Asia Society notes "Diwali, often known as the festival of lights, is celebrated in South Asia, by Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, and Buddhists. It symbolizes the triumph of light over darkness, knowledge over ignorance, and hope over despair." See Diwali Lights Up Asia Society 2025. Local Diwali celebrations include: Diwali at Times Square (Oct. 12); Diwali - Celebrating the Festival of Lights at the Tillary Hotel, Brooklyn, sponsored by the Brooklyn District Attorney's Office (Oct. 16, free registration required); Family Day at Asia Society (Oct. 18); and a performance by Brooklyn band Red Baraat at The Met Fifth Avenue (Oct. 24).
"Since 2013, the Hindu American Foundation has led efforts in California and nationwide to recognize October as Hindu American Awareness and Appreciation Month (HAAAM). October is significant because it is often when major Hindu holidays such as Navaratri and Diwali are celebrated and is the birth month of Mahatma Gandhi." Virginia was the first U.S. state to designate October (in 2022 and in succeeding years) as Hindu Heritage Month. See Hindu American Foundation, Hindu American Awareness and Appreciation Month.
Excerpt from book's description here: "Another Appalachia examines both the roots and the resonance of [teacher and writer Neema] Avashia’s identity as a queer, desi, Appalachian woman, while encouraging readers to envision more complex versions of both Appalachia and the nation as a whole."
Excerpt from publisher's book description: "In her fascinating account of Indian immigrants in New York City, Madhulika S. Khandelwal explores the ways in which their world has evolved over four decades. How did this highly diverse ethnic group form an identity and community? Drawing on her extensive interviews with immigrants, Khandelwal examines the transplanting of Indian culture onto the Manhattan and Queens landscapes."
Excerpt from publisher's book description: "This book explores the challenges that Asian immigrants face when their religion--and consequently culture--is 'remade in the U.S.A.' Peppered with stories of individual people and how they actually live their religion, this informative book gives an overview of each religion's beliefs, a short history of immigration--and discrimination--for each group, and how immigrants have adapted their religious beliefs since they arrived."
Excerpt from publisher's book description: "Blending her personal history with extensive research and reporting, [Yashica] Dutt provides an incriminating analysis of caste’s influence in India over everything from entertainment to judicial systems and how this discrimination has carried over to US institutions." "Published in India in 2019 to acclaim, this expanded edition includes 2 new chapters covering how the caste system traveled to the US, its history here, and the continuation of bias by South Asian communities in professional sectors."
You can email Hindu American Foundation to receive its Diwali Toolkit.
The New York Times Book Review described historian Ramachandra Guha's work as: "[A] monumental biography....Extraordinarily intimate.”
Essay by attorney Sai Santosh Kumar Kolluru.
BLS Library provides 1 print copy. Also available here in digital form at Internet Archive. Excerpt from this book's introduction: "Mahatma Gandhi sailed for England on 4th September, 1888 to study law and become a barrister....Gandhiji practised as a lawyer for over twenty years before he gave up the practice of the profession in order to devote all his time and energy to public service." BLS students might wish to read Gandhi's observations in "Section I: Gandhiji As a Law Student."
Excerpt from publisher's book description: "A vivid memoir of food and family, survival and triumph, Love, Loss, and What We Ate traces the arc of Padma Lakshmi’s unlikely path from an immigrant childhood to a complicated life in front of the camera."
Excerpt from publisher's book description: "In A Place at the Multicultural Table, Prema A. Kurien shows how various Hindu American organizations--religious, cultural, and political--are attempting to answer the puzzling questions of identity outside their homeland. Drawing on the experiences of both immigrant and American-born Hindu Americans, Kurien demonstrates how religious ideas and practices are being imported, exported, and reshaped in the process."
Excerpt from ebook's description: "The definitive English translation of the classic Sanskrit epic poem—now available in a one-volume [edition]." "Based on the authoritative seven-volume translation edited by Robert Goldman and Sally Sutherland Goldman, this volume presents the unabridged translated text in contemporary English, revised and reformatted into paragraph form."
Excerpt from Barnes & Noble's book overview: "After his return from South Africa in July 1914, Mahatma Gandhi travelled the length and breadth of India. The mode was the third class on Indian Railways. The aim was to have a one-to-one connect with the masses. His experiences were penned in the book 'Third Class in Indian Railways' written in Ranchi on September 25, 1917. Travelling from Lahore to Tranquebar and from Karachi to Calcutta in over two years, Gandhiji critically observed third class travel."
Excerpt from this ebook's summary: Sejal Shah's "memoir in essays emerges as Shah wrestles with her experiences growing up and living in western New York, an area of stark racial and economic segregation, as the daughter of Gujarati immigrants from India and Kenya. These essays also trace her movement over twenty years from student to teacher and meditate on her travels and life in New England, New York City, and the Midwest, as she considers what it means to be of a place or from a place, to be foreign or familiar."
Excerpt from this ebook's description: "Shashi Tharoor offers a profound re-examination of Hinduism, one of the world's oldest and greatest religious traditions."