Tag Archive for Buddhism

CFP: Buddhism and the Political Process, University of Toronto

10/12/2011 FYI No comments

The Department of Humanities, University of Toronto Scarborough
is pleased to present

A Call for Papers
The Tung Lin Kok Yuen Conference:

*BUDDHISM AND THE POLITICAL PROCESS*

April 13 – 15, 2012
University of Toronto Scarborough

For more infor­ma­tion: http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~humdiv/prg_bs.html**

The Weberian per­spec­tive on Buddhism as a tra­di­tion in “…oppo­si­tion to the spirit of pol­i­tics in its most acute form” has, despite a great deal of empir­i­cal evi­dence to the con­trary, held sway for a cen­tury. Silverstein’s view that “…Buddhists never made the intel­lec­tual leap from free­dom in the reli­gious realm to free­dom in the polit­i­cal world” is a good recent exam­ple of this way of thinking.

Yet reli­gious sys­tems are not iso­lated phe­nom­ena but aspects of the total cul­ture in which they are located. The apo­lit­i­cal read­ing of Buddhism has his­tor­i­cal roots coin­cid­ing with European colo­nial rule that, in the words of Paul Mus, was only aware of “a kind of rump Buddhist soci­ety.” It was also asso­ci­ated with a pri­mor­dial­ism that regarded Buddhism as a set of unchang­ing prac­tices, or clas­si­cal state­ments, tend­ing to sup­port a study of Buddhist his­tory con­ducted in purely Buddhist terms.

Buddhist polit­i­cal influ­ence has been strong in the con­tem­po­rary period. The elec­tion of nine Sri Lankan monks rep­re­sent­ing the *Jathika Hela Urumaya*(National Sinhala Heritage Party) to the national par­lia­ment in April 2004 and Myanmar’s 2007 “saf­fron rev­o­lu­tion” are glar­ing exam­ples. Less well known are the lob­by­ing activ­i­ties of the Buddha Light Mountain (*Foguangshan *) monas­tic order in Taiwan’s 1996 Presidential elec­tion or the role played
by promi­nent reli­gious per­son­al­i­ties in oust­ing the Thaksin Shinawatra gov­ern­ment in Thailand in 2006.

The pro­posed con­fer­ence aims to con­struct a bridge between the dis­ci­plines of Buddhist stud­ies and polit­i­cal sci­ence, with addi­tional con­tri­bu­tions from anthro­pol­o­gists, soci­ol­o­gists and his­to­ri­ans, on the rel­e­vance of Buddhist cat­e­gories and prac­tices for the polit­i­cal process. Read more

Assistant Professor, Chinese Buddhism, University of Toronto

09/16/2011 FYI No comments

JOB GUIDE NO.:
https://​www​.​h​-net​.org/​j​o​b​s​/​j​o​b​_​d​i​s​p​l​a​y​.​p​h​p​?​i​d​=​4​3​141

University of Toronto
Department for the Study of Religion and the Department of East Asian Studies

Assistant Professor (tenure stream), Chinese Buddhism

Institution Type: College / University
Location: Ontario, Canada
Position: Assistant Professor

The University of Toronto invites appli­ca­tions for a tenure stream posi­tion, Assistant Professor, located jointly in the Department for the Study of Religion (60%) and the Department of East Asian Studies (40%).

Candidates should have demon­strated exper­tise in one or more areas of research method­ol­ogy. Expertise in the rel­e­vant source lan­guages is essen­tial. Major area of spe­cial­iza­tion should be Chinese Buddhism. A PhD, excel­lent record of research and pub­li­ca­tion and excel­lence in teach­ing is required.

The suc­cess­ful can­di­date will teach under­grad­u­ate and grad­u­ate courses in both depart­ments on the St. George (down­town) cam­pus, total­ing two courses per semes­ter, and will be expected to con­tribute to a devel­op­ing doc­toral pro­gram in Buddhist Studies within the Department for the Study of Religion. Salary com­men­su­rate with qual­i­fi­ca­tions and experience.

For more infor­ma­tion about the depart­ment for the Study of Religion please visit our home page. For infor­ma­tion about the East Asian Studies Department please click here.

The University of Toronto offers the oppor­tu­nity to teach, con­duct research and live in one of the most diverse cities in the world. The University of Toronto is strongly com­mit­ted to diver­sity within its com­mu­nity and espe­cially wel­comes appli­ca­tions from vis­i­ble minor­ity group mem­bers, women, Aboriginal per­sons, per­sons with dis­abil­i­ties, mem­bers of sex­ual minor­ity groups and oth­ers who may con­tribute to fur­ther diver­si­fi­ca­tion of ideas. All qual­i­fied can­di­dates are encour­aged to apply; how­ever, Canadians and per­ma­nent res­i­dents will be given priority.

Contact: Qualified can­di­dates are encour­aged to apply online at
http://​www​.jobs​.utoronto​.ca/​f​a​c​u​l​t​y​.​htm
Job Number 1100719

Applicants should sub­mit as a sin­gle PDF file a let­ter of appli­ca­tion, cur­ricu­lum vitae and evi­dence of teach­ing effec­tive­ness. Arrange for three let­ters of ref­er­ence to be sent to Professor John S. Kloppenborg, Chair, Department for the Study of Religion, Jackman Humanities Building, Suite 309, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, M5R 2M8. Applications should be received by November 1, 2011. Candidates invited for an inter­view will be asked to send sam­ples of their pub­lished work. The appoint­ment will be effec­tive July 1, 2012.

Closing Date November 1, 2011

Website: http://​www​.reli​gion​.utoronto​.ca/​c​h​i​n​e​s​e​-​b​u​d​d​h​i​s​m​-3/
Primary Category: Religious Studies and Theology
Secondary Categories: East Asian History / Studies

Posting Date: 09/16/2011
Closing Date 11/01/2011

Tenured Professor, Japanese Buddhism, UC Berkeley

07/31/2011 FYI No comments

Tenured Professor, Japanese Buddhism

University of California — Berkeley, East Asian Languages and Cultures

Institution Type: College / University
Location: California, United States
Position: Tenure Track Faculty

Japanese Buddhism: The Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at the University of California, Berkeley, invites appli­ca­tions for a tenured posi­tion in Japanese Buddhism. The Department encour­ages inter­dis­ci­pli­nary approaches (anthro­pol­ogy, his­tory, lit­er­a­ture, reli­gious stud­ies, visual cul­ture), but all can­di­dates should have advanced facil­ity in the tex­tual tra­di­tions of Buddhism in Japan. Accordingly, exper­tise in both mod­ern and clas­si­cal Japanese (Bungo and Kanbun) is expected; can­di­dates should ide­ally have a strong grasp of at least one other lan­guage of the Asian Buddhist tra­di­tion as well (e.g. Chinese, Korean). The suc­cess­ful can­di­date is expected to con­tribute to the Department’s under­grad­u­ate and grad­u­ate pro­grams in Japanese stud­ies, as well as to the new under­grad­u­ate track in East Asian reli­gion and thought. In addi­tion, the can­di­date will be expected to con­tribute to teach­ing and advis­ing in the Group in Buddhist Studies Ph.D. pro­gram. This appoint­ment begins July 1, 2012.

Letter of appli­ca­tion, CV, teach­ing dossier (state­ment and syl­labi), sam­ple pub­li­ca­tions, and at least three let­ters of rec­om­men­da­tion should be sent as pdf files to: easearch@​berkeley.​edu, with “Japanese Buddhism search” in the sub­ject line. Alternatively, appli­ca­tion mate­ri­als may be sent by post to: Chair, Japanese Buddhism Search Committee, Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, 3413 Dwinelle Hall #2230, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720 – 2230. The appli­ca­tion dead­line is October 3, 2011; all mail sub­mis­sions must be post­marked by that date.

Instructions for let­ter writ­ers may be found at: http://​apo​.chance​.berke​ley​.edu/​e​v​a​l​l​t​r​.​h​tml. The University of California is an Affirmative Action, Equal Opportunity employer. The depart­ment seeks can­di­dates who share our com­mit­ment to diver­sity and inclu­sion in higher edu­ca­tion. UC Berkeley is com­mit­ted to address­ing the fam­ily needs of fac­ulty, includ­ing dual career cou­ples and sin­gle par­ents. Further infor­ma­tion on cam­pus resources may be found at: http://​calcierge​.berke​ley​.edu/.

Contact: easearch@​berkeley.​edu
Website: ealc​.berke​ley​.edu
Primary Category: Asian History / Studies
Secondary Categories: Religious Studies and Theology

Posting Date: 07/27/2011
Closing Date 10/03/2011

H-Net Review Publication: ‘Modern Korean Buddhism’

07/06/2011 Read No comments

Jin Y. Park, ed. Makers of Modern Korean Buddhism. Albany State University of New York Press, 2009. ix + 382 pp. $80.00 (cloth), ISBN 978−1−4384−2921−2; $29.95 (paper), ISBN 978−1−4384−2922−9.

Reviewed by Richard McBride (BYU-Hawaii)
Published on H-Buddhism (July, 2011)
Commissioned by A. Charles Muller

Modern Korean Buddhism

Makers of Modern Korean Buddhism brings together thir­teen wide-ranging essays on indi­vid­u­als and top­ics asso­ci­ated with the devel­op­ment and expe­ri­ence of Buddhism in mod­ern Korea. Jin Y. Park orga­nizes this col­lec­tion of essays in a roughly chrono­log­i­cal man­ner after sep­a­rat­ing the arti­cles under the three gen­eral sub­head­ings of (1) “Modernity, Colonialism, and Buddhist Reform,” (2) “Revival of Zen Buddhism in Modern Korea,” and (3) “Religion, History, and Politics.” Although six of the essays were pub­lished pre­vi­ously, all have been revised by the authors. Taken together, the essays pro­vide mul­ti­ple win­dows through which to view Korean Buddhism’s com­plex and mul­ti­fac­eted encounter with moder­nity, as well as demon­strat­ing the chang­ing norms of intel­lec­tual discourse.

Scholars of Korean Buddhism trained in Korea assess the his­tory of Korean Buddhism from the open­ing of Korea to for­eign influ­ences in the late Chosŏn (ca. 1876 – 1910)through the Japanese colo­nial period (1910−45) with a dif­fer­ent set of assump­tions and intel­lec­tual agen­das than schol­ars of Korean Buddhism trained in the West. Thus, the wide vari­ety of schol­arly approaches found in the book should be both chal­leng­ing and stim­u­lat­ing to read­ers inter­ested in ques­tions of the emer­gence of moder­nity and the evo­lu­tion of Buddhist doc­trine and prac­tice, as well as issues of Korean nation­al­ism. Jin Y. Park’s intro­duc­tion does an admirable job in con­tex­tu­al­iz­ing the main themes cov­ered in the book: Buddhist reform move­ments, the revival of Sŏn/Zen Buddhism, the Buddhist encounter with mod­ern intel­lec­tual ideas and views, and the recon­sid­er­a­tion of Buddhism and moder­nity in Korea.

This col­lec­tion of essays should cause stu­dents of Korean Buddhism trained in the West to rethink the received aca­d­e­mic under­stand­ing of the sig­nif­i­cance and his­tory of Korean Buddhism dur­ing the late Chosŏn and Japanese colo­nial peri­ods. Hitherto, schol­ar­ship on this period of Korean his­tory has cen­tered on the sem­i­nal issues of the reform and devel­op­ment of Korean Buddhism, and nation­al­ism. In other words, the peo­ple who have been stud­ied pri­mar­ily are those Buddhist monks who pub­lished essays describ­ing how the Buddhist church in Korea should reform and mod­ern­ize, regard­less of their actual influ­ence. Also, the issue of nation­al­ism has been para­mount. Buddhists, both monks and lay peo­ple, who played sig­nif­i­cant roles in pol­i­cy­mak­ing, schol­ar­ship, or prac­tice, have been labeled either as col­lab­o­ra­tors with the Japanese or as nation­al­is­tic patri­ots, nei­ther of which labels com­prise a fruit­ful approach to truly under­stand­ing who the most influ­en­tial Buddhists were dur­ing this trou­bled time period.

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