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Due to low registration, the Ho Centre has cancelled Monday’s lunch on Nov. 18. 

Mindfulness and Meditation Across Traditions: An Undergraduate Lunch Series

Is mindfulness Buddhist? Is meditation a part of other religions? Is meditation religious and mindfulness secular? What does that distinction even mean? Is it cultural appropriation to take on part but not all of another religious practice?

Through this program, we aim to facilitate critical engagement among faculty and undergraduates with the idea of “mindfulness” which is widely and inaccurately understood as solely a Buddhist concept, but in fact resonates across traditions. We also intend to deepen students’ understanding of meditation in a variety of historical and theoretical contexts. Held in the Department for the Study of Religion (JHB 318), the program is aimed at building relationships among undergraduates and faculty in the DSR. The lunches will be scheduled once per month in the Fall and Winter terms and the Ho Centre for Buddhist Studies will provide lunch for the speakers and students.

We invite YOU—undergraduate students—to register for the Fall lunch series and to mark your calendars for these three exciting events! Lunch will be provided for the FIRST 20 UNDERGRAD STUDENTS who register. See registration info on our website. Note: We prefer that students register and attend ALL THREE events; if you are unable to attend one of the events, you may still register for the other two. Preference will be given to Religion specialists, majors, and minors but all are welcome to apply.

Note: We prefer that students register and attend ALL THREE events; if you are unable to attend one of the events, you may still register for the other two. Preference will be given to Religion specialists, majors, and minors but all are welcome to apply.

Fall Lunches

1. PROF. JENNIFER HARRIS — Meditation and Mindfulness in Western Medieval Christianity 
MONDAY, OCTOBER 21, 12 pm, JHB 318

Jennifer Harris completed her doctorate in medieval studies in 2002. Her dissertation examined the place of the Jerusalem Temple in the medieval Christian imagination. Her doctoral research covered matters liturgical, philosophical, and theological. Since completing her doctorate, Jennifer has been studying concepts of place in the medieval world, Jewish-Christian relations, the Bible and historiography, and, most recently, the intersection between medieval theories and modern popular culture.

2. PROF. SOL GOLDBERG – Moral Ideals, Despair, and Resiliency
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 18, 12 pm, JHB 318

Sol Goldberg is a Lecturer in the Department for the Study of Religion and the Centre for Jewish Studies. In 2009 he was awarded a PhD in Philosophy from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem for his dissertation Heidegger on the Possibility of Philosophical Education. He also holds an MA in Philosophy and History from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and a BA Honours in Jewish Studies from McGill University. His primary areas of research are in modern European philosophy, especially where it intersects with modern Jewish thought. He first came to the University of Toronto in 2009 as the Senator Jerahmiel S. and Carole S. Grafstein Postdoctoral Fellow in Jewish Philosophy, and the following year accepted a two-year position as a Lecturer in the Department of Philosophy and the Centre for Jewish Studies. In 2012, he joined the Department for the Study of Religion. Besides several courses in continental philosophy, he has also taught courses on environmental philosophy; the Holocaust and contemporary philosophy; romanticism; modernism; and critical theory. Among his current research is a project on theories, concepts, and methods in the study of antisemitism, for which he and his co-investigators Kalman Weiser (York U) and Scott Ury (TAU) received a SSHRC Insight Development Grant.

Winter Lunches

PROF. FRANCES GARRETT – Meditation and Mindfulness in Buddhism 
Date TBD

I have taught in the Department for the Study of Religion at the University of Toronto since 2003. I grew up in Oregon, received a B.A. in Philosophy from Columbia University in 1989 and a Ph.D. in Religious Studies from the University of Virginia in 2004. My research has examined the intersections between tantric practice, ritual and occult knowledge and medical theory, and what these tell us about the processes of institutional and ideological change in Tibet. I have also worked on the Tibetan King Gesar epic. I am now beginning a project focused on Mount Khangchendzonga, together with colleagues in Toronto and Sikkim. Most recently in my teaching, with a team of colleagues and students I have developed an online Classical Tibetan language course, and I am co-founder of University of Toronto Outdoors.

 

PROF. JULIE VIG – Mindfulness in Sikhism
Date TBD

Bookings