Papers Presented
2024
“Buddhist Epistemes of Nature, Ecology, and the Climate Crisis: Perspectives from Bhutan and the Himalayas.” The 21st Annual Conference of the European Association for the Study of Religions. University of Gothenburg, August 2024.
“Recalibrating the Perspective on Tibetan and Himalayan History: Identity- and Nation-Building in Bhutan“. Drukrik Research Colloquium, Thimphu, Bhutan (online), February 2024.
2023
“What Does ‘Religio-Political’ Even Mean? The Diachronic Perspective on Bhutan as an Empirical and Theoretical Case Study.” Final Conference CAHSS “Multiple Secularities – Beyond the West, Beyond Modernites.” Leipzig University, October 2023.
“Buddhistische Identität und alternative Nationalstaatenbildung in Bhutan als globale Verflechtungs- und Religionsgeschichte.” 35th Annual Conference Deutsche Vereinigung für Religionswissenschaft, University of Bayreuth, September 2023.
“The ‘Age of Strife’” as Episteme: Buddhist Ethics, Action, and the Climate Crisis.” Contribution/Chair/Organizer. “Panel “Epistemes of Nature, Environment, and the Climate Crisis.” ReCentGlobe Annual Conference “Global Crises and Epistemic Fragmentation.” Leipzig University, April 2023.
2022
“‘Times of Strife’ as Didactics: Buddhist Ethics, Natural Disaster, and the Climate Crisis.” Conference “The Dharma-Ending Age: The Climate Crisis Through the Lens of Buddhist Eschatology, Past and Present.” Yin-Cheng Buddhist Studies Network/From the Ground Up: Buddhism and East Asian Religions. Conference, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, October 2022.
“Creating a Doctrinal Identity of the Bhutanese ’Brug-pa-bka’-brgyud School: Making Sense of Scripture, Lineage, Arguments, and Experience in the Mahāmudrā Debate.” 16th International Association for Tibetan Studies Seminar, Prague, July 2022.
“Buddhism, Diplomacy, and Travels: Identity- and Nation-building in 18th-century Bhutan.” Association for Asian Studies 2022 Annual Conference, Honolulu, March 2022 (online).
2021
“‘Secularities’ in a Maṇḍala: Boundaries between Religion and Politics in Bhutan.” Association for Asian Studies 2020 Annual Conference, Boston, March 2021.
2020
“Himalayan Research in the time of COVID-19: Views from Canada,” roundtable of graduate students and emerging scholars across different disciplines and institutions in Canada, organizer/moderator. University of British Columbia, Vancouver, November 2020.
“‘Paper,’ Binding, Books: Perspective from Japan, India, and Tibet.” Roundtable with Takahiro Sasaki, Adheesh Sathaye, and Hasan Siddiqui. University of British Columbia, Vancouver, February 2020.
2019
“Identity-Building in the Tibetan Borderlands: Buddhist Masters at the Intersection Between Religion and Politics in Eighteenth-century Bhutan.” 15th International Association for Tibetan Studies Seminar, Paris, July 2019.
“Debates on Mahāmudrā: Negotiating Tibetan Buddhist Esoteric Traditions.” Congress 2019 of the Humanities and Social Sciences and Canadian Association for the Study of Religion/Société Canadienne pour l’Étude de la Religion (CSSR/SCÉR) Annual Meeting, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, June 2019.
2018
“Translocal Buddhism: Movement and Connection in Buddhist History,” 8th Annual Tung Lin Kok Yuen Canada Foundation Symposium, respondent. The Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation Program in Buddhism and Contemporary Society, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, October 2018.
2017
“A Timely Message from the Cave: The Mahāmudrā Doctrine in the Intellectual Agenda of the Sixty-Ninth rJe mKhan-po dGe-‚dun-rin-chen, 1926–1997.” The Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation Buddhist Studies Symposium, Toronto, August 2017.
2016
“Tracing the Life and Intellectual Agenda of a Twentieth Century Bhutanese Scholar and Yogin, the Sixty-Ninth rJe mKhan-po dGe-’dun-rin-chen (1926–1997).” 14th International Association of Tibetan Studies Seminar, Bergen, June 2016.
2015
“In Defense of the Mahāmudrā Doctrine: Developments in the ’Brug-pa-bka’-brgyud School in Bhutan from the Eighteenth to the Twentieth Century.” 4th International Seminar of Young Tibetologists, Leipzig, September 2015.
Invited
2023
“Recalibrating the Perspective on Tibetan and Himalayan History: Identity- and Nation-Building in Bhutan.” University of Oxford, Wolfson College, Tibetan Graduate Studies Seminar. November 2023.
2022
“‘Tighter than a Silken Knot and Heavier than a Golden Yoke’: Tibetan Metaphors of the Religious and Political Between Imagination and Social Reality.” Center for Religious Studies, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, November 2022.
2021
“Doctrine, Diplomacy, and Travelling Scholars: Bhutanese Buddhist Identity Between Religion and Politics in the Eighteenth Century.” Research Colloquium, Institute for the Science of Religion and Central Asian Studies, University of Bern, June 2021.
“Identity-Building in the Tibetan Borderlands: Buddhist Masters at the Intersection Between Religion and Politics in Eighteenth-century Bhutan.” Program in the Study of Religion “Religion for Lunch Series.” University of British Columbia, Vancouver, April 2021.
2020
“Envisioning the Buddhist Mandala of Bhutan: The Importance of Terminology, Language, and ‘Secularities’.” University of Toronto’s Centre for South Asian Studies in the Asian Institute and the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy, December 2020 (online).
2019
“A Note About the History of Bhutan’s Gross National Happiness.” Terminal City Club, Vancouver, May 2019.
“Carrying a Basket of Gold: A Historical Reflection on Buddhist Concepts and Ethics in Bhutan.” UBC Himalaya Program, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, March 2019.
2018
“Almosenschale und soziale Verantwortung: Anwendung von buddhistischen Konzepten und praktischer Ethik in Politik und Wirtschaft heute.” Institute for the Science of Religion and Central Asian Studies, University Bern, May 2018.
“A Timely Message from the Cave: Mahāmudrā in the ’Brug-pa-bka’-brgyud School and the Sixty-Ninth rJe-mkhan-po of Bhutan, dGe-bshes dGe-’dun-rin-chen’s (1926–1997) Life and Thought.” Institute of Indology and Central Asian Studies, Leipzig University, Leipzig, May 2018.
2017
“Bhutan in Transition: Metamorphosis and Institutionalization of Buddhist Concepts.” CAHSS “Multiple Secularities – Beyond the West, Beyond Modernities,” Leipzig University, August 2017.
“Buddhistische Philosophie als innere Wissenschaft.” Institute of Philosophy and Sciences of Art, Leuphana University Lüneburg, June 2017.
2016
“Gross National Happiness (GNH) in Bhutan: Welchen Beitrag leistet dieses buddhistische Konzept zur Entwicklung einer nachhaltigen Wirtschaftspolitik?” German Academic Scholarship Foundation, Leysin, August 2016.