Conferences

The UK Association for Buddhist Studies holds an annual conference, either a one-day event at SOAS, London, or a longer themed conference hosted by another UK institution. The two types of conference tend to alternate.

The next UKABS conference will be held at the University of Manchester, 2nd-3rd July 2020.

We invite paper proposals within the theme of “Buddhism Beyond Boundaries.” By this we mean research on historical and contemporary Buddhism that examines the ways in which it transcends social, cultural, political, geographical, and temporal boundaries. While boundaries define and delimit, there always exists the possibility of crossing, breaking, erasing, or transcending those boundaries in ways that destabilise the very categories that the boundaries had been intended to protect. Within this theme we aim to explore how Buddhism has both enabled interactions between cultures, and how these interactions have helped shape the development of Buddhism itself. We welcome proposals on any topic that fits within this theme. We particularly welcome proposals on the following topics:

1) Buddhism and Migration
2) Transnational Buddhism
3) Intersections between Tourism and Buddhism
4) Textual Translations and Transmissions