Starting on 16 April, the University of Hamburg’s Numata Center for Buddhist Studies, in cooperation with the Women in Buddhism Study Initiative, is offering an online course on “Women in Indian Buddhism.” The course will explore the situation of women during different periods in the history of Indian Buddhism and compare it with other Indian religions. It consists of a series of 13 lectures by a group of international scholars, who will present their latest research.
The Dalai Lama with participants attending the international Buddhist congress on women’s ordination, Hamburg, 2007. From lionsroar.com
The Numata Center for Buddhist Studies was founded in 2007 to promote academic research and teaching in Buddhist Studies. The center offered the first e-learning course on women in Buddhism in 2014, on the topic of bhikkhuni/bhikshuni ordination focusing on the Theravada and Mulasarvastivada monastic traditions. This program grew out of the “1st International Congress on Buddhist Women’s Role in the Sangha: Bhikshuni Vinaya and Ordination Lineages,” which was held at the University of Hamburg in 2007.
The Women in Buddhism Study Initiative developed from an interdisciplinary workshop on “Women in Buddhism,” which was held jointly by the Numata Center and the Academy of World Religions at the University of Hamburg in June 2013. Its main aim is to advance academic research and teaching related to the role of women in Buddhism.
This year’s course will begin by exploring the early sutta and vinaya, with a focus on placing the situation of Buddhist women in context by comparing it with their situation in Jainism and Brahminism. It will then move on to Mahayana, followed by a study of Indian art, and will conclude with a look at academic studies of women in Indian Buddhism in general.
The course is designed so that participants “will gain knowledge of the complexity of the situation of women in Indian Buddhism based on current academic research alerting them to the different facets of the problem of gender discrimination as well as to the agency of women and the strategies women have adopted in order to pursue their aspirations,” according to the Numata Center for Buddhist Studies course page.
The course will include the following lectures: “Women in Early Buddhist Discourse,” by Venerable Analayo; “Female Virtue in Two Sanskrit Vinayas,” by Amy Langenberg; “Women in Medieval Buddhist and Jain Monasticism,” by Mari Jväsjarvi Stuart; “Women in the Buddhist and Jain Traditions,” by Nalini Balbir; “Women in the Theravada Vinaya and the Brahminical Tradition,” by Ute Hüsken; “The Nun Thullananda,” by Reiko Ohnuma; “Mahapajapati Gotami Narratives,” by Shobha Rani Dash; “Hagiographic Buddhist Texts on Women,” by Liz Wilson; “Women in Mahayana Sutra Literature,” by Rita Gross; “Women in Early Buddhist Inscriptions,” by Alice Collett; “Women in the Jataka Collection,” by Naomi Appleton; “Buddhist Women in Indian Art,” by Monika Zin; and “Summary and Outlook on Scholarship on Women in Buddhism,” by Petra Kieffer-Pülz.
The lectures will be held every Thursday from 2.15 to 3.45 p.m. local time, and participants are required to register by 15 March.