Participants: Department of Religious Studies

Participants

Antonio Terrone is an associate professor of instruction in the Asian Languages and Cultures Department. As a student of Tibetan Buddhist culture in contemporary China, his research focuses on the political history of Tibetan Buddhism. He is also interested in ethnic and religious policies, and ethno-religious violence in China. Before joining Northwestern, he served as an Assistant Professor of Tibetan Buddhist Studies at National Chengchi University in Taipei, Taiwan. His current projects include the rise of chögar in Eastern Tibet, the terma tradition in present day Tibet, and the life and work of the Tenth Panchen Lama Chokyi Gyaltsen. He has studied and worked extensively in numerous Asian countries including India, China and Tibetan areas, Nepal, and Taiwan. He has conducted fieldwork in various chögar and ritrö in Khams and Amdo (Qinghai and Sichuan) between 1998 and 2016.

Aaron McNeil is a PhD student in Buddhist Studies at Northwestern Un

iversity. His research interests focus on local cosmologies of the environment in the Tibetan region and how political, economic, and cultural forces influence environmental policies, resource management, and societal perceptions of nature. He received his BA in Religious Studies and Biology from Brown University and MA in Religious Studies from Naropa University. His advisor is Sarah Jacoby.

Cara Snajc

zuk is a doctoral student in Religious Studies at Northwestern University. She received her B.A. in Theology and Philosophy from Boston College, previouslystudied Buddhist Philosophy at Rangjung Yeshe Institute, and received her M.Div. from Harvard Divinity School. Her research focuses on Tibetan Buddhist literature and poetry, ritual and contemplative practice, and scriptural transmission and revelation. Cara is advised by Professor Sarah Jacoby.

Carmen Simioli is a postdoc researcher at “L’Orientale” University of Naples, where she completed her Ph.D. in Indological and Tibetological studies in 2015. Her doctoral dissertation focused on the history and literature of Tibetan mercurial alchemy and iatrochemistry. From 2006 to 2008 she lived in Lhasa, where she concluded the two years course of Tibetan Language (Certificate of Advanced Knowledge of Modern Tibetan) at Tibet University (Xizang Daxue). She has served as interpreter for Tibetan lamas and doctors since 2011. Her research focuses on the historical interactions of Buddhism and medical traditions in Tibet. Her project intends to evaluate role of Buddhist tantric medicine in the development of Tibetan nosology and ritualised pharmacology. She is member and cofounder of the Italian Association of Tibetan, Himalayan and Mongolian Studies (AISTHiM)

Darcie Price-Wallace received her Ph.D. in Religious Studies at Northwestern University, where she completed her dissertation entitled, “Telling Stories Differently: Changing Landscapes of Ordination for Buddhist Monastic Women in the Tibetan Tradition.” She also holds an MA in History of Religions and an MA in Social Work from the University of Chicago. She completed fieldwork in Buddhist monasteries in the northwestern Himalayan regions of India under a Fulbright-Nehru Student Grant and her dissertation under a Khyentse Foundation Doctoral Student Award. Her research examines textual narratives and oral histories of ordained Himalayan and Tibetan women alongside a contemporary ordination movement for female monastics, paying attention to how such rhetoric is relevant for sustaining present day monastic communities. She teaches anthropology on Carleton’s Buddhist Studies in India program.

Dhondup Tashi Rekjong is a doctoral student in Buddhist Studies with a strong background in Tibetan history, language, and literature. He was born in Rebkong in the Amdo region of Tibet. When he was sixteen, he escaped Tibet, crossing the Himalayas on foot into Nepal. Since then, he has studied in India, Norway, the US and Canada. His research concentration lies broadly at the intersections of religion, history, culture, and language. He is primarily interested in the life-writing literature of the 20th century Tibet. Before arriving at Northwestern, he received an MA from the University of British Columbia. His advisor is Sarah Jacoby.

Drukgyel Tsering is currently pursuing a PhD at the Centre of Buddhist Studies, the University of Hong Kong, with a focus on translating and critically analyzing Rendawa Shönnu Lodrö’s seminal treatise called “The Moonlight for the Essential Point: Distinguishing the Two Truth” (Bden gnyis rnam par 'byed pa gnad kyi zla zer). His research interests include Indo-Tibetan Madhyamaka philosophy, polemical literature, biography, the history of the Tibetan empire, and
the intellectual history of Tibet.

Elodie Pascal is a Ph.D. student at the University of Edinburgh. After graduating from the Ecole du Louvre in Art History in 2013, she started a research master’s degree at the same institution, focusing on Japanese Buddhist sculpture, especially dry lacquer statues from the Nara period and Amida Nyorai’s representations from the Heian period. In order to develop her linguistic skills, she then started a new formation in Japanese Language and Civilization at INALCO (Paris) in 2015, during which she spent one year in Kyoto (2018-2019). During this year abroad, Elodie began reading about objects placed inside Japanese Buddhist sculptures, (zōnai nōnyūhin), then decided that this subject would become the focus of her doctoral studies. I am now in first year at the University of Edinburgh, working on this topic under the supervision of Dr. Halle O'Neal and Dr. Ian Astley.

Joshua Brallier is a doctoral candidate in Buddhist Studies at Northwestern University. His dissertation research considers the gendered dimensions of tantric ritual, narrative, and ideology in Tibetan Vajrayāna Buddhism, with particular interest in the role of masculinity in tantric Buddhist subject formation. His dissertation focuses on the life and writings of Do Khyentsé Yeshé Dorjé, the deer-hunting, alcohol-drinking, gun-wielding tantric master from the Golok region of eastern Tibet. He holds an M.A. in Buddhist Studies from the University of Colorado Boulder, an M.Div. in Indo-Tibetan Buddhism from Naropa University, and a B.A. in Religious Studies from Georgetown. He is advised by Sarah Jacoby.

Kevin Buckelew is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Northwestern University, and specializes in the study of Chinese Buddhism. His book in progress focuses on the Chan Buddhist tradition in Song-dynasty China, and asks how Chan Buddhists understood Chan mastery to entail not just skill in meditation (as the word chan literally implies), but the full realization of buddhahood. Thematically, his research explores how religious identities take shape and assume social authority, how materiality and embodiment figure into Buddhist soteriology, and how Buddhists have grappled with the problem of human agency. He has performed research in China, Taiwan, and Japan with the support of grants from the Fulbright program and the Bukkyo Dendo Kyokai.

Lugyal Bum is a Ph.D. student in Religious Studies at Northwestern University. His research interests lie at the intersection of media and religion, specifically how digital media shape Buddhist practices in contemporary Tibetan society. Additionally, he is interested in learning how ecology and Tibetan Buddhism have interacted in the past and present. He received his MA in Cultural Sustainability from Goucher College in Maryland and his BA in English (Tibetan) from Qinghai Normal University in China. His advisor is Sarah Jacoby.

Madhuvanti Bandyopadhyay is a doctoral student in the Institute for Indology and Central Asian Studies at the University of Leipzig, Germany. She had completed her bachelor's, master's and M.Phil. degrees in Sanskrit from Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India. She specialized in Indian Philosophy during her master's. Her area of research interest is Mahāyāna Buddhism. Her PhD topic focuses on the study of non-duality as found in Mahāyāna tradition, with a special focus on Yogācāra. She is doing her PhD under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Jowita Kramer. Madhuvanti’s broader research interests include the philosophical history of Buddhism in India, Tibet, and China, the study of meditative practices in Mahāyāna Buddhism, and the comparative analysis between Buddhist philosophy and other Indian philosophical systems.

Matthew Drew is a doctoral student in Religious Studies at Northwestern University studying under Professor Sarah Jacoby. They are interested in questions of state formation, secularity, and subjectivity with a specific focus on how Tibetan monasteries shaped Tibetans’ economic, judicial, and social lives in the first half of the 20th century. By examining how various functions of monasteries were contested and reorganized, they hope to elucidate competing Tibetan modes of ordering (what we might otherwise call) religion and the state. Their other interests include affect theory and embodiment, and the automation of the cataloguing and analysis of scholarly materials. They received a B.A in Religious Studies and Psychology from Washington University in St. Louis in 2017, and an M.A. in Religious Studies from the University of Virginia in 2021.

Meng Xiaoqiang hails from Zhejiang, China. Thanks to the generous support of Khyentse Foundation, he is a Ph.D. candidate in the Institute for Area Studies, Leiden University, the Netherlands. Trained in Chinese history during my BA period, he decided to turn to the Buddhist Studies for his MA. This was partly because he was brought up by his grandparents who were pious believers of Pure Land Buddhism, and their daily chanting of Sukhāvatīvyūha Sūtra made him feel secure and comforted. Also, his keen interests in Sanskrit literature led him to Buddhist study. During his MA degree, he worked part-time as a traveling guide along the Silk Road in Northwest China, explaining its historical and cultural significance, as well as its relevance to Buddhism. Luckily, it was a great honor for Meng that he finally made a pilgrimage tour to Lhasa last August. For Meng, Buddhism is a perpetual shelter and hometown preserving his inner self.

Miranda Smith is a doctoral candidate in Buddhist Studies at Northwestern University. Her research interests focus on Tibetan literature, especially autobiography and poetry, as well as gender studies, women and Buddhism, affect studies, and poetics. Her dissertation examines modern poetry from Amdo, Tibet and the diaspora, focusing on a poetry collection by a female Tibetan poet who resided in India in the 1990’s. She is interested in how modern Tibetan poets sustain, depart from and reinvent Tibetan literary tradition, as well as questions related to poetry and biography. She is also interested in poetry as a technology of the self. Before arriving at Northwestern, she received an MTS from Harvard Divinity School, an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Texas at El Paso, and a BA from Mount Holyoke College. Her advisor is Sarah Jacoby.

Nisheeta Jagtiani is a Ph.D. candidate at Northwestern University’s Religious Studies Department. Her research interests lie in the relationship between religion and politics as well as the affect religion has on both elites and commoners. Her dissertation investigates sectarianism and rimé (non-sectarianism) in Tibetan Buddhism. She examines the biographies and works of Tibet’s renowned rimé figures such as Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo, Khyentse Choyki Lodro, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama and Dzongsar Khyentse. Her doctoral research is informed by diaspora studies, psychology of religion and lived religion. Engaging in both ethnographic fieldwork and textual research, Nisheeta is motivated by study and work in Kham (East Tibet) and in Tibetan settlements in India such as Dharamsala, Chauntra and Bylakuppe. Before joining Northwestern, Nisheeta completed her M.A. in Religious Studies from the University of Chicago (2016).

Pema McLaughlin is a doctoral student in Religious Studies at Northwestern University, focusing on Tibetan Buddhism under Professor Sarah Jacoby. They are currently interested in 19th and 20th century Tibetan textual and ritual models (particularly the sngon 'gro or preliminary practices) for how people begin the Buddhist path, and the role of such practices in religious life for Tibetan Buddhist communities globally. Other research concerns include the scholarly and religious discourse surrounding Buddhism in America, the consequences of modernity as a category shaping religious communities, and the role of affect and emotion in Buddhist practice and interpretation. Pema received a B.A. in Religious Studies from Reed College; their article "Imagining Buddhist modernism: the shared religious categories of scholars and American Buddhists," published in Religion, was adapted from their thesis. Pema has an M.A. in Buddhist Studies from the University of Oxford, where they studied via a Rhodes Scholarship.

Ray Buckner is a Ph.D. Student in Religious Studies at Northwestern University. His dissertation project, titled “Flowers, Fashion, and Film: Artistic Foundations of Queer and Transgender Buddhism,” analyzes the interventions of queer and transgender Thai Buddhist artists in Bangkok and Berlin. Analyzing vanguard films, paintings, flower arrangements, fashion, and drag performances, Ray’s project traces how queer and trans artists at once inherit and subvert orthodox Thai Buddhist views on queer desire and trans embodiment—forging their own Thai Buddhist practices that affirm queer and trans lives. Ray received his MA in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies from The Ohio State University. He has published peer-reviewed articles in The Journal of Global Buddhism and Religion. He has also published academic essays in American Religion and The Revealer. In his free time, Ray writes for Lion’s Roar Magazine, Buddhadharma: The Practitioner's Quarterly, and The Institute of Buddhist Studies’ Ten Thousand Things Blog. Ray is advised by Robert Orsi.

Sarah H. Jacoby is an associate professor in the Religious Studies Department at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. She specializes in Tibetan Buddhist studies, with research interests in Buddhist revelation (gter ma), religious auto/biography, Tibetan literature, gender and sexuality, the history of emotions, and the history of eastern Tibet. She is the author of Love and Liberation: Autobiographical Writings of the Tibetan Buddhist Visionary Sera Khandro (Columbia University Press, 2014), co-author of Buddhism: Introducing the Buddhist Experience (Oxford University Press, 2014), and co-editor of Buddhism Beyond the Monastery: Tantric Practices and their Performers in Tibet and the Himalayas (Brill, 2009). Currently she is working on a full Tibetan-English translation of Sera Khandro’s autobiography, as well as writing about motherhood in Tibetan Buddhism, among other projects. At Northwestern she teaches a range of Buddhist Studies courses for both undergraduate and graduate students, and seeks to strengthen the academic study of Buddhism.

Sherab Wangmo is a Ph.D. candidate in the Religious Studies department at Northwestern University. She was born in Khri-ka in the Amdo region of Tibet. Her research focuses on women in Tibetan Buddhism. More specifically, she is interested in exploring how Tibetan laywomen practice religion in various ways, sometimes innovative ways to advance their religious goals. She considers the cultural, social, and economic factors contributing to the mass interest in practicing religion among Tibetan laywomen by studying the laywomen’s religious practices on the ground. She also focuses on the intersection of religion and media in this new age to understand how media facilitates their practices in different settings. Prior to coming to Northwestern, she received an MA from the University of Colorado Boulder and a BA from the Minzu University of China in Beijing. Her advisor is Sarah Jacoby.

Somstobum is a Ph.D. student in Religious Studies at Northwestern University. She is primarily interested in gender and Buddhism, particularly as they transpire in emerging media practices and contemporary Tibetan literature in both Tibetan and Chinese languages in Amdo, Northeastern Tibet. Somtsobum received an M.A. in Buddhist Studies from the University of Colorado Boulder where she examined the life and times of Lamo Yongzin Rinpoche to explore the revitalization of Tibetan Buddhist identity in Amdo during the Post-Mao era. She completed her B.A. at Qinghai Nationalities University in China. Her advisor is Sarah Jacoby.

Tanner McAlister is a doctoral student in the Group in Buddhist Studies at U.C. Berkeley. His research centers on the Tibetan Treasure (gter ma) tradition broadly, and the literary corpus of the fourteenth century Treasure Revealer (gter ston) Orgyen Lingpa in particular: the Chronicle of Padmasambhava (padma bka’ thang) and the Fivefold Chronicles (bka’ thang sde lnga). He is interested in how apocryphal, revisionist historical narratives convey the relevance of the past to present concerns while establishing their legitimacy in relation to preexisting canonical histories. His research aims to contextualize the religious and political influence of these works throughout Tibetan history within broader Religious Studies discussions on historical consciousness and the politics of memory. Prior to coming to U.C. Berkeley, Tanner received an MTS from the Harvard Divinity School and bachelor’s degrees in Religious Studies and Economics at Utah State University. Tanner has also studied at the Rangjung Yeshe Institute, and spent the past year teaching Classical Tibetan translation for the Sarnath International Nyingma Institute.

Thabiso Bustraan is a PhD candidate in Tibetan Buddhism at the Centre of Buddhist Studies at the University of Hong Kong. Their research topic is on the six-syllable mantra OṂ MAṆI PADME HŪṂ as it was used by the 12th century Tibetan treasure revealer Myang Ral Nyima Özer (Myang ral nyi ma ’od zer) in a chapter from the third volume of the Maṇi Kabum (Ma ṇi bka’ ’bum). Tibetan editions identify this chapter as Instructions Pertaining to the Six-Syllable Mantra (yi ge druk pa’i zhal gdams kyiskor). The content is entirely devoted towards praising the mantra and presenting it as the common denominator binding together core concepts of the Mahāyāna and Vajrayāna traditions, arranging them in a framework informed by the Dzogchen Mind
Series. It establishes Tibet and its people as descendants of “Great Compassion” (thugs rje chen po) personified by the bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara as well as his alleged emanation, emperor Songtsen Gampo (6-7th century), as his unique representative bringing these instructions into the world. Before taking up Buddhist Studies in Hong Kong, Thabiso was an Indologist studying classical Sanskrit and material from the Brahminical and Śaiva traditions, as well as classical Indian history and culture more broadly.

Udita Das is a doctoral student in Religious Studies at Northwestern University. She is interested in Indian Buddhism with a particular focus on Pali and Sanskrit narrative literature. She has previously completed her B.A. in History from the University of Calcutta, M.A. in History and M.Phil. in Buddhist Studies from the University of Delhi. She is also the editor of Indian Buddhism for the Digital Orientalist. Her advisor is Mark McClish.

Yannick Lambert is a doctoral student in Religious Studies in the Hinduism track focusing on legal and political traditions (dharmaśāstra, arthaśāstra) in pre-modern South Asia. He is also more broadly interested in South Asian religions, Sanskrit literature, philosophy, and politics. Prior to joining Northwestern, he completed an undergraduate M.A. in Religious Studies at the University of Edinburgh, an M.Phil in Classical Indian Religion at the University of Oxford, and a PGDip in Global Diplomacy at SOAS University of London. He also worked as a journalist in his native Luxembourg. His advisor is Mark McClish.