Christopher Hiebert

My dissertation examines the rise to prominence of Tibetan Buddhist "commentarial colleges" (bshad grwa) within the Nyingma sect from their beginnings in late-19th century Tibet to their current status as a distinctive and influential mode of transnational religious education. Utilizing a range of archival and historical sources, I will trace the development and standardization of the curricula of these institutions—and, indeed, the very category of curriculum—in light of their engagement with the shifting cultural, political, and economic landscapes of a range of Asian societies and state bureaucracies. Such an approach will illuminate how Asian Buddhists have drawn on “traditional” discourses, practices, and categories in order to contest, reshape, and create alternatives to modernist pressures and imperatives.

Wisdom Publications is the leading publisher of books and online courses on contemporary and classic Buddhism, mindfulness, and meditation. They are also the premier membership platform for Buddhists, having launched the Wisdom Experience in 2019 and now providing hundreds of hours of video and thousands of pages of books for their members to read online. Additionally, they publish the Wisdom Podcast and the Wisdom Journal. The Buddhism Public Scholar will work with the Publisher to publish digital versions of Wisdom translations and to link them with their original language editions.