Binu Varghese

Profile

Binu ‘Ben’ Varghese is a PhD candidate in Religion and Society. He earned his Bachelor of Theology from the Senate of Serampore College (University) in India, an MBA in Computer Information Systems from Missouri State University, an MA in Theology and Culture at Fuller Theological Seminary, and a ThM at Princeton Theological Seminary.

His research examines the intersections of religion, caste, race, colonialism, and social inequalities. His dissertation explores ways marginalized communities develop alternative religious, historical, and political imaginaries in response to slavery and caste oppression under colonial modernity. He employs historical-interpretive methodology, combining archival research, oral histories, missionary texts and colonial government records.

His broader scholarship brings postcolonial and decolonial theories into conversation with the study of religion, with particular attention to caste, antiblackness, migration, and religious nationalisms. His work asks how structures of hierarchy shape belonging, citizenship, social worth, and religious practice across colonial and contemporary contexts.

He has been published in the Routledge Handbook of Politics and Religion in Contemporary America, the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace & World Affairs, and the Political Theology Network, and the London School of Economics.

Dissertation:
Towards a Subaltern Decolonial Border Praxis: History, Ritual and Memory of Prathyaksha Raksha Daiva Sabha

Committee:
Chair: Raimundo Barreto, Keri Day, and Richard Fox Young