Research

My research expertise and interests cover the religious-doctrinal history and practices of Tibetan and Bhutanese Buddhism and the relationship between the societal spheres of religion, politics, law, and economics in the Tibetan cultural area. I am especially interested in sustainable development models and alternative modernity and secularity beyond Anglo-Euro-centric perspectives, the entangled history between Asia and Europe, and Buddhist ethics and activism in the climate crisis.

I personally locate my work in the disciplinary field of Tibetology with a focus on text-critical and historical-philological methods/theories, global history, Buddhist studies, and environmental humanities. I am engaged in using more critical and postcolonial approaches to investigate and discuss the history of the discipline of Tibetan and Bhutanese Studies at large. Having recently returned to Germany and being a German citizen myself, this also includes efforts to address the role of our academic disciplines during national socialism (1933–45).