Buddhism and the Senses [aka “Buddhist stuff”]

EASTD 112 Subject & Catalog Number

Description

How does Buddhism smell, taste, sound, look, and feel? This course explores how bodies experience religious worlds. We will investigate how Buddhists encounter divine presence, religious rules, sacred spaces, and powerful imaginaries through the senses. Moving beyond texts and doctrines, we will step into the sensory and embodied practices that make Buddhist worlds tangible: from spirit possession and prayer rituals to carving statues, cooking and tasting feasts, and rolling and smelling incense. You will not only study but also experiment with methods that attune us to the sensory life of religion. Along the way, we will probe what “religious affects” mean and how embodied practices generate lived realities. At the same time, you’ll gain a theoretical and methodological grounding in the study of material religion, learning how to analyze the entanglements of objects, bodies, and belief. By the end of the course, you will have both experienced and critically reflected on how religious worlds come alive through the senses.