Peter Faggen, doctoral candidate in History of Religions, University of Chicago Divinity School
This presentation in conjunction with my current dissertation-in-progress analyzes motherhood (both the representation of and actuality) and the construction of authority for Kelzang Drolma (1936-2013) who was the sixth member of a rare Tibetan Buddhist female reincarnate lineage in the eastern Tibetan region of Amdo in Gansu, China. (There are two contiguous female lineages out of 2,000 Tibetan lineages in Tibetan history). Based on my recent fieldwork in Amdo and textual studies, I will compare representations of motherhood as a metaphor in a Buddhist and specifically Tibetan context and an actual mother’s experience to understand the high stakes of memorializing Kelzang’s life as a Buddhist exemplar in the Tibetan biographical genre of namtar. (A namtar chronicles the story of an exemplar’s enlightenment or liberation). Kelzang laicized in 1958 and became a mother of four children during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976). She also married three times, endured divorce and domestic violence and a later challenge to her seat by another woman. Whereas this talk will show how an official namtar will attempt to depict Kelzang’s authority as an idealized and accepted Buddhist mother within the ruling patriarchy at Labrang Monastery in Gansu (and also within Kelzang’s family), it will focus more on how oral interviews reclaim an alternative and overlooked narrative about how Kelzang’s actual motherhood directly implicated her authority with others as a fascinating lay religious figure.
Dates:
Thursday, October 31, 2019 - 5:00pm
Foster 103