The lecture will be in person and live-streamed via YouTube with simultaneous English and Mandarin channels.
Stefania Travagnin’s lecture in English
Stefania Travagnin’s lecture in Chinese
Speaker: Stefania Travagnin (SOAS)
Date & Time: February 21, 2025, 2:00 pm London
Location: Gillis Lecture Theatre, University of Oxford
Abstract:
Tzu Chi Foundation is now a trans-national and trans-faith Taiwanese Buddhist charity active in all continents and with missions in almost 140 countries. Operating in areas with a Christian or Muslim majority, and in cultural contexts that are far from the Chinese/Asian (and Buddhist) frameworks implied the repositioning and translation of religious and Buddhist vocabularies to become accessible and understandable to non-Buddhist populations. In addition, locals and non-Buddhists from the Middle East to Africa and the Americans have joined Tzu Chi, embracing an inclusive Buddhist philosophy while maintaining their original beliefs.
This talk explores presence and activities of Tzu Chi in the Middle East, with particular attention to Turkey and Jordan. Based on a long-term study of Tzu Chi and recent fieldwork and interviews in the Middle East, my study especially focuses on the framework of Tzu Chi operations, including the local interpretation of Tzu Chi and Master Cheng Yen and the multi-faith membership of this charity. This research also addresses what I call Tzu Chi tactics of women’s empowerment that have affected women’s self-confidence and position in the region.
About the Speaker: Stefania Travagnin (SOAS)
Stefania Travagnin is Reader in Chinese Buddhism at SOAS, University of London. Travagnin is currently co-director of the multiyear project “Mapping Religious Diversity in Modern Sichuan”; within this project, she is exploring Han Buddhist local micro-histories, female communities, patterns of Sangha education, and the spatial ecology of religious sites, focusing especially on the time from the late Qing to the end of the Republican era. Travagnin has also done field research among Buddhist communities in Taiwan for more than twenty years, studying Buddhist women, the phenomenon of Humanistic Buddhism, the figure of the monk Yinshun, and the intersection between religion and media. She has been recently awarded a British Academy Mid-Career Fellowship for completing a research on Tzu Chi’s multifaith membership and global humanitarianism. She has edited or co-edited several volumes, including Religion and Media in China: Insights and Case Studies from the Mainland, Taiwan, and Hong Kong (Routledge, 2016), and the three-volume publication Concepts and Methods for the Study of Chinese Religions (De Gruyter, 2019-2020). She is editor in chief of the journal Review of Religion and Chinese Society.
About the Respondent: Emma Tomalin (University of Leeds)
This event is part of the Yin-Cheng Distinguished Lecture Series in Buddhist Studies.
Launched in September 2021, the Yin-Cheng Distinguished Lecture Series (印證佛學傑出學術系列講座) is a collaborative, multi-university partnership between Peking University, University of Oxford, University of Cambridge, Inalco (Institut national des langues et civilisations orientales), Princeton University, Harvard University, and the University of British Columbia.The Lecture Series is established in honor of Venerable Cheng-yen 證嚴, founder of Tzu Chi, and her mentor Yinshun 印順 (1906–2005), with the goal of promoting topics in Buddhist studies.
Free and open to the public.
