growing up cult 2009

NEWS RELEASE

Immediate: October 2, 2009 Contact: Alicia Steger: 516.572.9634 E-mail: alicia.steger@ncc.edu  

The Fall 2009 Nassau Community College Cultural Program Presents My Fall From Grace: a Memoir of Growing Up Cult Jayanti Tamm

November 2

Garden City, NY – The Fall 2009 Cultural Program at Nassau Community College is proud to present Jayanti Tamm, former member of the cult of Sri Chimnoy, on Monday, November 2 at 11:00 a.m. in the College Center Building. During My Fall From Grace: a Memoir of Growing Up Cult, Tamm will speak about her childhood as a member of the cult and her struggle to leave it.

From the time of her birth, Jayanti Tamm was declared the chosen disciple in the cult of Guru Sri Chimnoy. Tamm lived inside the confines of the Guru’s inner circle, shuttling between her family’s home, Sri Chimnoy’s Connecticut headquarters and his ashram in Queens, New York. Sri Chimnoy assigned Tamm to court celebrities, infiltrate the United Nations and find elephants for him to weight lift. At the age of 25, after multiple attempts to leave, she was permanently exiled from the group. After graduating from Queens College, she received an M.F.A. in creative writing from American University in Washington, D.C. Following graduation, Tamm had a number of stories published in literary journals, and in 2000 she was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Currently an English professor at Ocean County College, Tamm lives in New Jersey with her husband and daughter.

For more information about My Fall From Grace: a Memoir of Growing Up Cult, which is free and open to the public, call 516.572.7153.

About Nassau Community College

Nassau Community College, a division of the State University of New York, is an institution where over 23,000 full- and part-time students and nearly 15,000 continuing and professional students start and continue their successful journey through higher education. More than 65 fields of study are offered on a 225-acre campus located in the center of Long Island. As the largest single-campus two-year college in New York State, Nassau Community College maintains a national reputation for excellence. For more information, visit www.ncc.edu.

 

 

 

Ref: 1406.10/7/09 e-mail