Interest in the economic study of Buddhism has grown dramatically in a very short time. Initially involving individual scholars pursuing isolated inquiries, enough people have begun to ask similar questions that a field of study has begun to emerge. At this point conversations among those scholars pursuing such studies can help to define the scope of the field and its terrain. Elizabeth Williams-Ørberg responded to this need by organizing a workshop titled “Buddhism and economics: Conceptual and theoretical approaches to a burgeoning field.” The workshop was held on May 25th and 26th, 2017, at Konventum in Helsingør, Denmark. It was arranged by the Center of Contemporary Buddhist Studies as part of the ‘Buddhism, Business and Believers’ research cluster at the University of Copenhagen, with generous funding by the Carlsberg Foundation.

We note that Ann Gleig, Jeff Wilson, Brooke Schedneck, and Elizabeth Williams-Ørberg are all participants in the AAR seminar: Economics and Capitalism in the Study of Buddhism.

Program:

May 25

(1) Charismatic Capitalism: Rebuilding the Land of the Buddha in the Golden Triangle

Alexander Horstmann

School of Humanities, Tallinn University

[alexander dot horstmann at tlu dot ee]

(2) The Lao Buddhist temple and the intrusion of statehood. The emergence of (dis)embedded ritual economies in the Vientiane area during the 1950s and 60s.

Patrice Ladwig

Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity, Göttingen

[ladwig at mmg dot mpg dot de]

(3) Benjamin and Buddhist materiality

Trine Brox

[trinebrox at hum dot ku dot dk]

Director, Center for Contemporary Buddhist Studies

Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies, University of Copenhagen

(4) Sacred sangha economy – Buddhism, Asian capitalism and cultural evolution

Jørn Borup

http://pure.au.dk/portal/en/jb@teo.au.dk

[jb at cas dot au dot dk]

Dept of the Study of Religion, Aarhus University, Denmark

(5) An Entangled Relationship: Buddhism and Tourist Economies in Contemporary Thailand

Brooke Schedneck

Institute of Southeast Asian Affairs, Chiangmai University, Chiangmai, Thailand

http://www.iseaa.org/brooke-schedneck.html

 (6) The field of Buddhism in a mediatized culture

Inken Prohl

(7) Buddhism without merit

Jeff Wilson

Renison University College, University of Waterloo

(8) The imaginative value of Buddhism: Marketing “not-religion” to secure the survival of “religion”

Elizabeth Williams-Ørberg

Department of Cross-cultural and Regional Studies, University of Copenhagen

[elizabeth dot oerberg at hum dot ku dot dk]

May 26

(9) The Upper-Middle Way: The Complexities of Dana and Diversity in American Convert Buddhism

Ann Gleig

University of Central Florida, Orlando

[Ann dot Gleig at ucf dot edu]

(10) Theorizing the emotional work of mindfulness

Marianne Hedegaard

(11) Buddhism as religion, Buddhism as self-help

Richard Payne

Institute of Buddhist Studies, at the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley

[rkpayne1 at mac dot com]