Presenting Tibet: Celebrating the Contributions of E. Gene Smith to Tibetan Studies

A half-day of presentations and discussion, followed by the formal ceremony of bestowal of the (posthumous) Doctorate in Philosophy (PhD) on E. Gene Smith.

Venue: Gravensteen (room 111), Pieterskerkhof 6, Leiden

Short presentations followed by discussion:

13.00   - 13.05
Welcome by Prof. Jonathan A. Silk (Leiden University Institute for Area Studies)

13.05   - 13.50
Dr. Henk Blezer (Leiden University Institute for Area Studies)
Where to Look for the Origins of Zhang zhung-related Scripts

As stories go, in the good old days of Bon, larger or smaller parts of what we now call Tibet outshone the Yar lung dynasty and long-lived masters and scholars in Zhang zhung wrote Bon lore in their own languages, in sMar chen/chung scripts. Bon writ supposedly also existed the sPungs chen/chung script varieties, said to derive from Ta zig, somehow, which is generally placed beyond the borders of Western Tibet. So far the samples that we have in hand for the mentioned scripts are no more than a few centuries old, at most. Where did these scripts come from and when did they first evolve? Can we tell at all?

13.50 - 14.35
Prof. Leonard van der Kuijp (Harvard University, USA)
A Tibetan-Buddhist - Protestant-Christian Encounter near Xining, Qinghai Province, in 1890

The Tibetan tradition knows of very few Buddhist-Protestant Christian encounters. One of these took place near Xining, Qinghai Province, in the beginning of 1890. A memorandum of the conversations that ensued was written down by the Tibetan who participated in the dialogue, and this document sheds interesting light on what his impression of the kind of Protestant Christian theology that was communicated to him by his British Counterpart.

14.35 - 15.00
Coffee/Tea break

15.00 - 15.45
Prof. Charles Ramble (Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris, France)
The Origins of Tibetan Autobiography

Contrary to the claims of certain authors, autobiography is not a recent phenomenon that, as Carl Gusdorf puts it, merely “expresses a concern peculiar to Western man”. Janet Gyatso reminds us that the genre emerged in Tibet as early as the twelfth century, and has continued to be one of the most popular forms of literature among Tibetans down to the present day. Ostensibly, the purpose of autobiography is to convey Buddhist ideals through the example of a life well lived. However, many instances of such writing feature sentiments that are uncomfortably un-Buddhist, a fact that has attracted the opprobrium of Tibetan and Western commentators alike. This paper will argue that it is precisely this “un-Buddhist” component that not only explains the early popularity of autobiography in Tibet, but constitutes one of the main sources of the genre.

15.45 - 16.30
Prof. Cristina Scherrer-Schaub (University of Lausanne and Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris, France)
Places and writings (waiting) to be discovered: Tibet in the epoch of Paul Pelliot (1878-1945)

In 1905 Paul Pelliot is officially put in charge of the French archæological mission in Eastern Turkestan, with the scope of exploring the region of Eastern Turkestan («Chinese Turkestan»), the focus of political, scientific, cultural, and economic interests from the part of the then nearby Empires, and their political Allies.
     Following the northern route of the Tarim Basin, Pelliot will have several irons in the fire: topographic(al )and orographic(al) survey, observation of animal life and flora, survey of archaeological monuments and sites. Essentially oriented towards historical geography and phonology, Paul Pelliot, a gifted polyglott and polymath, sent to France, among others, a collection of Chinese, Tibetan and Sanskrit manuscripts that where influential in the subsequent rise of Asian Studies.
     The intriguing and fascinating reports of this epoch are well-known, and the kiplingian notion of Great Game has been thoroughly exploited. What is less known is the equally intricated and amazing intellectual history of Tibetology that seemingly, at this time, lays the foundation of the main axes of research, and intentions whose momentum is still perceptible nowadays.

16.30 - 17.15
Dr. Peter Verhagen (Leiden University Institute for Area Studies)
Encyclopedic Knowledge in Tibet's Traditions: Si-tu Chos-kyi-'byung-gnas (1699?-1774) and E. Gene Smith

In this paper I want to offer a brief comparison between the breadth and depth of expertise of (soon to be) Dr. Gene Smith and of a renowned 18th-century polymath from Eastern Tibet, Si-tu Chos-kyi-'byung-gnas (1700-1774).

Awarding of the Degree

17.30
Formal bestowal of the doctoral degree
(Senaatskamer of the Academy Building, Rapenburg 73, Leiden)