Fellowships

The Office of Academic Affairs is pleased to announce the recipients of the Frederick P. Lenz Foundation Residential Fellowship for Buddhist Studies and American Culture and Values. This is an opportunity for faculty and other professionals planning sabbaticals during the 2009–10 academic year to spend a semester on the Naropa University campus in Boulder, Colorado, conducting a research, artistic, social action or other project that relates Buddhist philosophy and practice to an aspect of American culture and values. 

Scholars Chosen for the 2009–10 Academic Year

Kim Russo
Drawing on the Dharma: Contemporary Art and Buddhist Practice

Kim Russo is currently an art critic for the Albuquerque Journal North. During her time at Naropa, she plans to write an extended article on the methodologies of contemporary artists who are also committed Buddhist practitioners. She will outline how the integration of Buddhist and studio practices provides an alternative framework for perceiving, understanding and impacting contemporary culture. She will present the ways in which Buddhist practice affects the intention, form, process, and content of an artist’s work. Further, she argues that this contemplative methodology provides a needed alternative to the disconnected, hyper-mediated, technology-based forms that we use to investigate culture. The proposed article will lay the groundwork for a book on the same subject, and will highlight the integrated Buddhist/artistic practices of individual artists. Artists who have agreed to participate include Suzanne Lacy, Ross Bleckner, Nancy Holt, Sanford Biggers, Sylvian Bouthillette, Susan York, Joan Watts and Michael Diaz.

In addition, while at Naropa Ms. Russo will study the Diamond Sutra and use it to examine the nature of desire and attachment in contemporary American life in a series of 10 to 20 small drawings on paper. Ms. Russo will be in residence during the fall 2009 semester.

Hillary Stephenson
Pedagogy of Awakening: Exploring the Relationship Between Zen and Transformative Pedagogy

Hillary Stephenson has been facilitating dialogue and transformative group process on issues of diversity and social justice for almost ten years, with a particular focus on doing antiracism work in white communities.  A Zen Buddhist, she recently spent five years as a resident at the Zen Center of Los Angeles, which significantly deepened her commitment to the cultivation of sangha practice.  While at Naropa, she will conduct dissertation research on the relationship between Zen and transformative pedagogy, with a particular focus on the way issues of diversity and oppression are explored in the university classroom.  This research is inspired by Hillary’s experiences doing popular health education in South Africa as an undergraduate, her doctoral program in Transformative Inquiry at CIIS, and a recent return to the women’s studies classroom as adjunct faculty at Cal State Long Beach.  Hillary hopes to contribute to the fields of contemplative education and critical pedagogy, affirming education as a vehicle for transformation.  Ms. Stephenson will be in residence during the fall 2009 semester.

Scholars Chosen for the 2008–09 Academic Year

Erin McCarthy, PhD
St. Lawrence University   
While at Naropa, Dr. McCarthy developed her teaching practices, pursued philosophical research and deepened her practice of Zen and yoga in order to further integrate these in her academic and personal life. She will also completed the final chapter of her book Ethics Embodied, which addresses ethical being-in-the-world from a comparative feminist philosophical perspective. Quoting from her application, Dr. McCarthy planned to “discuss the prospects for integrating aspects of Japanese Zen Buddhism, contemporary Japanese philosophy and western ethics through a feminist lens. More specifically, I propose an alternative orientation for thinking about selfhood and ethics that draws on my comparison of Western feminist and Japanese philosophy…. I will argue the model of self and values encouraged in the critical integration of Japanese philosophy, Buddhism and feminism lead to a self better suited for fostering global citizenship by encouraging the idea that individuals are at once embedded in a particular local context but also citizens of the world.” Dr. McCarthy was in residence during the spring 2009 semester.

Elizabeth Lozano, PhD
Loyola University Chicago   
Dr. Lozano furthered her study and understanding of the Buddhist teachings on nonviolence, and applied this knowledge to the study of nonviolent resistance as practiced by U.S. groups in international settings. More specifically, she planned to:

• “Investigate the ways in which the work of U.S. groups, such as Witness for Peace and FOR, appeal to core American values such as autonomy, freedom of conscience, self-determination and equality.”
• “Study the contribution of American Buddhism to our understanding of nonviolent resistance, and of the relationship between nonviolence and gender.”
• “Study how the work of solidarity between American and Colombian groups relates to Buddhist principles and practices of nonviolence.”

Dr. Lozano was in residence during the spring 2009 semester.

John Whalen-Bridge, PhD
National University of Singapore  
Dr. Whalen-Bridge has been working for several years on the transmission of Buddhism into American culture, and is currently working on a book about Buddhism, literary adaptation and progressive politics entitled Dharma Bums Progress. While at Naropa, Dr. Whalen-Bridge will research and write about “devotion and authority in Buddhism, a subject that will be less directly literary and more anthropological.” He is “interested in particular in ways in which the 'guru' system has been modified, and ways in which it has had to continually authenticate itself in the face of a sometimes caustic rationalism.” Dr. Whalen-Bridge will be in residence during late spring and early summer 2009.

More information or to apply: Frederick P. Lenz Foundation Residential Fellowship for Buddhist Studies and American Culture and Values