Suraj Yengde
Indian scholar, activist and columnist (born 1988)

Suraj Yengde
Yengde at Harvard India Conference in Harvard, 2020
Born1988 (age 37–38)
Nanded, Maharashtra, India
Occupations
  • Scholar
  • Author
  • Activist
Awards
  • Dr. Ambedkar Social Justice Award (2019)
  • Rohith Vemula Memorial Scholar Award (2018)
Academic background
Education
  • LLM
  • PhD
  • DPhil
Alma mater
ThesisSouth-south migration: an ethnographic study of an Indian business district in Johannesburg (2016)
Doctoral advisor
Faisal Devji (Oxford)[1]
Dilip Menon (Witwatersrand)[2]
Academic work
DisciplineSocial Sciences
InstitutionsHarvard University
Notable works
Websitewww.surajyengde.com

Suraj Milind Yengde (born 1988) is an Indian scholar, author and activist known for his work on caste and race. He is an Assistant Professor of History and Africana Studies and a Ford Foundation Presidential Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania.[3] He was a W.E.B. Du Bois Fellow at Harvard University and a research associate in the Department of African and African American Studies.[4] He was named as one of the "25 Most Influential Young Indians of 2021" by GQ India.

Early life

Yengde was born in 1988 in Nanded, Maharashtra, to a Dalit Buddhist family. He earned a BSL and LLB from Nanded Law College between 2005 and 2010.[5]

Education and career

(L to R) Suraj Yengde, Pa. Ranjith, Niharika Singh, and Nagraj Manjule taking a selfie at the Dalit Film Festival in New York City in 2019.

Yengde earned an LLM from Birmingham City University, England (2011–2012) and interned at the United Nations Secretariat.[6] He completed a PhD in Anthropology at the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa, in 2016, with a thesis on Indian business districts in Johannesburg.[7] He pursued further studies at the University of Oxford, focusing on caste and race.[1] In May 2025, he received his DPhil (Doctor of Philosophy) from the University of Oxford for his thesis titled Dalit-Black Worlds: An Intellectual History of Race and Caste.[8][9]

Yengde has been a post-doctoral fellow at Harvard University and a senior fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School.[10] He has published in Economic and Political Weekly and contributes to Art Review and Hindustan Times.[11][12][13] He appeared as himself in the 2023 biographical drama film Origin.[14][15]

From January 2024 to June 2025, he was a W. E. B. Du Bois Fellow at Harvard University and a research associate in the Department of African and African American Studies. Since January 2026, he has served as an Assistant Professor of History and Africana Studies and a Ford Foundation Presidential Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania.[16][17][18]

Works

In 2018, Yengde co-edited The Radical in Ambedkar: Critical Reflections with Anand Teltumbde.[19] In 2019, he authored Caste Matters, a book listed in The Hindu’s "Best Non-Fiction Books of the Decade".[20][21] The book is published in several Indian languages with the Kerala translation winning a state award for translation.[22] His new book Caste: A Global Story was published in May 2025.[23][24]

Awards and recognitions

Yengde's work has received attention in both academic and public spheres. His book Caste Matters was reviewed in major outlets such as The Hindu, The Wire, and The Polis Project, where it was described as a "powerful polemic" and "path‑breaking" in its engagement with caste and Dalit identity.[21][25]

He received the Dr. Ambedkar Social Justice Award, Canada in 2019,[26] and was one of the finalists for Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puraskar.[27] He has been named as one of the "25 Most Influential Young Indians of 2021" by GQ,[28] and appeared in American biographical drama film Origin (2023) as himself. [14][29]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b "Professor Faisal Devji". University of Oxford. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  2. ^ "Dalit is the New Political and Epistemic Horizon: An Interview with Suraj Yengde". Borderlines. 23 November 2020. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  3. ^ https://www.penguin.co.in/book_author/suraj-milind-yengde/
  4. ^ "Suraj Yengde". Pulitzer Center. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  5. ^ "Suraj Yengde: Trying to leave his caste behind him to pursue his education". World Education Blog. 22 May 2020. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  6. ^ "About". scholar.harvard.edu. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  7. ^ Yengde, Suraj (2016). "South-south migration: an ethnographic study of an Indian business district in Johannesburg". Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  8. ^ "Dr. Suraj Milind Yengde".
  9. ^ Yengde, S. M. (2024). Dalit-black thought: An intellectual history of caste & race (Thesis). University of Oxford.
  10. ^ "Suraj Yengde". The Lakshmi Mittal and Family South Asia Institute. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  11. ^ Yengde, Suraj (11 September 2015). "Caste among the Indian Diaspora in Africa". Economic and Political Weekly. 50 (37): 65–68. JSTOR 24482375. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  12. ^ "Suraj Yengde". Art Review. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  13. ^ "Suraj Yengde". Hindustan Times. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  14. ^ a b Sun, Rebecca (5 January 2024). ""A Story That Broke All of Our Hearts": The Making of 'Origin'". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  15. ^ "B.R. Ambedkar Makes His Hollywood Debut in 'Origin' Which Explores Global Connections of Caste". The Wire. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  16. ^ https://www.penguin.co.in/book_author/suraj-milind-yengde/
  17. ^ https://www.hurstpublishers.com/profile/suraj-milind-yengde/
  18. ^ https://www.ids.ac.uk/events/caste-a-global-story/
  19. ^ "Radical Ambedkar: Analysing divergent personas of the leader". Financial Express. 17 February 2019. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  20. ^ "Best non-fiction books of the decade". The Hindu. 28 December 2019. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  21. ^ a b Sampath, G. (21 September 2019). "G. Sampath reviews Caste Matters by Suraj Yengde". The Hindu. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 20 November 2025.
  22. ^ "Suraj Yengde". Harvard University. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  23. ^ "Caste: A Global Story".
  24. ^ Yengde, Suraj Milind (30 June 2025). Caste: A Global Story. C. Hurst (Publishers) Limited. ISBN 978-1-80526-289-3.
  25. ^ Stephen, Cynthia. "A Path-breaking Effort – A Review Of Caste Matters - The Polis Project". Retrieved 20 November 2025.
  26. ^ "HOME - Chetna". www.chetna.ca. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  27. ^ "Sahitya Akademi Awards" (PDF). Sahitya Akademi. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
  28. ^ Sethi, Shikha (11 February 2021). "Innovators, entertainers, disruptors, game changers: Meet GQ's Most Influential Young Indians". GQ India. Retrieved 2 June 2025.
  29. ^ "B.R. Ambedkar Makes His Hollywood Debut in 'Origin' Which Explores Global Connections of Caste". thewire.in. Retrieved 3 January 2025.
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