sábado, 4 de abril de 2015

Stanford Silk Road lectures Friday April 10 and Thursday, April 16 (different days,times and places))

Prof. Stephen F. Teiser, Princeton University


“The Origins of the Dunhuang Manuscripts”


Friday, April 10 (note day) at 7:30 p.m.


Knight Building, Room 102.  Knight Building is behind Memorial Auditorium.


From the time the manuscripts from Dunhuang were first discovered in 1900, curious minds have wondered why the texts were deposited in the library cave (Mogao Cave 17) in the early 11th century. Two major reasons have been proposed. The “sacred waste” theory proposes that the texts, wrappers, and paintings in the cave had outlived their usefulness in religious and social life but were too sacred or rare to be simply burned or disposed of. Hence, batches of manuscripts from several temple libraries were collected and sealed up. Another theory is that the manuscripts were intentionally placed into the cave in order to “avoid disaster,” such as the rumored invasion of the Karakhanids.


These theories have guided research and generated important scholarship.
But they have also encouraged us to ignore other important aspects of Buddhist manuscript culture. In particular, in assuming that the entire body of manuscripts from Dunhuang constitutes a library or single corpus, such theories obscure the multiple origins of the manuscripts and the diverse range of religious and social institutions in which the texts were produced. Instead of focusing on the end of the manuscripts, this lecture explores how the genesis of the manuscripts provides invaluable information about Buddhist religious practice and the institutions of literacy in medieval China.


Free and Open to the Public


Speaker's Bio


Stephen F. Teiser is the D. T. Suzuki Professor in Buddhist Studies and Professor of Religion in the Department of Religion at Princeton University. He specializes in the study of Buddhism and Chinese religions.
His current research focuses on Chinese Buddhist practice and medieval liturgical manuscripts.


Sponsored by the Silk Road Foundation, Ho Center for Buddhist Studies, and Center for East Asian Studies


The Expedition of the French Sinologist Paul Pelliot to Chinese Turkestan and China, 1906-1909


Date

Thu Apr-16-2015, 6:00pm


Location

Levinthal Hall, Stanford Humanities Center


Program / Series
  

Silk Road Buddhism


Co-sponsor


Stanford Humanities Center

Jean-Pierre Drège

Director Emeritus, Ecole française d’Extrême-Orient

Paul Pelliot himself briefly described the archeological expedition he led in Turkestan and China at the beginning of 20th century and that we know about it is usually limited to the facts stated in Pelliot’s published reports at that period. And yet it is possible to propose a better evaluation of the ins and outs of his mission which seemed important for both French scholars and economic investors. This can be made thanks to the notebook written by Pelliot during his trip, recently published, and to his personal papers kept now in the Guimet museum in Paris.


Free and open to the public


Speaker's Bio 

From 1980 to 1989, Jean-Pierre Drège was research fellow at the Ecole française d’Extrême-Orient. He was the director of this institution from
1998 to 2004. He has taught the history of Chinese manuscripts and books at the Ecole pratique des hautes études from 1985 to 2012. He also directed the Research Group on ­Dunhuang manuscripts at the Centre national de la recherche scientifique from 1993 to 2001 and co-directed the Institut d’études chinoises at the Collège de France from 1992 to 1999. He recently published a new French translation of the Record of buddhistic kingdoms by the monk Faxian (2013).


Co-sponsored by Ho Center for Buddhist Studies and the Stanford Humanities Center


Coming soon:


“’The Tea Road’”:  Shanxi Merchants and the Expansion of Chinese Trading Network in the Mongolian Steppe”


By Zhijian Qiao, Ph.D. candidate, History


Thursday, May 21, at 7:30 p.m.


Knight Building Room 102.



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Posted by: Connie Chin <csquare@stanford.edu>