Accomplished women: Female leadership and reproductive health in the Bhikṣuņī-Vinaya

Key information

Date
Time
5:30 pm to 7:00 pm
Venue
Senate House
Room
SWLT
Event type
Lecture & Event highlights

About this event

Beginning from the premise that Buddhist bhikṣuṇī-vinaya traditions are in some imperfect and/or indirect way an archive of monastic women’s lives, in this presentation I provide a basic overview of themes of health and healing in those traditions (especially the Mahāsāṅghika-lokottaravādin bhiksuṇī-vinaya), with a focus on female vulnerability and reproductive health. 

First, I comment on the unevenness of the discourse around women’s bodies in vinaya texts: it is at times pragmatic and humane and at other times semantically laden and suspicious. Second, I explore the theme of what I am calling, drawing on Martha Selby's work on Āyurvedic texts, the "accomplished woman" (āptāḥ stryaḥ), a figure knowledgeable and experienced in matters of health who acts in a healing or advisory role in the female saṅgha

Finally, I elaborate on the figure of the accomplished woman in a broader South Asian and Chinese comparative context in order to shed light on the potential presence of female authoritative voices in bhikṣuṇī-vinaya traditions. 

About the Speaker

Amy Paris Langenberg is Professor of Religious Studies at Eckerd College in Florida, USA. She specializes in South Asian Buddhism, with a focus on gender, sexuality, and female monasticisms. Her work combines textual and ethnographic approaches. She is author of Birth in Buddhism: The Suffering Fetus and Female Freedom (Routledge, 2017) and has published articles in History of Religions, the Journal of the American Academy of Religion,Religion Compass, Religious Studies Review, and the Journal of Global Buddhism.

Her most recent project is a study of sexual abuse in North American and transnational Buddhism, co-written with Ann Gleig, to be published in 2026 by Yale University Press. 

Attending the event

This event is free and open to all. 

  • Organiser: Centre of Buddhist Studies
  • The Buddhist Forum series is kindly sponsored by Khyentse Foundation