[Blog] “‘How to Milk a Painted Cow’: Considering the Buddhist View of Emptiness”: A Lecture by Khenpo Chöying Dorjee at UBC, February 28, 2019

By Sarah FinkOn February 28, 2019, Khenpo Chöying Dorjee gave a talk titled, “‘How to Milk a Painted Cow’: Considering the Buddhist View of Emptiness.” This lecture was co-sponsored by the University of British Columbia’s Robert H. N. Ho Foundation Program in Buddhism and Contemporary Society and the Himalaya Program, with support from the Khyentse …

[Opportunity] 2018 Khyentse Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow in Tibetan Buddhist Studies at UBC

The Department of Asian Studies, University of British Columbia (Vancouver campus), invites applications for the Khyentse Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship in Tibetan Buddhist Studies. The Department of Asian Studies has strengths in a number of areas, including East Asian and South Asian history, religion, literary culture and thought. The interdisciplinary UBC Himalaya Program brings together faculty …

[Blog] “Unbalanced Flows in the Subtle Body”: A Talk by Professor Geoffrey Samuel

By Ryan Jones and Jingjing Li (McGill University) This semester, McGill’s School of Religious Studies (SRS) had the honor to invite Professor Geoffrey Samuel from Cardiff University and University of Sydney, as the annual Numata Visiting Scholar of 2017. With the support of the Numata foundation, SRS and McGill’s Division of Social and Transcultural Psychiatry, …

[Conference] UofT: Hidden Lands in Himalayan Myth and History: Transformations of Beyul (sBas yul) through Time (December 15–17, 2017)

Convened by Dr. Frances Garrett, Professor Geoffrey Samuel, Elizabeth McDougal and Ian Baker. Sponsored by the Robert H.N. Ho Family Foundation Centre for Buddhist Studies at the University of Toronto, the Body, Health and Religion Research Group of Cardiff University, and the Bukkyo Dendo Kyokai Yehan Numata Program in Buddhist Studies at the University of Toronto. …

[Blog] A Reflection on Two Lectures in the “Buddha and the Other” Lecture Series (Oct 19 & 26, 2017)

By Jingjing Li October, McGill University’s Centre for Research on Religion (CREOR) organized two lectures on the theme of “Buddha and the Other.” On October 19th, Professor Arvind Sharma’s talk investigated the relationship between Hinduism and Buddhism. The following Thursday, Professor Lara Braitstein enquired into the differences and distinctions presented in the narrative of the history of …

[Blog] Spontaneous Presence: The Rapid Normalization of Padmasambhava’s Iconography in Image (and Text)

By Julia Stenzel A Talk by Professor Daniel Hirshberg on October 20, 2017 at McGill University Students of the history of Tibetan Buddhism are familiar with the renowned tantrika Padmasambhava and his eminent role in establishing Buddhism throughout the kingdoms of the Himalaya in the eighth century. They also learn that Padmasambhava is venerated by …

[Public Talk] UBC: Searching for the Right Buddha: Procedures for Locating Incarnations (tulkus) in Tibetan Historical Literature (October 16, 2017)

UBC Himalaya Program is hosting a talk which will consider the topic of incarnate lamas (tulkus)—births of the same awakened consciousness in successive human bodies. It will focus particularly on the practices used to locate subsequent incarnations of deceased Tibetan lamas. These practices involve analyzing prophecies and divinations, as well as evaluating child tulku candidates in a …

Requesting Energy to Realize Emptiness: A Structural Analysis of Losang Chokyi Gyaltsan’s Guru Pūjā

Christopher Emory-Moore, PhD Candidate, Religious Studies, University of Waterloo. This paper is based on a chapter of my M.A. thesis, The Systematic Dynamics of Guru Yoga in Euro-North American Gelug-pa Formations, supervised by Dr. James Apple at the University of Calgary and published in 2012 as Tibetan Guru, Western Disciple (Saarbrucken: LAP Lambert). Introduction: Since …

[Event Announcement] UBC Public Lecture: The Science of Healing: Tibetan Medicine as Local Practice, National Heritage, and Global Brand (Nov.7, 2016)

Often translated as ‘the science of healing’ (sowa rigpa), Tibetan medicine is at once a diverse system of healing with ancient roots extending out from the Tibetan Plateau and a modern, globalizing ‘alternative’ therapeutics. The contemporary practice of Tibetan medicine is enmeshed within multiple, and sometimes conflicting, agendas: from the need to conserve medicinal plants …

[Blog] HH Chamgon Kenting Tai Situpa on The Relevance of Tibetan Buddhism in the 21st Century

By Shanshan Zhao The development of technology and urbanization in the contemporary society has set more people free from farm and traditional labor. Worries and concerns have been raised towards this rapid progress, yet many Buddhist teachers regard it as an advantage for the spread and practice of Buddhism. On May 15th, 2016, His Holiness …