After the Rains | Theravada Studies Talks

Transnational Network of Theravada Studies | Shan State Buddhist University | King’s College London

This series is now ended. Many thanks to all speakers and attendees.

Video recordings of the talks are available below.

25 November 2020

18 December 2020

Rachelle Saruya (University of Toronto)

Learning Directions: Myanmar-Burmese Buddhist Nuns’ Education Trajectories, the Siṅgālovāda Sutta, and the Importance of Responsibility

• This talk looks at my recent article and research that engages with nine Myanmar-Burmese Buddhist nuns (thilashin) from three different nunneries in Sagaing, Myanmar, and examines their experiences with the monastic examinations. As the nuns’ voices are frequently omitted from studies on monastic education, this presentation includes some of these perspectives and highlights a few of the factors that contribute to the thilashin’s success in their monastic endeavors. In my research, I find that responsibility, gratitude, and the Burmese concept of kyezusat, or the return of gratitude to those who have taken care of them, all play a key role. I examine the nuns’ networks and “interlocking relationships” between teachers and students, and additionally explore the active role that the thilashin play in maneuvering their monastic kin into the different education systems that result in affective notions of kyezusat, and the responsibility for the monk or nun to want to return the gratitude to the one that took care of them. Furthermore, I encourage looking at the Siṅgālovādasutta, Ledi Sayadaw’s version of this sutta, the Sukumāramaggadīpanī, and the suttas within the Mahāvagga in the Vinaya that focus on reciprocity, with the students taking care of their teachers, and the teachers taking care of their students that help influence lived Buddhism, and is important in the understanding of monastics and their education, as well as Myanmar Buddhist society.
• Rachelle Saruya is a PhD Candidate in the Department for the Study of Religion at the University of Toronto. Her research interests include: Abhidhamma, Myanmar-Burmese Theravada Buddhism, Buddhist nuns, monasticism, gender and Buddhism, religious education, and the Burmese diaspora in the US. Her dissertation is an ethnography of one “non-teaching nunnery” in Sagaing, Myanmar, but which allows for an examination of the networks and connections that this nunnery has with “teaching nunneries” and monasteries in the area. Her work focuses on fourteen Buddhist nuns, their experiences with education and monastic training, and their spaces of choice and convenience that help mediate these practices.
• Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATBeAiZ9P5Y

15 January 2021

Thomas Borchert (University of Vermont)

Governing Thai Monks in Contemporary Thailand: The Appearance of Centralization and Legal Pluralism

• Every once in a while, there are stories in the Thai press about monks behaving badly. Some of these stories are minor infractions that only have local consequences, such as monks drinking alcohol, and then driving. Others are national stories, such as the 2018 arrest of a group of handful of prominent monks, including some members of the Supreme Sangha Council, the body responsible for managing the Thai Sangha. While these stories are clear about the infraction – drinking alcohol or embezzlement – they are often vague about the legal framework under which Thai monks are managed and governed. They may refer to the Vinaya, but rarely to ecclesiastical rules that govern monastic life. In part this is because the institutional aspects of the Thai Sangha, its lines of authority and the rules and regulations that govern it, are not very well understood. I want to suggest that the Thai Sangha looks like a highly centralized organization with the Supreme Patriarch at its head, but is in fact highly decentralized, and Thai monks are subject to multiple different legal systems: vinaya, ecclesiastical, and state law. In this paper, I shall discuss institutional aspects of the Thai Sangha, with attention to the way that legal pluralism complicates the governance of Thai monks.
• Thomas Borchert is a Professor of Religion at the University of Vermont. His research is focused on contemporary monasticism in Theravada communities, with a focus on Buddhist education, Buddhism and nationalism, and dynamics of secularism and Theravada Buddhism. He has conducted research among Theravada Buddhists in China and Singapore, and on the Sangha in Thailand. He is the author of Educating Monks: Minority Buddhists on China’s Southwest Border (University of Hawai’i Press, 2017) and the editor of Theravada Buddhism in Colonial Contexts (Routledge, 2018).

19 February 2021

Charya Samarakoon (Centre for Policy Alternatives, Colombo)

A Talk by Charya Samarakoon on Conflict-related Sexual Violence and Buddhist Principles

• Conflict Related Sexual Violence (CRSV) against combatants and civilians remains a reality of war despite global efforts to address it. In armed conflict, the objectives of power and dominance often manifest in the form of sexual violence, making both men and women vulnerable. International Humanitarian Law (IHL) unequivocally condemns CRSV and there are specific measures addressing this issue in IHL. However, many measures of IHL have not achieved their maximum potential with regard to protection and accountability for CRSV. It is proposed here that the willingness to hold perpetrators accountable can be achieved through integrating the rules of IHL into the moral fabric of society, in this case Buddhist principles and values. The realization of the Buddhist doctrine of anattā together with meditation training is a practical means of creating awareness and fostering compassionate behaviour towards others. The conceptions of gender created by socio-cultural elements which exacerbate CRSV are essentially bound up with the ‘self’ which Buddhist doctrine recognizes as a mere illusion. The Buddhist practice of meditation, as brought to light by recent neurological research, lessens this ‘self’ focused outlook and increases the capacity for compassion, active empathy and resilience to peer pressure. Training in Buddhist meditation, supported by explanation of doctrine, may therefore significantly reduce the cultural and individual attitudes that cause CRSV and develop prosociality, active compassion and resilience, while maintaining effective military functioning of the combatant.
• Charya is a researcher with the Research and Advocacy team of the Centre for Policy Alternatives, Colombo. She has a Bachelor’s degree in Law from the University of Colombo. She has engaged in research for publications, advocacy activities and public interest litigation conducted by the Research and Advocacy team since October 2018. Her research interests include International Humanitarian Law, Human Rights Law and Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL).
• This talk is co-hosted with the International Association of Buddhist Universities, International Association of Theravada Buddhist Universities and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).
• Video (on ICRC’s website): https://blogs.icrc.org/religion-humanitarianprinciples/webinar-conflict-related-sexual-violence-and-buddhist-principles/

19 March 2021

Sarou Long (Australian National University)

Buddhism and environmental protection in Cambodia

• Sarou is going to speak about his experience working with NGOs in Cambodia, who are trying to link Buddhist concepts with the conservation ideas and forest protection. He provides an overview on how and when the concept of Buddhism and environmental conservation emerged in Cambodia, then considers the challenges and opportunities of applying these ideas at the community level.
• Sarou Long is currently a PhD student at the Australian National University (ANU). His PhD research project focuses on indigenous land rights in Cambodia. Before coming to ANU, he had many years of experience in natural resource management and renewable energy projects with various local and international organizations, where he worked with local governments and communities in the development and implementation of various projects such as forestry management, land management, renewable energy in agri-food sector, and other environmental education programs.
• Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GKHOJleBSU

21 May 2021

M.L. Pattaratorn Chirapravati (California State University, Sacramento)

Reflections on the Boundary Markers and the New Buddhist Lineage: the Mahā-sīmā at Wat Rajapradit Sathitmahasimaram by King Rama IV (r. 1851–1868)

• After 27 years in the monkhood before King Mongkut (Rama IV) came to the throne, he initiated a new Buddhist sect called the Dhammayuttika (Thai: Thammayut nikaya) that paid strong attention to the Buddhist disciplines (vinaya). The king was concerned about the procedure and demarcation of sīmā stones in temples. As a result, he had a revered monk, Somdet Phra Wannarat (Dang), write instructions and descriptions of how to erect sīmā stones and classify different types of sīmā in sīmāgatha. This article focuses on the new development of concepts and forms of sīmā stones during the King Mongkut (r. 1851-1868) and King Chulalongkorn periods (r. 1868-1910). It will include symbols, types, and functions of different categories of sīmā (i.e., baddhasima, abaddhasima, khandasima, mahasima and visunggamasima).
• M.L. Pattaratorn Chirapravati is an art historian who specializes in Buddhist art and Southeast Asian art visual cultures. She received her Ph.D. in Southeast Asian Art History and Southeast Asian Studies at Cornell University. She has published extensively on ancient Buddhist art (e.g., Votive Tablets in Thailand: Origin, Styles, and Uses (Oxford University Press, 2007) and Divination Au Royaume De Siam: Le corps, la guerre, le destine (Presses Universitaires de France, 2011). She co-curated two major art exhibitions at the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco entitled The Kingdom of Siam: Art from Central Thailand (1530–1800) and Emerald Cities: Arts of Siam and Burma (1775–1950). She is a faculty member in the Art Department and former Director and Vice Director of the Asian Studies Program at California State University, Sacramento. She is also former Head of Studies, Division of Arts and Humanities at Yale-NUS College (Singapore).
• Video: https://youtu.be/mq_HOXpN1q8

18 June 2021

Olivia Porter (King’s College London)

Hidden in Plain Sight: The Tai Zawti of the Myanmar-China border

• The Tai Zawti Theravada Buddhist tradition has been mentioned enigmatically in scholarship since the 19th century, yet little is known of their history and religious practices outside of the group itself. After their exile into the Shan Hills in the 18th century, the Zawti remained underground, enjoying relative obscurity until the 1980s when they were absorbed into the Thudhammā gaing (Pali: gaṇa) during the sangha reforms imposed by the Burmese State Sanghamahanayaka Committee. Labelled as ‘heretical’ by missionaries and scholars on account of their austere monastic and lay practices, the Zawti have remained peripheral in scholarship and among the wider Shan community. Although the Zawti remain marginal, Zawti zares (lay practitioners skilled in traditional Shan lik long poetic texts) who have trained at the headquarters and subsequently disrobed, are thought of as some of the most skilled and revered composers of lik long literature by the wider Shan community.
• Who are the Zawti and how did they manage to remain under the radar for so long? Despite being seemingly ‘underground’, Zawti communities are found throughout Myanmar and across the border in Dehong, China. Using an ethnographic account of the triannual sang long novice ordination ceremony as a starting point, this talk aims to provide and introduction to the Zawti tradition as it is practiced in contemporary Myanmar.
• Olivia Porter is a PhD candidate at King’s College London. She completed her undergraduate degree in Sanskrit with Pali at the University of Oxford and her master’s degree in Social Anthropology at the London School of Economics and Political Science. She has conducted fieldwork in Shan State, Kachin State and Yangon, combining ethnographic approaches with textual study. She is particularly interested in lay ritual practice, vernacular texts and identity making.
• Video: https://youtu.be/UcMI98PvKsY

16 July 2021

Tony Scott (University of Toronto)

The Milindapañha and the Fifth and Sixth Councils in Myanmar

• The Milindapañha (Questions of King Milinda) is a seminal but enigmatic text in Theravada Buddhist history, considered part of the Tipiṭaka only in Myanmar. This talk will explore how the Milindapañha was interpreted in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries of South and Southeast Asia as Theravada Buddhists were trying to reconcile their textual corpus with competing colonial worldviews. At the same time, this very textual corpus was being transformed from a more open ‘Tipiṭaka’ in the centuries prior to a closed ‘canon.’ Hence the place of the Milindapañha in the Fifth and Sixth Councils in Myanmar will be examined to shed light on what was at stake in this transformation.
• Tony Scott is a PhD Candidate at the University of Toronto’s Department for the Study of Religion. His research interests lie in South and Southeast Asian religious commentary and its intersection with communities of practice and twentieth-century Buddhist statecraft. His dissertation focuses on the Milindapañha-aṭṭhakathā, a controversial Pali commentary on the Questions of King Milinda (circa 1st century B.C.E.) composed by a Burmese pioneer of insight (vipassanā) meditation, the Mūla Mingun Jetavan Sayadaw (1868-1955).
• Video: https://youtu.be/72Y6dOWCybg

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