Staff Profiles<\/a><\/p>\n[\/et_pb_accordion_item][\/et_pb_accordion][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”2_3″ _builder_version=”4.4.8″][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/21\/2020\/06\/Jayanti_Tamm_Landing-2.jpg” _builder_version=”4.9.10″ _module_preset=”default” alt=”Queens College Visiting Professor and Alum Jayanti Tamm, declared \u201cthe chosen one\u201d by spiritual leader Sri Chimnoy (pictured with his right hand on Tamm\u2019s head)” title_text=”Jayanti Tamm” sticky_enabled=”0″ align=”center” border_width_all=”1px”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.9.10″ text_font=”Open Sans||||||||” text_font_size=”16px” hover_enabled=”0″ sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n
Queens College Visiting Professor and Alum Jayanti Tamm, declared \u201cthe chosen one\u201d by spiritual leader Sri Chimnoy (pictured with his right hand on Tamm\u2019s head), grew up as a disciple of Chimnoy\u2019s. After leaving the group, Tamm chronicled her experiences in her book <\/strong>Cartwheels in a Sari: A Memoir of Growing Up Cult.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\nAs Jayanti Tamm\u2019s mother labored to give birth to her in a Connecticut hospital in 1970, Sri Chinmoy, the spiritual leader who had arrived in America from India several years earlier, sped from Queens through the warm September morning to greet the newborn. Tamm\u2019s parents were among Chinmoy\u2019s first American followers, and the guru gave the baby her name and declared her to be the \u201cchosen one.\u201d<\/p>\n
In Cartwheels in a Sari: A Memoir of Growing Up Cult<\/em> (2009), Tamm describes life among the followers of Sri Chinmoy. Many of them, including her parents, handed over their money, all their waking time, and the smallest decisions of their lives to the Queens-based spiritual master who proclaimed himself the incarnation of god on earth. Her critically praised book is all the more powerful for its lack of rancor as Tamm describes what she came to see as the guru\u2019s manipulative and increasingly quirky hold over his followers.<\/p>\nAfter several years during which Tamm\u2019s doubts grew, the guru threw her out of the community. Lost and at one point suicidal, she enrolled at Queens College. She notes that as an English major, \u201cthe faculty was very supportive. They really took me under their wing and gave me the confidence I needed.\u201d While a student, Tamm tutored at the writing center of Queensborough Community College and wrote an award-winning play.<\/p>\n
Writing her memoir was \u201ca wonderful and liberating experience,\u201d Tamm says. She found the yearlong work remarkably \u201ceasy,\u201d especially since she had kept diaries all her life, and her mother, who eventually left the Sri Chinmoy group, had kept all sorts of photos and mementos from her family\u2019s life there.<\/p>\n
In October 2007 Tamm gave birth to a daughter. That same morning Sri Chinmoy died of a heart attack at his Queens home. A bizarre coincidence, Tamm concedes. Chinmoy had gone to her mother\u2019s bedside to welcome Tamm into the world; now he exited the world as Tamm gave birth to her own child.<\/p>\n
Tamm is currently working on a novel.<\/p>\n
Book everyone should read:<\/strong> Freedom by Jonathan Franzen. \u201cIt is wonderfully sad, honest, and painfully funny.\u201d<\/p>\nFavorite music:<\/strong> The Smiths. \u201cMorrissey\u2019s voice and lyrics have never become rusty or dated; the music excites me as much as it did back when I first discovered it decades ago.\u201d<\/p>\nSurprising fact:<\/strong> \u201cI have enrolled my three-year-old daughter in ballet class so I can have the chance to experience all of the \u2018normal\u2019 elements of growing-up that I missed.\u201d<\/p>\n[\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Name: Jayanti Tamm Title: Visiting Professor Department: English Degree(s): BA, Queens College; MFA, American University “On October 11, 2007, my daughter was born. About three hours earlier, Sri Chinmoy died. In a way, it felt as though everything had gone full circle.\u201d- Jayanti Tamm Student Profiles Alumni Profiles Faculty Profiles Staff ProfilesQueens College Visiting Professor […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"page_category":[],"wf_page_folders":[137],"class_list":["post-1201","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1201"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1201\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1867,"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1201\/revisions\/1867"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"page_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/page_category?post=1201"},{"taxonomy":"wf_page_folders","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qc.cuny.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wf_page_folders?post=1201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}