This omnibus session features a selection of highly rated papers from PhD candidates and early career scholars. It emphasizes the contemporary period, and features ethnographic research on deities and spirit mediums in Kullu, oral histories of female Tibetan masters, an investigation of religious expressions in contemporary Tibetan music, and a study of the “dialectical invention” of the “non-sectarian movement” (ris med). There is also a more traditional philological study of Chapa Chökyi Senge’s 12th-century doxographical work. This session includes the THRU business meeting.
My presentation focuses on the deity traditions observed in the Western Himalayas, specifically the Kullu district in the North Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. I aim to discuss how the thriving presence of mediumship and oral traditions helps maintain important trans-Himalayan connections among the deities of the Western Himalayas. Drawing from fieldwork conducted in 2021-2022, I will present the example of the indigenous pantheon of Tharah Kardu and the figure of the deity Jamlu to explore how the deity traditions sustain an age-old relationship with the Himalayan landscape. Using this example, I will discuss the deities’ trans-Himalayan connections – which also cut across national boundaries – in juxtaposition to the rising influence of Hindu nationalism in the context of the Kullu Valley, Himachal Pradesh, India.
Chapa Chökyi Sengé (ca. 1109 - ca. 1169) played a central role in the later propagation of Buddhism in Tibet Buddhism. For example, Chapa’s commentaries on seminal works by the Three Eastern Madhyamikas—Jñānagarbha’s Distinguishing the Two Truths (Satyadvayavibhaṅga), Śāntarakṣita’s Ornament of the Middle Way (Madhyamakālaṃkāra), and Kamalaśīla’s Illumination of The Middle Way (Madhyamakāloka)—are among the earliest native Tibetan commentaries on important Indian texts during this period. Even though the root of the Tibetan doxographical genre can probably be traced as early as the early ninth century, in the fom of Yeshé Dé’s (eighth century) Distinguishing Philosophical Views and Kawa Paltsek’s (ninth century) Instructions of the Order of Philosophical Views, I argue that Chapa’s doxographical work, the Distinguishing Buddhist and non-Buddhist Scriptural System (Bde bar gshegs pa dang phyi rol pa’i gzhung rnam par ’byed pa) represents the first fully elaborated native Tibetan work of doxographical literature.
This paper focuses on the current generation of five monastic sisters, who contributed to the rebuilding of a Drikung Kagyu nunnery after its destruction in the Cultural Revolution, who fled into exile, who have performed dozens of years of closed retreats in Tibet and India, and who continue to strive for educational reform and access to teachings for nuns today. The lives of these women trace the history of political upheaval during the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution, the resurgence of religious activity during the Reform and Opening Up period and the complex religious negotiations currently being enacted within monastic and nunnery spaces throughout the plateau. Their ability to work within Buddhist frameworks to accomplish their goals sets them apart as highly skilled Buddhist masters. I argue that these women, beyond their mastery of Buddhist ritual and retreat practice, are also masters of alternative technologies of authority.
This paper shows the transformations in the usage of the Tibetan term ris med between the death of Jamgon Kongtrul (‘jam mgon kong sprul blo gros mtha’ yas, 1813-1899) in 1899 and Gene Smith’s “creation” of the “ris med movement” in a 1969 landmark article. Was Smith vocalizing an existing understanding of ris medamong his Tibetan interlocutors, or did he inadvertently invent ris med in his introduction to Kongtrul’s Treasury? In tracing ris med’s genealogy, the paper follows on three thinkers who were especially influential in ris med’s transformation from a term used primarily esoteric states of Dzogchen meditation to one of the most profound expressions of political and religious non-sectarianism in Tibetan history: Jamgon Mipham (‘jam mgon ‘ju mi pham rnam rgyal rgya mtsho, 1846-1912), Dezhung Rinpoche (sde gzhung rin po che kun dga’ bstan pa’i nyi ma, 1906-1987), and Dilgo Khyentse (dil mgo mkhyen brtse, 1910-1991).
This paper discusses a genealogy of devotional music of a Tibetan female singer Tsewang Lhamo. This paper accounts for well-regarded musical and historical figures such as Palgong, Yadong, Dadon, and Dubhe and their vital roles in giving encouragement, innovation, and guidance to the singers like Tsewang Lhamo. Also, this paper examines Tsewang Lhamo’s private and public socio-cultural environments, in which she establishes her musical creativity and audacity. Finally, we analyze the lyrical aspects of her devotional songs demonstrating the intersections of devotion for the Dharma and lamas, a sense of loss and alienation, and a notion of self-assertion with the subtle nuance of the nation and politics through figurative languages. In essence, through examining these historical backgrounds and influences within the socio-cultural contexts of her musical world, we illustrate the ways she blazes the path of musical creativity and audacity inside Tibet and beyond.