American Buddhisms: An Experiential Introduction (two weeks 3.0 semester credits) - Wakoh Shannon Hickey

The United States is home to a tremendous variety of Buddhist traditions. This two-week course will introduce basic Buddhist doctrines and practices, provide a brief historical overview of Buddhism in the U.S., and include visits to Buddhist groups in the Berkeley area. Race dynamics will be an important theme of the course. Students will be asked to make at least four site visits to Buddhist communities during the course - Pure Land, Ch'an, Theravada, Nichiren, Tibetan, and/or Zen - and to write brief reflection papers on them. A final exam will occur in class on the last evening.

Wakoh Shannon Hickey, Ph.D., is an alumna of UC Berkeley, Pacific School of Religion, and Duke University; will teach religious studies at Alfred University beginning fall, 2008, and is ordained as a priest of the Soto school of Japanese Zen.