Philip Deslippe
Welcome.
I am a historian of American religion with a background in history, cultural studies, and literature, and am currently a doctoral candidate in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, finishing a dissertation on the early history of yoga in the United States from the mid-nineteenth to mid-twentieth century.
My research on Asian, metaphysical, and marginal religions in modern America has been presented in eleven countries and translated into nine languages including Japanese, Portuguese, and Romanian. I have published numerous articles and chapters for academic journals and edited volumes, written over two dozen articles for popular audiences, co-authored several investigative news features, and been interviewed for over two dozen podcasts. In 2011, I introduced a new and definitive edition of the metaphysical classic The Kybalion for Tarcher/Penguin.
Recently, I served as a historical and archival consultant and an on-camera subject matter expert on Kundalini Yoga and the Healthy, Happy, Holy Organization (3HO) for the 2024 docuseries Breath of Fire on HBO Max, and am co-creator and co-host of Temple of Steal, an unofficial companion podcast to Breath of Fire on Axis Mundi Media with Stacie Stukin.