Registration closes June 20. June 22–23, 2024. Vandenhove Pavilion, Ghent
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Yin-Cheng Distinguished Lecture Series: Mindful China: Embracing Early Meditation and Vipassanā Practices in Search for Awakening, and Secular Well-being
March 28, 2024, 4 pm PDT, with Ester Bianchi (University of Perugia). In person, Room 604, Asian Centre, UBC, and online
Guest Lecture: Jātaka, Purgatory, and Supernatural Stories (zhiguai)—On the Classicization of Buddhist Stories from the Perspective of Fa Yuan Zhu Lin
Professor Yu ZHANG. Thursday, March 28, 2024, 2:00 pm PST. In person at UBC Asian Centre, Room 604, and online
Chinese Religious Texts Authority (CRTA) workshop
Paris, France. January 4-7, 2024. Updated with schedule.
Glorisun Distinguished Lecture Series: What do East Asian Buddhists call their books and why?
George Keyworth (University of Saskatchewan). April 14, 2023, 4:00 pm PDT. In person at C.K. Choi Building, Room 120, and online
Guest Lecture: A New Translation and Study of The Zhuangzi (Sayings of Master Zhuang)
Richard John Lynn (University of Toronto). October 9, 2022, 7:30 PM PDT. In-person at UBC Asian Centre Auditorium and online
Keynote Presentation: A Sense of an Ending: Chinese Buddhist Eschatology Reconsidered
T. H. Barrett (SOAS). October 7, 2022, 6:30 pm PDT. In-person at The Place of Many Trees, Liu Institute for Global Issues, and online
Chinese Religious Texts Authority (CRTA) workshop on reading late imperial Chinese religious texts and database building
Paris, France. January 5-8, 2023.
Yin-Cheng Distinguished Lecture Series: Monasteries and Madhouses: On the Care and Confinement of the Insane in Early Modern and Contemporary East Asian Buddhism
August 1, 2022, with James Robson (Harvard). Online, via Zoom
2022 FROGBEAR Phase 2 Cluster Activities
May 23–August 5, 2022
Guest Lecture: Revival of Buddhism in Southeast China in the Late Ninth Century: The Case of Shanquan Temple
You Ziyong (Capital Normal University, China). 6:00 PM PDT, March 31, 2022. Online
Guest Lecture: How did the Military Institutions Interact with Local Society in the Ming and Qing Dynasties: A Case of Yuzhou Guard
Deng Qinping (University of Political Science and Law, China). 6:00 PM PDT, April 6, 2022. Online
Yin-Cheng Distinguished Lecture Series: Fostering Education beyond the Classroom Examples from Republican Buddhism and their Legacy Today
December 8, 2021, with Stefania Travagnin (SOAS, University of London). Online, via Zoom
UBC Tianzhu-Hurvitz Distinguished Lecture Series: Ethics of Ambiguity in Chan and Existentialism
April 22, 2021, with Wendi L. Adamek (Calgary). Online, via Zoom.
Training Program—FROGBEAR Summer 2021 Training Sessions
Applications due March 30, 2021.
UBC Tianzhu-Hurvitz Distinguished Lecture Series: Karma in Chinese Buddhist Historiography
October 9, 2020, with John Kieschnick (Stanford). Online, via Zoom.
[CANCELLED] Guest Lecture: Theravāda Meditation within Contemporary Chinese Buddhism. The case of Sichuan Shifosi 石佛寺
Ester Bianchi (Perugia University). Wednesday, April 8, 2020, 5:30 pm–7 pm. UBC, C. K. Choi Building, Room 120.
[CANCELLED] UBC Tianzhu-Hurvitz Distinguished Lecture Series: The Buddhahood of Ordinary Persons: Revisioning the Lotus Sūtra in Medieval Japan
Jacqueline Stone (Princeton University). Friday, March 6, 2020, 5:30–8 pm. University of British Columbia, St John’s College.
[CANCELLED] Guest Lecture: Sun Wukong: The Monkey God
Li Ling (Sichuan University). 4 pm Thursday, March 5, 2020. UBC Asian Centre, Room 604.
Guest Lecture: Did women produce Buddhist texts in Medieval China? And does it matter if they did?
Stephanie Balkwill (The University of Winnipeg). 2:30pm Thursday, January 30 2020. UBC Asian Centre, Room 604.
Guest Lecture: Chiasmus in Bodhisattva Literature: Two Examples and Theorizing a Meta-Structure
Matthew Orsborn (Taiwan National University). January 30, 2020. 370 Dwinelle Hall, University of California, Berkeley.
Report on CRTA (Chinese Religious Texts Authority) workshop
Report on the CRTA workshop, December 15-19, 2019 Aussois, France.
CRTA workshop on reading late imperial Chinese religious texts
December 15-19, 2019 Aussois, France.
Guest Lecture: Clerical Privileges and the Jurisdiction of the Buddhist Clergy: Do They Exist?
Cuilan Liu (University of Pittsburgh). 5 pm, Friday, November 15, 2019. UBC C.K. Choi Building, Room 120.
Guest Lecture: Cataloging the Medieval Japanese Sacred Transmitted Documents (shōgyō 聖教) from Shinpukuji 真福寺 and Amanosan Kongōji 天野山金剛寺
George Keyworth (University of Saskatchewan). 2:30 pm, Thursday, November 14, 2019. UBC Asian Centre, Room 604.
Guest Lecture: Through Altruism to Enlightenment
Rey-Sheng Her (Tzu Chi University). 2:30 pm Thursday, November 7, 2019. UBC Asian Centre, Room 604
Guest Lecture: “All Living Beings Have Buddha-Nature”—the Genesis of the Concept of Universal Buddhahood
Michael Zimmermann (Numata Center for Buddhist Studies, Hamburg University/University of Tsukuba). 4:30 pm, Monday, October 7, 2019. UBC Geography Building, Room 229.
Guest Lecture: The influence of Buddhism on Chinese language
Peng Lu (Wuhan University). 2:30 pm–4 pm, Thursday, October 3, 2019. UBC Asian Centre, Room 604.
Tianzhu Book Prize Lecture: The Meanings of Meditation in Early Zen Buddhism
Sam van Schaik (British Library). 7 pm, Saturday, September 21, 2019. UBC St. John’s College.
Guest Lecture: On the “Image of the Extinction of the Dharma” at the Dazhushengku Cave of Baoshan
Liu Yi (Capital Normal University). 2:30 pm–4 pm, Thursday, September 19, 2019. UBC Asian Centre, Room 604.
Buddhism and Social Change Workshop at Dharma Drum
9am – 4:30pm, Sept 21, 2019 at Dharma Drum Vancouver. Advance registration required.
UBC Tianzhu-Hurvitz Distinguished Lecture Series: A Place for Doubt: The Theory and Practice of “Questioning Meditation” (Kanhwa Sŏn 看話禪 ) in Korean Zen Buddhism
Robert E. Buswell Jr. (University of California, Los Angeles). 5 pm. Thursday, September 12, 2019. UBC Ponderosa Commons Ballroom.
Guest Lecture: On Chinese Qin and Chan Buddhism Literature: to learn from the performance of Guqin
Huqun Li (China University of Political Science and Law). 2:30pm. Thursday, March 14, 2019. UBC Asian Centre, Room 604.
Guest Lecture: Educational Modernization in Chinese Buddhism: A Century of Transformation
Rongdao Lai (University of Southern California). 1:30pm. Thursday January 31, 2019. UBC Asian Centre, Room 604.
The Initial Rise of Manjusri Belief: Centered on the “Three Biographies of Qing Liang Mountain”
Long Chen (Xinzhou Teachers University). 4:30pm. Thursday, January 24, 2019. UBC Buchanan Building B Room 302
Guest Lecture: The Life-world of Chinese Buddhism: Temple-Town Relationship and Everyday Life in the Area South of the Yangtze River
Tang Zhongmao. 3:30 pm Wednesday, November 21, 2018. Asian Library RM 506.
Guest Lecture: Rethinking the Structure and Typology of Liturgical Texts from Dunhuang
Hao Chunwen. 4pm November 15, 2018. UBC Asian Studies Auditorium.
Guest Lecture: What is Buddhist Ge-yi
Tang Jia. 4pm November 1, 2018. Asian Centre Room 604.
Guest Lecture: Reflections on the Movement to Revive the Precepts in Kamakura Japan
Paul Groner. Thursday October 25, 2018, 5 pm. 180 Doe Memorial Library, UC Berkeley.
Guest Lecture: Ritual, Reliquary, and Local Legend: Glocal Context of Twin Pagodas from the Silla Dynasty
Youn-mi Kim. 4 pm Monday, October 22, 2018. Asian Centre Auditorium
Guest Lecture: The Visual Culture of Buddhist Maṇḍalas at Dunhuang
Michelle C. Wang. 1:30pm October 18, 2018. UBC Asian Centre Room 604.
Guest Lecture: Making Frogbear Materials Meaningful in the Undergraduate Classroom
Susan Andrews. 4pm Thursday, October 18th, 2018. Auditorium Annex A room 157
Guest Lecture: Taixu’s Global Buddhist Movement and His Discourse on Civilization: A Study Centered around the 1920s
GONG Jun. Thursday 4pm, Oct 11 2018. Asian Center Room 604.
Guest Lecture: From Tranquility(ji 寂) to Illumination (zhao 照): The Jizhao Temple in the Context of Social Changes in Dali Prefecture
Xuan Fang. 4pm October 4th, 2018. UBC Asian Studies Auditorium.
Guest Lecture: Reimagining East Asian Buddhism: Wuyue Foundations of Song Dynasty Buddhism and Beyond
Albert Welter. 3:30 pm September 20, 2018. UBC CK Choi Room 120.
Guest Lecture: The Book of Change, Confucianism and A Community of Shared Future
Dr. Wen Haiming. September 4, 2018. 4pm UBC Asian Library Room 616.
Tianzhu Book Prize Lecture
Dr. Jiang Wu lecture August 12, 2018 at UBC.
Digital Humanities Workshop at McMaster University
May 26 – 27, 2018 at McMaster University. Apply for funding by April 30, register by May 10.
Guest Lecture: Reconstructing Ānanda’s Grief in the Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra
4-6 pm March 14, 2018. Dr Charles Li – UBC Asian Centre, Room 604.
Guest Lecture: What Use is a Digital Edition?
Dr. Charles Li. 3-5 pm March 16, 2018. UBC Asian Centre, Room 604.
Guest Lecture: The Chinese Buddhist Canon Constructed in the Ming Dynasty
Dr. Darui Long (University of the West). March 8, 2018 at UBC.
2018 PKU-HYI International Summer Training Workshop “Buddhism and Ethnicity in the Period of Sixteen Kingdoms and Northern Dynasties”
Please send the electronic version (WORD or PDF) of application materials by email or WeChat by April 20, 2018.
Guest Lecture: Du Fu’s Poems and Chan Buddhism
Dr. Yi’nan Zhang. January 18, 4-6pm. Asian Centre Room 604.
Workshop: The Ten Thousand Rooms Project
Michael Hunter . January 8, 12:30 – 2:00 pm, Asian Centre Room 604.
Research Presentation: The First Master Text: The Classic of Odes
Michael Hunter. January 5, 4:00 – 6:00 pm. CK Choi Building Room 120.
Guest Lecture: Reflections on Self-Immolation in Chinese Buddhist and Daoist Traditions
Dr. Jimmy Yu. November 22, 4pm. UBC Asian Center room 604.
Guest Lecture: The Philosophy and Practice of Buddhist Confession in the Song Dynasty
Dr. Kai Sheng. October 26, 2:15pm. UBC Asian Center room 604.
Guest Lecture: The Thirteenth Fourteenth Century Encounter of Chinese Tiantai and Japanese Tendai
Dr. Paul Groner. October 23 5pm. UBC Asian Center room 604.
Guest Lecture: “Diving into Buddhahood: The Four Inversions at Shanyingshan and Baoshan”
Dr. Wendi Adamek. 4pm September 28, 2017. Asian Center Room 604, UBC.
Writing “The Book of Rivers and Lakes”
September 1-2, 2017. UBC Vancouver, Canada.
Converting Markets through Merit: Perspectives for Fostering a New Entrepreneurial Culture with Chan Buddhist Principles
Ven. Dayuan. 7pm Saturday June 17, 2017. Jack Poole Hall, Alumni Centre, UBC
Liturgy, Icon, and Text in the Development of Esoteric Buddhism
By Charles D. Orzech . 4pm, February 9, 2017. UBC Department of Asian Studies, Room 604.
Medieval Japan’s Unique Interpretation of Monastic Discipline and the Precepts
Professor Paul Groner. May 30, 2016. Asian Centre Room 604.
Como: Angry Spirits and Urban Soundscapes in Ancient Japan
Prof. Michael Como. April 5, 2016. C.K. Choi building room 231.
Lines and Enlightenment: Chan Buddhism and Literature in Medieval China
August 9, 2016. Vancouver, Canada.
The relationship between literary and religious activities has been a lasting theme for any society of any time all over the world. One lens to see through the patterns of interactions between the religious and literary practitioners is provided by the relationship between Chan Buddhism and literature in medieval China. This one-day workshop, co-sponsored by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) and the UBC Buddhist Studies Forum, invites several top scholars based in China and Canada to jointly shed new light on this intriguing issue.
“Compassionate Killing”: Violence in East Asian Buddhism
May 29, 2016. Vancouver, Canada.
This workshop aims to throw light on East Asian Buddhism’s involvement in warfare and other violent and semi-violent activities (e.g., military chaplains and counsellors, warriors, practitioners and promoters of the martial arts, and spices). In addition to bringing to light an important (and severely understudied) front in which the samgha (i.e., Buddhist community) intervened in the secular world, this workshop will also underscore the necessity to move beyond studying the “real situation of Buddhism” through the prism of the Buddhist precepts, which prescribed, rather than described, the circumstances under which the samgha grew and was transformed. Another aim is to study new features and patterns of state-samgha relations in East Asia.