonize This! Young Women of Color on Today's Feminism (Seal Press) and author of Marianna's Beauty Salon. Bushra travels around the country, reading poems and telling jokes and stories. She's been featured in The New York Times and NY Newsday. Her work has appeared in ColorLines, Mizna, Curve, SAMAR, Bottomfish and Voices of Resistance: Muslim Women Write War, Faith, Sexuality (Seal Press). To read poetry, or excerpts from her on-the-road desi adventure novel or memoir of being a Pakistani little rascal, visit her website www.bushrarehman.com.Radha Gummuluri, Webmaster
Radha Gummuluri is a Bombayite who is presently living in Chicago, IL. She shares her studio apartment with two cats who dote on her. Radha works full time as a technical consultant. Some of the sites that she has designed and developed include www.womenforwomen.org, www.teachingexcellencenetwork.org and www.thetruthaboutpitbulls.com. In her free time she likes to read books, watch movies and volunteers her time with Deborah's place. She can be reached at radha_gumm@yahoo.com