University of Toronto - Scarborough, Humanities

Tung Lin Kok Yuen 東蓮覺苑 Visiting Professor in Buddhist Studies

The Department of Humanities in the University of Toronto Scarborough (UTSC) invites applications for the position of Tung Lin Kok Yuen 東蓮覺苑VisitingProfessor in Buddhist Studies. This call for applications is for two visiting professors, with one successful candidate to be in residence during the fall and winter academic semesters of 2013-14 and the other during the fall and winter academic semesters of 2014-15. Candidates should indicate which time slot they might prefer.

A Visiting Professor is a faculty member from another university or research institute who holds a continuing appointment in her/his home institution.  Applicants are expected to specialize in any aspect of Buddhist Studies (including but not limited to Asian Studies, cultural anthropology, history, geography, literature, politics, philosophy, creative and performing arts), with demonstrable mastery of one or more relevant modern languages of Asia for their research and/or at least one of the classical languages of Buddhism. Applicants should be 3 to 5 years past completion of the PhD (or comparable seniority in the arts) at the time of joining the position, with a strong publication record and/or comparable career accomplishments. Applications will be assessed primarily in terms of applicants’ scholarly profiles and their fit with the University’s academic programs (for further information on this, please see below). Compensation will be competitive, depending on the candidate's qualifications and experience.

The Greater Toronto Area (GTA) is home to one of the most densely populated and complex Buddhist communities in the world, with around a hundred temples, monasteries, and centres communicating in dozens of languages, and a variety of Asian groups from Newars to Tibetans to Sinhalese. This thriving diversity of practice, cultures, teachings, and diasporas offers a unique opportunity for the university’s Buddhist Studies and Global Asia programs to foster wider university-community linkages. Toronto itself is one of the world’s most diverse and multi-cultural spaces with a rich variety of cultural and international events taking place, from the annual Toronto International Film Festival to 2014 World Pride to the 2015 Pan Am Games.

The University of Toronto’s unique tri-campus structure (with campuses at downtown/St George and in Scarborough and Mississauga, all located in the Greater Toronto Area) gives faculty and students associated with any of the campuses equal scholarly privileges across the whole university. Accordingly, scholars appointed as TLKY Visiting Professors will have the opportunity to collaborate with not just faculty and students on the UTSC campus, especially in the interdisciplinary program in Global Asia Studies, but also on the other campuses including, for example, the Centre for Religious Studies and the Asian Institute on the St George campus, and the Department of Historical Studies on the Mississauga campus. The University of Toronto libraries are one of the largest and best-equipped systems in North America.

The Tung Lin Kok Yuen東蓮覺苑VisitingProfessorships in Buddhist Studies are made possible at the University of Toronto Scarborough thanks to the Tung Lin Kok Yuen 東蓮覺苑Gift for Buddhist studies. The benefits of this generous gift are profound and far reaching. Initiatives supported by Tung Lin Kok Yuen 東蓮覺苑emphasize multiple perspectives in the study of Buddhist thought and culture, including linkages among history, literature, philosophy, religion, and the visual and performing arts. Within the context of UTSC's multi-disciplinary Department of Humanities, the Tung Lin Kok Yuen 東蓮覺苑Gift greatly enhances our offerings in Global Asia Studies, and it supports important conversations about cultural pluralism and diversities.

For further information about the University and the TLKY Program there, please see:

http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~humdiv/index.html and

http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~humdiv/prg_bs.html

The University envisages that these distinguished visitors would engage in the life of the department with the following specific academic responsibilities:

*To reside in Toronto for two academic terms, from August/September to April/May. Salary and allowances are generous and commensurate with similar international fellowships and the candidates’ scholarly profile.

*To teach one upper-level undergraduate course at UTSC per term, usually a small-group lecture or seminar course which runs for 12 weeks, with 2 hours of class meeting per week.

*To guide a specialized academic workshop over 1-2 days open to senior undergraduate and graduate students from all three UofT campuses. The theme, format, and projected enrolments would be at the discretion of the visitor, in consultation with other faculty.

*To deliver two public lectures at UTSC on an academic topic pertaining to Buddhist Studies broadly defined, but with a focus on their own research, to appeal to a wider target audience drawn from the Greater Toronto Area as part of the TLKY 東蓮覺苑Perspectives on Buddhist Thought and Culture series, as well as the tri-campus academic community.

*In both years, the successful candidates will take a lead role in organizing an international research workshop or small conference on theme/s of their choice in consultation with the University’s TLKY Committee. Candidates for the 2013-14 Visiting Professorship may wish in particular to consider the unique opportunity to participate in the organization of the Canadian “Big Berks” conference being hosted at the University of Toronto in May 2014, a leading international conferences on gender histories and interdisciplinary scholarship, with a view to facilitating a panel broadly focused on Buddhism and gender. 

Applications, consisting of a statement of interest with some indication of how a candidate will contribute to the University’s programs (at most two pages), accompanied by a curriculum vitae,should be sent to buddhist-studies-search@utsc.utoronto.ca. The search committee reserves the right to ask for further materials from shortlisted candidates.

If electronic submission is not possible, applications may be mailed to:

TLKY Visiting Professor Search

Professor William Bowen, Chair

Department of Humanities

University of Toronto Scarborough

1265 Military Trail

Toronto, ON M1C 1A4

Canada

The deadline for applications is June 10, 2012.