Leadership
Co-Chairs:
Frances Garrett
University of Toronto
frances.garrett@utoronto.ca
Andrew Quintman
Princeton University
quintman@Princeton.edu
Steering Committee:
Ben Bogin
Georgetown University
beb34@georgetown.edu
Lara Braitstein
McGill University
lara.braitstein@mcgill.ca
Jacob Dalton
Yale University
jacob.dalton@yale.edu
Sarah Jacoby
Columbia University
shj2102@columbia.edu
Derek Maher
East Carolina University
maherd@ecu.edu
THRG is part of the American Academy of Religion. AAR is the "largest, most comprehensive association dedicated to promoting the academic study of religion." The Academy meets annually and its members share research and work together on projects. With "over 8,000 members who teach in some 1,500 colleges, universities, seminaries, and schools in North America and abroad," the AAR is "dedicated to furthering knowledge of religion and religious institutions in all their forms and manifestations."
THRG aims to create an environment that promotes conversation between different approaches to the study of Tibetan and Himalayan religions. The group is multi-disciplinary, especially focusing on work that challenges the traditional disciplinary dichotomies through which the field has defined itself, such as: text/practice, written/oral, philology/ethnography, humanistic/social scientific study.
The group's efforts are centered largely on cultural history, resulting in a methodologically varied approach to such subjects as folk religious practices, religion and material culture, the politics of religious institutions, the representation of Tibetan religions in the media, and the historical construction of the field itself.
Working with the idea that one of the most important features of religious traditions in our field (perhaps in every field) is the degree to which they are inextricably connected, THRG aims at scholarship which recognizes that those interconnections often cut across ethno-national boundaries.
2009 Annual Meeting Call for Papers
The THRG promotes conversations between different approaches to the study of Tibetan and Himalayan religions. For 2009, we are particularly interested in papers on Tibetan/Himalayan religions in North America; on heretical or marginalized religious groups or practices; on modern/contemporary Tibetan/Himalayan scholasticism; on pilgrimage; on Tibetan/Himalayan religions across Eurasia; or on translating Tibetan Buddhism. We are always interested in papers or panels that may be co-sponsored with other groups or sections of the AAR.
To submit a paper, see AAR Annual Meeting Information.
Image: A scene from a mural that depicts Yumbu Lagang
THDL ID# A3006
Resources:
THRG History
Record of past THRG panels.
Graduate Programs in Tibetan/Himalayan Studies
Columbia University
Florida State University
Harvard University
McGill University
University of California, Berkeley
University of California, Santa Barbara
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
University of Toronto
University of Virginia
Yale University
H-Buddhism Discussion List
"The Buddhist Scholars Information Network (H-Buddhism) serves as a medium for the exchange of information regarding academic resources, new research projects, scholarly publications, university job listings, and so forth, for specialists in Buddhist Studies who are currently affiliated with academic institutions."