Women and Buddhism
with Professor Jan Willis
Tuesdays, Jun 29, Jul 13, 20 & 27, 7–8:30pm EDT ONLINE
The Buddhist community has always consisted of men and women practitioners—of monks and nuns, laymen and laywomen, in that order, largely in deference to the social and cultural structures and conditions of its birth. However, the question of women’s place and standing within Buddhism has remained a problematic and often contentious one. In this short seminar, we investigate why this has been so, and explore the complex and changing status of women—in relationship to Buddhist literature, doctrine, and practice. In addition, we look at some women practitioners themselves with the aim of understanding the ideals and concerns which sustain, drive, and empower them.
Course Requirements
- Registration for the entire course is required.
- Students will need to acquire the books listed below, links to the other readings will be posted on the website:
(i) Dharma Matters by Jan Willis
(ii) In Search of Buddha’s Daughters by Christine Toomey
(iii) The First Free Women by Matty Weingast
- Reading of all class materials prior to each session.
- Thoughtful engagement with the materials and verbal contributions to discussions.
- Three short essays (one-page, typed, double spaced). These will be read and “graded” by Professor Willis.
Required Assignments
- Thoughtful and Engaged attention and contributions to class discussions.
- All the details for the required weekly reading and writing assignments are provided in the Syllabus. Please review the requirements before registering for the course.
Important Note
This is an online-only event that is administered using Zoom.
After registering, the system automatically sends a confirmation and/or a receipt email that contains the Zoom meeting link and/or other instructions. If you don’t immediately receive the system email(s) or you have any other questions, please contact us at registration@shantidevanyc.org.
*Zoom is an interactive video-conferencing tool that allows participants to see one another and ask questions. You will need a computer, a tablet or a smartphone with the Zoom application to attend. If you are using Zoom for the first time, please login earlier to allow any necessary installations on your device.
Registration / Schedule
Suggested: $72 for all 4 sessions
Other offering options: free, $25, $50, $108
The suggested amount helps support teacher offerings and expenses, direct costs and rent. Shantideva member discounts or benefits will be applied automatically if you have a membership in MindBody.
Shantideva Center may publish recorded sessions in the public domain (e.g., on YouTube). By registering for this event, you are agreeing to give your consent to this process. To protect your privacy, we recommend being conscious about any personal information you share during the sessions. To further enhance anonymity, you may want to consider turning off video or naming yourself using abbreviations.
Time zone: US Eastern Standard Time (GMT/UTC-5)
For questions regarding registration, please email registration@shantidevanyc.org for assistance.
Additional Materials
If you are a registered student, you may access the readings on our password protected page. After registering, an online receipt will be sent to the email address that you used to register. The page link and password will be on the receipt. Please contact us at registration@shantidevanyc.org if you have questions about accessing this page.
Part of the Required Readings in Syllabus
Dana for the Teacher
About the Teacher
Jan Willis, Ph.D. is an author, activist, scholar, professor, and long-time Buddhist practitioner. TIME magazine named her as one of six “spiritual innovators for the new millenium”, and Ebony called her one of its “Power 150” most influential African-Americans.
Dr. Willis is Professor Emerita of Religion at Wesleyan University and now Visiting Professor of Religion at Agnes Scott College in Decatur, GA. She received her B.A. and M.A. in Philosophy from Cornell University, and her Ph.D. in Indic and Buddhist Studies from Columbia University. She is the author of The Diamond Light: An Introduction to Tibetan Buddhist Meditation (1972), On Knowing Reality: The Tattvartha Chapter of Asanga’s Bodhisattvabhumi (1979), Enlightened Beings: Life Stories from the Ganden Oral Tradition (1995); and the editor of Feminine Ground: Essays on Women and Tibet (1989).
Additionally, she has published numerous articles and essays on various topics in Buddhism—Buddhist meditation, hagiography, women and Buddhism, and Buddhism and race. Her best-known work is her personal memoir, Dreaming Me: Black, Baptist, and Buddhist—One Woman’s Spiritual Journey.
Dr. Willis is one of Lama Yeshe’s earliest Western disciples and sees him as one of her root spiritual mentors. She grew up in the Jim Crow South of 1950s and 1960s and took part in the Civil Rights movement. While traveling through Asia in the early 1970s, she met Lama Yeshe and discovered a path to healing the wounds of racism: “[Buddhism] has helped me in real ways to find what I was looking for as a young person in a world that was violent,” she explained. “It showed me how to locate deep wounds that racism caused in my early life … and having found them, how to heal them.”
