Keith Edward Cantú

Keith Edward Cantú is an academic, musician, and polyglot with a deep professional and personal interest in South Asian religion and spirituality. He completed a PhD in Religious Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and currently holds the post of Assistant Professor (postdoctoral research associate) at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków.

He has both extensively researched and directly engaged Baul Fakiri, Tamil Śaiva, and other tantric currents over the course of his eleven years of fieldwork in and writing on India and Bangladesh, and also has a personal and professional interest in esotericism more broadly.

Publications include his forthcoming monograph on the yoga of Sri Sabhapati Swami, City of Mirrors: Songs of Lālan Sā̃i (OUP, 2017), “Islamic Esotericism in the Bengali Bāul Songs of Lālan Fakir,” and a forthcoming translation of the “Eighth Instruction” of a Sanskrit alchemical text called the Rasāyanakhaṇḍa about the alchemical wonders of Śrīśailam. He feels privileged to contribute to this dialogue and exchange with participants at Esalen.