Natasha Heller is a Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow, 2006-08. She specializes in the intellectual and religious history of China, with a particular focus on the intersection of Buddhism and literati culture. She received her Ph.D. (November 2005) from the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations at Harvard University, with a dissertation on the Chan monk Zhongfeng Mingben (1263-1323) and his literati followers. Other research interests include religion and the state, material culture, and concepts of law and justice in imperial China.