On November 13, 2018, Prof. Rae Dachille's Tibetan Buddhism class (RELI 358) was joined by several prominent Tibetan ascetics and researchers, including Venerable Ani Thukden Dema, a nun studying as part of Emory Tibet Science Initiative (ETSI); Rangdol Rinpoche, amonk studying as part of ETSI; Tsondue Samphel, a translator for ETSI; and Drupon Tinley Ningpo Rinpoche, a master from the Drikung Kagyu lineage of Tibetan Buddhism.

Students were able to learn about developments in the conversation between Buddhism and Western science as well as to hear more about meditation and the lives of famous masters.

Professor Brett Esaki's essay "Whiteness Studies--Why Not to Teach it (As an Untentured Professor)" was recently published in the American Academy of Religion's professonal magazine Religious Studies News in the "Spotlight on Teaching" special issue on Anti-Racism Education. 

Click to read Prof. Esaki's essay or the entire special issue.

The Department of Religious Studies and Classics hosted local high school students enrolled in AP World History courses. Over two days (Oct. 8-9), the visiting students met with Professors Alison Jameson and Robert Stephan and attended several courses offered by Religious Studies and Classics professors on campus. 

For more information, see coverage of the event in the UA Daily Wildcat.

Professor Daisy Vargas was recently featured on Arizona Public Media's weekly public affairs show Arizona360. In the episode that aired on September 21, 2018, Professor Vargas discusses the impact of the recent sexual abuse scandal in the Catholic Church and its impact on people in Arizona.

Watch the full episode here: Arizona360

Professor Brett Esaki has been invited by the Department of Philsophy and Religious Studies at Middle Tennessee State to give a public lecture entitled "Legacy of Dominance in Japanese American Monuments." The lecture will be September 14, 2018 in Murfreesboro, TN.

Lecture Abstract:

Controversies surround monuments because they dominate space with one version of history. Japanese Americans have created monuments and utilized this power to express their ancestors’ legacy of surviving dominance, notably the overt racism of the 19^thcentury, the World War II internment camps, and WWII atomic bombs. Yet even while illustrating the horrors of domination, controversies arose around Japanese American monuments regarding their domination of space. In this lecture, Dr. Esaki will detail controversies around three monuments, especially how the Japanese American artists carefully negotiated politically fraught environments while maintaining roots in Japanese American religions. In the process, he will shed light on the hope and ruin intrinsic to the legacy of dominance in monuments. 

In their new book Nine Nights of the Goddess: The Navarātri Festival in South Asia (SUNY Press), UA Religious Studies Professor Caleb Simmons, Dr. Moumita Sen (University of Oslo), and Professor Hillary Rodrigues (University of Lethbridge) bring together sixteen renowned scholars from around the world to explore various aspects of the Indian festival of Navarātri. 

From the publisher's website:

Nine Nights of the Goddess explores the festival of Navarātri—alternatively called Navarātra, Mahānavamī, Durgā Pūjā, Dasarā, and/or Dassain—which lasts for nine nights and ends with a celebration called Vijayadaśamī, or “the tenth (day) of victory.” Celebrated in both massive public venues and in small, private domestic spaces, Navarātri is one of the most important and ubiquitous festivals in South Asia and wherever South Asians have settled. These festivals share many elements, including the goddess, royal power, the killing of demons, and the worship of young girls and married women, but their interpretation and performance vary widely. This interdisciplinary collection of essays investigates Navarātri in its many manifestations and across historical periods, including celebrations in West Bengal, Odisha, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, and Nepal. Collectively, the essays consider the role of the festival’s contextual specificity and continental ubiquity as a central component for understanding South Asian religious life, as well as how it shapes and is shaped by political patronage, economic development, and social status.

“This is a unique collection of marvelously diverse perspectives on one of the most prominent contemporary Hindu festivals. Even those who know much about Durgā Pūjā should prepare to be fascinated by the work of these scholars.” — Patricia Dold, Memorial University

For more information about the book or for a free download of the book's "Introduction" co-written by Professor Simmons, please visit: https://www.sunypress.edu/p-6598-nine-nights-of-the-goddess.aspx

Professor Max Strassfeld recently published an article titled "Transing Religious Studies" in the Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion (Vol. 34, No.1, Spring 2018). In this article, Prof. Strassfeld considers "the effects of th[e] constructed incongruity between religion and transgender--both the direct impacts on trans people and the legacy within religious studies as an academic pursuit" through a close reading of the Mississippi House Bill (HB) 1523, which has recently gone into effect.

The article served as the focus of a roundtable discussion at the heart of the journal issue in which leading scholars of Religious Studies responded. Respondents included Joy Ladin, Ellen T. Armour, Evren Savci, Cameron Partridge, Judith Plaskow, Zohar Weiman-Kelman, Melissa M. Wilcox, and Robyn Henderson-Espinoza.

Professor Strassfeld's essay has received critical acclaim as "groundbreaking" (p. 53), "intrigu[ing] and persua[sive]" (p. 58), "critical" and "unprecedented" (p. 68), and "important and provocative" (p. 75).