Ghent Centre for Buddhist Studies

Below, please find information on an upcoming workshop:

Intensive Teaching Program Winter School in BUDDHIST TEXTUAL SCHOLARSHIP

CHIANG MAI, 24 FEBRUARY–1 MARCH 2025

Co-organized by the École Pratique des Hautes Études-PSL, theÉcole française d’Extrême-Orient, and the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München.

Prof. Christoph Anderl has been visiting universities in the Lanzhou, Chengdu, and Hangzhou areas, giving lectures, conducting field research, and meeting with colleagues and some of his former and future PhD students.

GCBS professor Charles DiSimone participated in a stimulating workshop in Munich this week on the Mūlasarvāstivāda Buddhist tradition.

Some scenes from the Diverse Lives conference at Musée royal de Mariemont. If you missed this absolutely wonderful conference you can still see the inspiring BOUDDHA. L'EXPÉRIENCE DU SENSIBLE exhibition until next April. We can only recommend a visit.

We are pleased to announce a public talk by Nicholas Witkowski on Oct 3 (next Thursday) titled "Monastic Monsters: Historicizing Outcaste Characters in the Grotesquerie of Indian Buddhist Literature". The talk is in person and online so if you're interested please join! Details may be found on the poster below or via this link: https://networks.h-net.org/group/announcements/20044848/talk-monastic-monsters-historicizing-outcaste-characters-grotesquerie

Some pictures from the opening night of the Bouddha exhibit co-organized by Professor Ann Heirman of GCBS!

GCBS professor Charles DiSimone will speak at the 2024 5th Seoul International Meditation Expo this week held at Dongguk University in Seoul, Korea. https://mind.dongguk.edu/front/scholarship/scholarship01.php

The Ghent Centre for Buddhist Studies (GCBS) (www.cbs.ugent.be ), is seeking candidates for postdoctoral fellowships which run between 3 and potentially 6 years. This fellowship is open to scholars worldwide. There are two fellowship opportunities: the Junior FWO Postdoctoral Fellowship, which is open to those who have received their PhDs within the past three years and the Senior FWO Postdoctoral Fellowship, which is open to those who have received their PhD no earlier than three years ago and no later than six.

networks.h-net.org

Articles from two GCBS researchers have just been published in the Journal of Chinese Buddhist Studies. One by Prof. Heirman "Buddhist Monasteries and (Their) Oxen: Daoxuan’s Vinaya Commentaries" and another by FWO postdoctoral fellow Mariia Lepneva: “Institutional Adaptation of Chinese Buddhism to the Ming-Qing Transition: Two-Lineage Model of Guangji Monastery in Beijing.” The article explores the seventeenth-century history of Guangji Monastery 廣濟寺, which is nowadays the seat of the Buddhist Association of China. Using social network analysis, it unveils the unique institutional arrangement at the monastery that housed a local tonsure lineage, a group of Vinaya experts, a monk famous for his austerities, and a famous Chan master.

Zhejiang Normal University released a report on GCBS Prof. Christoph Anderl's recent visit.

Below, please find information on an exhibition on Buddha's life which is organised by the Royal Museum of Mariemont, in collaboration with GCBS:

2024-2025 • Sensing the Buddha - Musée Royal de Mariemont - Administration Générale de la Culture - Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles description pour le site prefixe_site

A new publication from GCBS's Professor Charles DiSimone: Manuscript Discoveries at Mes Aynak. The article is the first examination of important new Buddhist manuscripts recently excavated in Afghanistan and is the inaugural publication in his ERC funded Gandhāra Corpora project.

www.academia.edu

We have some great postdoctoral opportunities this year. Anyone interested in Buddhist Studies is welcome to reach out.

A new publication from GCBS professor Charles DiSimone: PERFECT AWAKENING: AN EDITION AND TRANSLATION OF THE PRĀSĀDIKA AND PRASĀDANĪYA SŪTRAS.

SHARE IN THE DISCOVERY OF A RARE MŪLASARVĀSTIVĀDA MANUSCRIPT

Wisdom is happy to announce the publication of PERFECT AWAKENING: AN EDITION AND TRANSLATION OF THE PRĀSĀDIKA AND PRASĀDANĪYA SŪTRAS by Charles DiSimone. The present volume is the first in a three-volume series, called DĪRGHĀGAMA STUDIES, to present this rare manuscript, with a study, translation, and critical edition of two of the sūtras in the collection, and is available only from Wisdom.

These sūtras from the Mūlasarvāstivāda tradition are made available to the public for the first time in over a thousand years with philological reconstructions and translations. They are accompanied by synoptic parallels from the corresponding Pali Long Discourses of the Theravāda tradition and the Chinese Long Discourses of the Dharmaguptaka tradition along with citations and related passages from elsewhere in Buddhist literature. In addition, the work contains a full transliteration of the birchbark folios, an introduction to the two sūtras with a study providing paleographic and textual analysis of the manuscript, and notes providing insight and explanation throughout.

“A giant step towards opening up the hitherto hidden treasures of Buddhism’s rich scriptural heritage.
—Peter Skilling, author of BUDDHA’S WORDS FOR TOUGH TIMES

Learn more and get your copy at https://rebrand.ly/Dirghagma-Studies-Vol-1

A week of intense program in the framework of the Ghent Doctoral School "Chinese Buddhist Iconography and Manuscript Culture" is coming to a conclusion. We are thankful to our sponsors, the Ghent Doctoral Schools, and the Frogbear project "From the Ground Up: Buddhism and East Asian Religions". This time, the instructors were Michelle Wang, Wendy Yu, Lia Wei, Kira Johansen, Ann Heirman, and Christoph Anderl (organiser). Doctoral and postdoctoral researchers from various universities participated!
More photos will follow soon!

This is a short reminder that registration for the event below is closing tomorrow night!
For those who have not registered yet, please follow this link:

From the Ground Up: Buddhism and East Asian Religions Buddhism & East Asian Religions

SECOND announcement of a lecture series (June 22-23) aimed at the GENERAL PUBLIC, organised by the Department of Languages and Cultures, Ghent University and the Frogbear Project "From the Ground Up: Buddhism and East Asian Religions".
Participation can be both in-person and online.
PLEASE USE THE LINK PROVIDED ON THE POSTER TO REGISTER FOR THE EVENT!
https://frogbear.org/asian-buddhism-text-art-and-practice
The website also includes abstracts of the presentations.

First announcement of a lecture series (June 22-23) aimed at the GENERAL PUBLIC, organised by the Department of Languages and Cultures, Ghent University and the Frogbear Project "From the Ground Up: Buddhism and East Asian Religions".
Participation can be both in-person and online.

Below, please find information on an upcoming conference on Theravada Buddhism at Oxford University.
The lecture by Kira Johansen and Christoph Anderl will also introduce aspects of the GCBS-led fieldwork in Bangkok, investigating Guanyin temples, in the framework of the FROGBEAR project "From the Ground Up: Buddhism and East Asian Religions".

We are hiring! A four year doctoral fellowship is available in the European Research Council funded Gandhāra Corpora project led by Professor Charles DiSimone.

Doctoral fellow Doctoral fellow Doctoral fellow Last application date May 24, 2024 00:00 Department LW21 - Department of Languages and Cultures Contract Limited duration Degree MA Occupancy rate 100% Vacancy type Research staff Job description Doctoral Fellowship in the ERC Funded Gandhāra Corpora Project at Ghent...

This is a reminder that on Saturday, April 20th, 15:00-17:00 CET, the GCBS led research cluster "Typologies of Text-Image Relations" ("From the Ground Up: Buddhism and East Asian Religions" project) will present its results of the fieldwork activities of 2022 (virtual fieldwork: Sichuan sites) and 2023 (Chinese Temples in Bangkok).
Speakers include Prof. Christoph Anderl, Dr. Wendy Sau Ling Yu, Ms. Kira Johansen, Dr. Anna Sokolova, and PhD researcher Massimiliano Portoghese.

The meeting can be joined via the following link:
https://ubc.zoom.us/j/67125050290?pwd=NjlYemtRbDFiQ3NaQWYySXhGUDAyZz09

For more information, see https://frogbear.org/from-the-ground-to-the-cloud/

From the Ground Up: Buddhism and East Asian Religions Buddhism & East Asian Religions

CORRECTION OF THE ORIGINAL POST:

PLEASE NOTE THAT THERE ARE TWO LECTURES BY DR. HUANG GIVEN IN THE NETHERLANDS!
(1) April 17, 2024 (15:15-17:00): Hulsewé-Wazniewski Foundation at Leiden University of Virginia Tibet Center
(2) April 19, 2014 (15:00-17:00): University Library, Address Witte Singel 27, 2311 BG Leiden

Below, please find information concerning an upcoming lectures of Prof. Dr. Shih-shan Susan Huang:
https://www.kvvak.nl/en/agenda/2024/lecture-dr-shih-shan-susan-huang/?fbclid=IwAR1suqJSgIO886N-_z6-Ms-TSmFbHiac2B0A-fH6UpLdHmQB5mxvRZbqb60_aem_AU2gVs7RL4raMCCDgIy66_kGA8xdOYxwHoZfUORyhAolqgmz6GdcvHWr-NJUMSjhKXzTI2pvrDDXhFd1tMtTf83w

As for the second lecture, please see the link provided in the commentary field!

Lecture Dr. Shih-shan Susan Huang: The Dynamic Spread of Buddhist Print Culture in China and Beyond – KVVAK At the invitation of the Hulsewé-Wazniewski Foundation at Leiden University, Susan Huang (PhD) will be in the Netherlands from 13 to 19 April. She is an associate professor in the Department of Transnational Asian Studies at Rice University in Houston....

GCBS researcher Wen Xueyu just returned from China where she surveyed the Yungang and Longmen grottoes in the framework of her project on the development of apsara (feitian 飛天) iconography. During the fieldwork she collected a large number of photographs, including many 3D images.
Here, she kindly shares a few photos with us.

Below, please find information on final meetings of the various Research Clusters of the FROGBEAR project. Cluster 3.4, led by Prof. Christoph Anderl of GCBS/Ghent University, will convene on April 20th. If you are interested to participate, please register as soon as possible.

"From the Ground to the Cloud: Insights from Seven Years of Fieldwork, Training, and Data Collection"

From the Ground Up: Buddhism and East Asian Religions Buddhism & East Asian Religions

The second instance of Dialogues in Jain Studies in Europe (partially organized by Ghent) on narrative literature in Jaina traditions is tomorrow. It’s hybrid so you’d be well served to check it out!

It is not too late to register for the second of our Dialogues in Jain Studies in Europe (November 6th, from 5pm CET). This month's theme is Jain Narrative Literature, and the line up is awesome :)
Eva De Clercq (UGent) will moderate the discussion.
Simon Winant (UGent) will present "Invitation to Bhīma’s Beheading and Quenched Fire: Strategies of Suspense in Devaprabhasūri’s Jain Mahābhārata Adaptation"
Heleen De Jonckheere (SOAS) will present "The Absurd and the Grotesque in the Dharmaparīkṣā: a Taste of Embodied Humour".

Info and registration: https://dialogues.arihantainstitute.org/