News & Announcements

NCBS Announces the 2023 Toshihide Numata Book Award

September 12, 2023

BERKELEY— The Numata Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, is pleased to announcethat the winner of the 2023 Toshihide Numata Book Award in Buddhism is Professor John Kieschnick (Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation Professor of Buddhist Studies, Stanford University), for his book Buddhist Historiography in China (Columbia University Press, 2022).

The Toshihide Numata Book Award in Buddhism is presented on an annual basis to an outstanding book in the area of Buddhist studies....

CBS Announces the 2022 Toshihide Numata Book Award

September 19, 2022

BERKELEY — The Numata Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, is pleased to announce that the winner of the 2022 Toshihide Numata Book Award in Buddhism is Professor John Strong (Emeritus Professor, Bates), for his book, The Buddha’s Tooth: Western Tales of a Sri Lankan Relic (University of Chicago Press, 2021).

The...

New Glorisun Postdoctoral Fellowship in Chinese Buddhism

November 17, 2021

With the generous support of the Glorisun Global Buddhist Network, the Center for Buddhist Studies at UC Berkeley is pleased to invite applications for a postdoctoral research-teaching fellowship. The term of the appointment is July 1, 2022 - June 30, 2024. For more information, see fellowship ...

CBS Announces the 2021 Toshihide Numata Book Award

September 9, 2021

BERKELEY — The Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, is pleased to announce that the winner of the 2021 Toshihide Numata Book Award in Buddhism is Dr. Christopher V. Jones (Affiliated Lecturer and Research Associate at the Faculty of Divinity, and Bye-Fellow of Selwyn College, University of Cambridge), for his book The Buddhist Self: On Tathāgatagarbha and...

Padmanabh Jaini, Master of Buddhist and Jain Studies and cofounder of Berkeley's Group in Buddhist Studies, passes away.

May 30, 2021

Our revered colleague, teacher and friend, Prof. Padmanabh Srivarma Jaini, master of Buddhist and Jain Studies, passed away on Tuesday May 25, just five months shy from what would have been his 98th birthday. His health had been failing over the last weeks, and he peacefully passed away on his own terms in his home in the Berkeley hills, with his son Arvind at his side, who as medical...

Gandhāran Relics and Reliquaries: What they teach us about Buddhist history - Webcast

April 1, 2021

Webcast, March 12, 2021

CBS Announces the 2020 Toshihide Numata Book Award

September 11, 2020

BERKELEY — The Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, is pleased to announce that the winner of the 2020 Toshihide Numata Book Award in Buddhism is Roger R. Jackson (John W. Nason Professor of Asian Studies and Religion, Emeritus, Carleton College), for his book Mind Seeing Mind: Mahāmudrā and the Geluk Tradition (Wisdom...

2020 Khyentse Lecture Webcast

March 31, 2020
Charles Ramble ( Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes) - "Leaves on the Forest Floor: Towards a Method of Mapping the Evolution of Tibetan Ritual Complexes"

2019 Numata Symposium Webcast - Buddhist Philosophy: The State of the Field

October 24, 2019
2019 Numata Symposium to Celebrate the 35th Anniversary of the Numata Chair Program at UC Berkeley.

CBS Announces the 2019 Toshihide Numata Book Award

September 4, 2019

BERKELEY — The Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, is pleased to announce that the winner of the 2019 Toshihide Numata Book Award in Buddhism is Professor Paul Swanson (Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture) for his book: Clear Serenity, Quiet Insight: T’ien-t’ai Chih-i’s Mo-ho chih-kuan (3 vols., Nanzan Library of Asian Religion and Culture, University of...

2020 Chao Presidential Chair - Jay Garfield

July 11, 2019

Professor Jay Garfield (Smith College) will be the 2020 Chao Presidential Chair in Buddhist Studies.

2019 Chao Presidential Chair - David Germano (University of Virginia)

April 1, 2019

2019 Chao Presidential Chair
David Germano, University of Virginia

2019 Seminar Series
David Germano teaches a weekly graduate-level seminar, reading with graduate students across several departments in the Tibetan Buddhist literature of the Great Perfection, one of today's most popular Buddhist traditions around...

2019 Khyentse Lecture - Toni Huber (Humboldt University Berlin) Recently discovered ancient Tibetan manuscripts and what they reveal about old cultures of ritual and some Tibetan Buddhist innovations

February 28, 2019

In recent years, two sets of unique 11th century Tibetan manuscripts have been discovered - a sensational development according to many scholars. Texts and paintings in these manuscripts allow new insights into the cultural outlook of the little-known transition period between the 9th century fall of the Tibetan empire, and the radical socio-religious project of forging...

Center for Buddhist Studies joins the new Tianzhu Global Network for the Study of Buddhist Cultures

January 9, 2019

UC Berkeley’s Center for Buddhist Studies is part of a new international network of universities that is receiving $4.9 million to advance the study of Buddhism and East Asian cultures.

2018 Toshihide Numata Book Award Presentation and Symposium ‘Meaning in the World and in Texts’: Thoughts on Buddhist Philosophy of Language

November 9, 2018

The Toshihide Numata Book Award in Buddhism is awarded on an annual basis to an outstanding book or books in the area of Buddhist studies. The selection is made by an external committee that is appointed annually. This year's winner is Professor Roy Tzohar (Tel Aviv University) for his book A Yogācāra Buddhist Theory of Metaphor (Oxford University Press).

Program:
3:10 pm:...

CBS Announces the 2018 Toshihide Numata Book Award

October 1, 2018

A Yogācāra Buddhist Theory of Metaphor (Oxford University Press) book coverBERKELEY — The Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, is pleased to announce that the winner of the 2018 Toshihide Numata Book Award in Buddhism is Professor Roy Tzohar (Tel Aviv University) for his book: A Yogācāra Buddhist Theory of Metaphor (Oxford University...

2018 Chao Presidential Chair: Evan Thompson, University of British Columbia

March 14, 2018

head shot of Evan Thompson2018 Lecture and Seminar Series

Wednesday, March 14, 2018, 5 pm
Annual Lecture by Evan Thompson
Meditation and Nonconceptual Awareness Perspectives from Buddhist Philosophy and Cognitive Science
Toll Room, Alumni House, UC Berkeley

Mindfulness meditation practices are often...

Migrants, Monks, and Monasteries: Toward a History of South China Sea Buddhism

March 8, 2018

Jack Meng-Tat Chia is a Senior Tutor in the Department of History at the National University of Singapore and currently a Postdoctoral Scholar at the Center for Buddhist Studies, University of California, Berkeley. Born and raised in Singapore, he received his MA in East Asian Studies from Harvard University, and his PhD in History from Cornell University. He is currently working on his book manuscript, entitled Diaspora's Dharma: Buddhism and Modernity across the South China Sea. This book seeks to contribute to our understanding of the connected history of Buddhism in China and Southeast...

2018 Khyentse Lecture - Brandon Dotson (Georgetown University)

February 28, 2018

Approximately 70 people attended the 2018 Khyentse Lecture by Prof. Brandon Dotson (Georgetown University). In his lecture, entitled "Buddhism and Divination in Tibet," Dotson introduced an early form of Tibetan dice divination involving intimate exchanges with gods and with goddesses (sman), and considered how Buddhism variously transformed, absorbed, and transmitted such divination...

2018 Khyentse Lecture - Buddhism and Divination in Tibet

February 8, 2018

In Tibet, various forms of divination persist both within and alongside the Buddhist and Bon religions. Excavated divination texts from Dunhuang and from other Silk Road sites furnish us with traces of the dynamic processes by which Buddhism absorbed various divination techniques practiced in 8th to 10th centuries. This lecture will introduce an early form of Tibetan dice divination involving...

2017 Toshihide Numata Book Award Presentation and Symposium

December 1, 2017

Professor Jacqueline I. Stone was presented with the Toshihide Numata Book Award on the afternoon of Friday, December 1, 2017. The prize presentation included a keynote by the author and a symposium with talks by Professors James Benn (McMaster University), Gregory Schopen (UCLA), and Mark Blum (UC Berkeley).

The Toshihide Numata Book Award in Buddhism is awarded on an annual basis to an...

2016 Toshihide Numata Book Award Presentation and Symposium

October 28, 2016

During a ceremony at the Alumni House, the Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, and Bukkyō Dendō Kyōkai (Numata Foundation) presented the 2016 Toshihide Numata Book Award to Professor Janet Gyatso (Harvard Divinity School) for Being Buddhist in a Human World: An Intellectual History of Medicine in Early Modern Tibet (Columbia University Press, 2015...

CBS Announces the 2015 Toshihide Numata Book Award

September 9, 2015

BERKELEY — The Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, is pleased to announce that the winners of the 2015 Toshihide Numata Book Award are Lothar Ledderose and Sun Hua for their edited volume, Buddhist Stone Sutras in China, Sichuan Province, Volume 1 (Wiesbaden/Hangzhou: Harrassowitz Verlag/China Academy of Art Press, 2014).

The Toshihide Numata Book Award in Buddhism is...

CBS Announces the 2014 Toshihide Numata Book Award

September 19, 2014

BERKELEY — The Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, is pleased to announce two winners of the 2014 Toshihide Numata Book Award: Erik Braun, Professor of...

Buddhism, Mind, and Cognitive Science

April 25, 2014

This conference was made possible by a grant from The Robert H.N. Ho Family Foundation and is dedicated to the exploration of the methodological underpinnings of the current encounter between Buddhism and cognitive science. Recently, this encounter has been criticized for failing to take account of the historical and cultural complexities of Buddhist thought and practice, failing to reflect the most recent...

The Center for Buddhist Studies Announces the Winner of the 2013 Toshihide Numata Book Award

August 28, 2013

BERKELEY — The Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, is pleased to announce that the 2013 Toshihide Numata Book Award has been awarded to Daniel Arnold, Associate Professor of the Philosophy of Religions at the University of Chicago Divinity School, for his book Brains,...

2012 Khyentse Lecture - Tibet in the Age of Manuscripts: Reflections on Recent Textual Discoveries

February 16, 2012

During the past few decades, the discovery, cataloguing, and partial publication of important Tibetan manuscript collections has substantially transformed our view of the intellectual and religious history of Tibet. Important developments about which we were almost entirely ignorant only a decade ago may now be studied in detail thanks to copious newly available documentation. The present talk will...

The Center for Buddhist Studies Announces the Winner of the 2011 Toshihide Numata Book Award

August 25, 2011

BERKELEY — The Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, is pleased to announce that the 2011 Toshihide Numata Book Award has been awarded to Todd Lewis and Subarna Man Tuladhar for their jointly authored book, Sugata Saurabha: An Epic Poem from Nepal on the Life of the Buddha by Chittadhar Hridaya (Oxford...

The Center for Buddhist Studies Announces the First Winner of the Toshihide Numata Book Award

September 1, 2010

power of place book coverBERKELEY - The Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, is pleased to announce that the 2010 Toshihide Numata Book Award has been awarded to Professor James Robson of Harvard University for his 2009 book Power of Place: The Religious Landscape of the Southern Sacred Peak (Nanyue) in Medieval China (Harvard University Asia Center).

The...