Buddhism in India and Tibet

3 credits · Undergraduate

This course engages the student with the Tantric forms of Buddhism practiced initially in early medieval India and subsequently in the Tibetan cultural region, emphasizing the ritual, devotional, meditative and social expressions of Vajrayana or Tantric Buddhism which informed the rise of Buddhist institutions and popular practice in premodern Tibet and the Himalayan region. The course also examines issues of religion and the Tibetan state, diaspora and the fraught nature of the Western reception of Tibetan Buddhism. PREREQUISITES: Any 2000 level RELS or permission of the instructor FORMATS: Seminar