The Yogic Studies Podcast

In this episode, we speak with Dr. George Michell, an architectural historian whose work has shaped how the field understands sacred architecture across the Deccan, from the sixth-century rock-cut and structural temples of the Early Chalukyas at Badami, Aihole, and Pattadakal to the imperial ruins of Vijayanagara at Hampi and beyond. 
The conversation traces Michell's path from his first encounter with India as an architecture student in the mid-1960s, through his doctoral fieldwork surveying and measuring the Chalukya temples of Badami in the early 1970s, to his decades-long partnership with Dr. John Fritz at Vijayanagara, where their Smithsonian-funded survey work mapped and documented the standing remains of one of South India's largest and most complex medieval cities. 
The episode closes with a discussion of Michell's new course, YS 140 | Sacred Architecture of the Deccan, which moves across four defining moments in the region's religious architecture: the Buddhist rock-cut monasteries of Karla, Bhaja, and Kanheri; the early Chalukya temples of Badami, Aihole, and Pattadakal; the Jain pilgrimage sanctuaries of Shravanabelagola, Mudabidri, and Karkala; and the temples of the Vijayanagara emperors at Hampi. 

Speaker Bio

Dr. George Michell is one of the world's most foremost authorities on the art and architecture of South Asia. Trained as an architect at the University of Melbourne, he subsequently pursued advanced study at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, receiving his doctorate in 1974 for a dissertation on Early Chalukya temple architecture. 
Michell has devoted more than five decades to the study, documentation, and interpretation of India's sacred monuments. From 1981 and for over twenty years, he co-directed the Hampi Vijayanagara Research Project alongside the American archaeologist Dr. John M. Fritz: a comprehensive architectural and archaeological survey of the Vijayanagara capital, supported in part by the Smithsonian Institution, Washington. He is a co-founder of the Deccan Heritage Foundation and has produced more than a dozen guidebooks to Deccan sites. He currently oversees the completion of the Vijayanagara Archaeological Atlas, documenting some 25 square kilometers of the historical site.
Among his most recent publications are Temples of Deccan India (Woodbridge, 2023), Islamic Architecture of Deccan India (with Helen Philon, 2018), and City of Victory, Hampi Vijayanagara (with John M. Fritz, Mumbai, 2025). He divides his year between London, Goa, and Melbourne.

Links
YS 140 | Sacred Architecture of the Deccan
George Michell, Temple Architecture and Art of the Early Chalukyas: Badami, Mahakuta, Aihole, Pattadakal (Niyogi Books, 2014)
John M. Fritz and George Michell, Hampi Vijayanagara (Jaico / Deccan Heritage Foundation)
Deccan Heritage Foundation

In this episode, we speak with Dr. Mark Singleton, Research Associate at SOAS University of London and Visiting Scholar at the University of Santiago, Spain, about his forthcoming book, Yoga Machine: Technology, Transhumanism and Transcendence (Penguin), which serves as the basis for his new live course at Yogic Studies. Dr. Singleton is one of the most influential scholars in the field of modern Yoga Studies, and returns to the podcast for the first time since Episode 15 in 2020.
The conversation ranges widely, from the ancient to the contemporary. We begin by exploring the surprising breadth of the Sanskrit word yoga in its earliest dictionary definitions, where it encompasses a wide range of mundane "technologies"—raising the question of whether yoga might be understood, in its most etymologically expansive sense, as a near-synonym of the Ancient Greek technē, the root of our word "technology." We discuss how even the premodern, "classical" forms of yoga share certain aspirations with what we today call transhumanism—augmentation, enhancement, morphological freedom, and the pursuit of immortality—and what is at stake for practitioners invested in yoga's spiritual and liberatory dimensions when yoga is reframed as technology.
We discuss the proliferating landscape of "smart" yoga technologies, yoga's curious double role in the modern cultural imagination—positioned simultaneously as an ancient technology and as an antidote to the ravages of modernity—and how AI is reshaping that landscape in ways that may have surprising historical antecedents. We close by reflecting on why all this matters for yoga teachers and practitioners, and what students can expect from Dr. Singleton's new online course, YS 139 | Yoga Machine: Technology, Transhumanism, and Transcendence.

Bio
Dr. Mark Singleton is a Research Associate at SOAS University of London and Visiting Scholar at the University of Santiago, Spain. He is one of the foremost scholars of the history of yoga, and the author of several books including Yoga Body: The Origins of Modern Posture Practice (Oxford University Press, 2010) and Roots of Yoga (co-authored with James Mallinson, Penguin, 2017), as well as numerous edited volumes and articles. From 2014–2020 he served as Senior Research Fellow at SOAS, where he was a core member of the Haṭha Yoga Project, a major European Research Council-funded initiative to document the history of haṭhayoga in India and across the globe. His forthcoming book, Yoga Machine: Technology, Transhumanism, and Transcendence, will be published by Penguin.

Links
YS 139 | Yoga Machine: Technology, Transhumanism, and Transcendence
Yoga Machine: Technology, Transhumanism and Transcendence  (forthcoming Penguin, 2027).
Yoga Body: The Origins of Modern Posture Practice (Oxford University Press, 2010)
Roots of Yoga, co-authored with James Mallinson (Penguin, 2017)
Episode 15 | Mark Singleton | Yogic Studies Podcast (2020)

In this episode, we speak with Anjali Rao, yoga educator, practitioner, and doctoral candidate at the California Institute of Integral Studies, about her recently published book, Yoga as Embodied Resistance: A Feminist Lens on Caste, Gender, and Sacred Resilience in Yoga History (North Atlantic Books, 2025). 
The conversation ranges widely, exploring the entangled histories of yoga, caste, and gender; the contested question of whether yoga is "Hindu"; and the rich "heterodox" traditions—Bhakti, Tantra, and Śramanic renunciation—that have always existed in productive tension with Brahmanical orthodoxy. We also discuss Rao's methodology as a practitioner-scholar, her use of feminist historiography and the kathā storytelling tradition, her own complex relationship to Sanskrit and to the Hindu tradition in which she was raised, and her journey to becoming a scholar and author of yoga and feminist history. 
Bio

Anjali Rao brings an intersectional and decolonial feminist lens to the study of philosophy and religion integrating storytelling, art and poetry. Deeply influenced by her dance training, her work emphasizes an embodied approach and explores how spirituality, power and politics intersect. Her first book, Yoga As Embodied Resistance: A Feminist Lens in Caste, Gender And Sacred Resilience in Yoga History, North Atlantic Books was named as one of the 10 most inspiring, insightful and seriously worthwhile books of 2025 by Yoga Journal and "a scholarly work and a deeply personal journey" by L.A Book Review. 
She is on the faculty of multiple yoga education programs. She considers herself a first, foremost and forever a student and is currently pursuing a PhD in Philosophy and Religion (Women's Spirituality) at the California Institute of Integral Studies.
Links
Yoga as Embodied Resistance — North Atlantic Books
Anjali Rao's website
The Love of Yoga Podcast

In this episode, we speak with Anirudh Kanisetti, a public historian and award-winning author specializing in early medieval South India. We discuss his path from tech journalism and podcasting into serious historical scholarship, and explore the world of his latest book, Lords of Earth and Sea: A History of the Chola Empire (Juggernaut, 2025). Beginning with the origins of the Chola dynasty on the banks of the Kaveri river around 850 CE, we trace how a clan of humble agrarian origins rose to become one of the most powerful and far-reaching empires in Asian history—building temples that dwarfed all other structures on Earth (save the Pyramids). We discuss the essential role of women and queens in Chola statecraft, the extraordinary functioning of medieval South Indian village assemblies, the dynasty's spectacular temple patronage and famous bronze sculpture, and what ultimately led to its decline. We conclude by discussing his upcoming online course at Yogic Studies, YS 138, which offers students an accessible and richly illustrated four-week entry point into the Chola world.
Speaker Bio
Anirudh Kanisetti is a public historian specialising in the political, commercial, and cultural history of early medieval South India. He is the author of Lords of Earth and Sea: A History of the Chola Empire (Juggernaut, 2025) and the award-winning Lords of the Deccan: Southern India from the Chalukyas to the Cholas (Juggernaut, 2022). Drawing on epigraphy, art history, and literary material, his work reconstructs the shifting networks of kingship, trade, and religious patronage that shaped the Deccan and the Tamil country across half a millennium. His research has received support from Princeton University, the India Foundation for the Arts, and the Museum of Art and Photography, Bengaluru.
Kanisetti's broader scholarly practice spans institutional and editorial work. He served as Editor at the MAP Academy (now impART), where he contributed to the Encyclopedia of Art. He has also held fellowships  at the Takshashila Institution and the Deccan Heritage Foundation. His awards include the Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puraskar (2023), the Ramnath Goenka Sahitya Samman, and Tata Literature Live's Non-Fiction Book of the Year (2022).
A committed communicator of historical research, Kanisetti writes the Thinking Medieval column for ThePrint and hosts three podcasts — Echoes of India, YUDDHA: The Indian Military History Podcast, and The Altar of Time: A History of India's Christian Art. He has presented for the BBC and Arté. His work consistently foregrounds the material and epigraphic record to challenge colonial and nationalist framings of the subcontinent's past, making him a distinctive voice on the political and religious worlds of the Cholas and their contemporaries.
Links
YS 138 | Lords of Earth and Sea
Lords of Earth and Sea: A History of the Chola Empire (Juggernaut, 2025)
Lords of the Deccan: Southern India from the Chalukyas to the Cholas (Juggernaut, 2022)
Echoes of India, YUDDHA: The Indian Military History Podcast

In this episode, we speak to Dr. Giacomella Orofino about her decades of research in Indo-Tibetan religious traditions, and the fieldwork she has conducted across Nepal, Bhutan, and the Himalayan regions of India. We then turn to the centerpiece of this conversation: her recently published monograph, The Dawn of Physical Yoga: Dispelling the Hindrances to Immortality (Amṛtasaṃkaṭanibarhaṇa, Tib. 'Chi med kyi 'phrang sel), published by UniorPress in 2025 and available open access. This landmark study presents the first critical edition and annotated translation of a Tibetan yoga manual that Dr. Orofino identifies as one of the earliest known manuals of physical yoga in the Indo-Tibetan tradition. The text, attributed to the enigmatic mahāsiddha Amoghavajra, describes one hundred and eight dynamic physical exercises (yantra / 'khrul 'khor) designed to remove obstacles to the practice of the Amṛtasiddhi—itself regarded as the earliest Sanskrit source introducing foundational principles of haṭhayoga.
We explore the complex transmission lineages of the Amṛtasiddhi corpus, the authorship of Amoghavajra, the relationship between Vajrayāna Buddhist tantric practices and the emergence of haṭhayoga, and the broader significance of this text for our understanding of yoga history in both India and Tibet. We also discuss the connections between these practices and the Six Yogas of Nāropā, internal alchemical traditions, and the thirty-six obstacles.
We conclude by discussing Dr. Orofino's recent live course at Yogic Studies, YS 137 | The Dawn of Physical Yoga: New Discoveries in Tibetan Haṭhayoga, which she just completed teaching and which is now available for self-study enrollment.
Speaker Bio
Dr. Giacomella Orofino is a Full Professor at the University of Naples "L’Orientale", where she holds the Chair of Tibetan Language and Literature and the History and Cultures of Tibet and Himalayan Countries. Her research focuses on the history of Indo-Tibetan religious traditions, employing philology, textual criticism, and the history of religions as her primary methodological frameworks. A leading figure in the promotion of Tibetan studies in Italy, she is the co-founder and current President of AISTHiM (the Italian Association of Tibetan, Himalayan, and Mongolian Studies) and the founder and Director of the Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of Naples "L’Orientale".

Her scholarly work is primarily dedicated to the study of the Kālacakratantra, the Chöd tradition, Dzogchen, and the Bön religion, with a recent focus on the origins of physical yoga. Her latest monograph, The Dawn of Physical Yoga: Dispelling the Hindrances to Immortality (UniorPress, 2025), explores the early historical development of physical yoga through the study and translation of primary textual sources.
Links
YS 137 | The Dawn of Physical Yoga: New Discoveries in Tibetan Haṭhayoga
The Dawn of Physical Yoga: Dispelling the Hindrances to Immortality (UniorPress, 2025) — available open access
AISTHiM — Italian Association of Tibetan, Himalayan, and Mongolian Studies
Università di Napoli L'Orientale — Centre for Buddhist Studies