The Buddhist Cosmopolis: Connectivity, Diversity, and Materiality

The Buddhist Cosmopolis: Connectivity, Diversity, and Materiality in the Buddhist World(s)

You are invited to a distinguished lecture “The Buddhist Cosmopolis: Connectivity, Diversity, and Materiality in the Buddhist World(s)” by tansen-sen">span> (NYU Shanghai). Prof Sen will graciously serve as the distinguished speaker for the 2024 ,">span>, organized by the FASS Research Division at the NUS Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences.

Programme

7:00pm Registration

7:30pm Welcome Remarks by Professor Elaine Lynn-Ee Ho, FASS Vice Dean of Research (NUS Department of Geography)

7:35pm Introductory Remarks by Mr. K. Kesavapany, Guest of Honour

7:40pm Opening Remarks by Associate Professor Jack Meng-Tat Chia, Chair of Buddhist Studies Group (NUS Department of History)

7:45pm Lecture by Distinguished Speaker, Professor Tansen Sen (NYU Shanghai Center for Global Asia)

8:30pm Q & A and Discussion

9:00pm Refreshments

9:30pm End of Event

Abstract

The circulations of Buddhist ideas, literature, art, and people resulted in the creation of a connected spaces in Asia and beyond, which this presentation calls a “Buddhist cosmopolis.” In addition to explaining this idea of a Buddhist cosmopolis, the presentation examines the ways in which the circulations and the diversity of Buddhist practices and ideas could be studied and conceptualized. It specifically examines the spread of knowledge, art forms, and the travels of missionaries and pilgrims within various parts of the Buddhist cosmopolis to demonstrate the spatial and ideological connections, as well as the unique local traditions that emerged at multiple sites. The presentation suggests employing frameworks of “convergence,” “divergence,” “entanglements,” “translocality,” and other concepts related to mobility and connections to theorize this idea of a Buddhist cosmopolis. The understanding of a Buddhist cosmopolis, it argues, also helps comprehend the intricacies of transregional interactions, the impact the circulations of Buddhist ideas had in fostering them, and the unique geographies Buddhist mobilities have created over the past two millennia.

Speaker Bio

Tansen Sen is Professor of history and the Director of the Center for Global Asia at NYU Shanghai, and Associated Full Professor of History at New York University. Previously he was a faculty at the City University of New York and the founding head of the Nalanda Sriwijaya Center at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore. He is the author of Buddhism, Diplomacy, and Trade: The Realignment of Sino-Indian Relations, 600-1400 (2003; 2016) and India, China, and the World: A Connected History (2017; 2018). He has co-authored (with Victor H. Mair) Traditional China in Asian and World History (2012), edited Buddhism across Asia: Networks of Material, Cultural and Intellectual Exchange (2014), and co-edited (with Burkhard Schnepel) Travelling Pasts: The Politics of Cultural Heritage in the Indian Ocean World (2019), and (with Brian Tsui) Beyond Pan-Asianism: Connecting China and India, 1840s-1960s (2021). He is currently at the Institute of Advanced Studies in Princeton working on a book on the Ming admiral Zheng He, a collaborative project on China-India interactions during the 1950s, and co-editing (with Engseng Ho) the Cambridge History of the Indian Ocean, volume 1.

About the FASS Distinguished Lecture Series in Buddhist Studies

The annual FASS Distinguished Lecture Series in Buddhist Studies, funded by an endowment established via a generous donation by the Buddha Tooth Relic Temple and Museum, brings a distinguished professor in Buddhist Studies to the National University of Singapore.