REL 235 - Gender and Sexuality in Buddhism

Course unit(s): 1
Meets GAR (students beginning prior to Fall 2024): Meets general academic requirements HU and DE.
Meets Explore Core requirement (students beginning Fall 2024 and later): MV and GP
Buddhism conceptualized as a religion of monks, as a story exclusively about male enlightenment, or as a practice void of sex, emotion, and family ties, ignores much of the richness of the world’s Buddhist traditions. Following Ursula King’s injunctive to “take up a more gender balanced and more dialogical methodology,” this course offers a corrective to those misconceptions both in the material we will study, and in the interpretive lenses we will employ. We will explore Buddhist understandings of gender (including Buddhist masculinities), Buddhists’ negotiations of the power of sexuality and sexual discipline, and use of the body as a tool for liberation.