Semester assignments REL4130 H08

1. Discuss analytical concepts useful for understanding the meeting between

religious traditions and religious change. Illustrate the discussion

with empirical examples from one or several Buddhist communities.

Or:

2. Define syncretism and discuss its usefulness as an analytical concept.

Apply the concept to a discussion of the combination of religious

traditions in one or several Buddhist communities.Or:

Or: 

3. Describe selected elements of Buddhist practice in one or two Tibetan or

Himalayan communities. What are the distinguishing features of what is

generally defined as Tibetan Buddhism?

Or:

4. Describe pilgrimage practice in one or two Buddhist communities. Discuss

how local (or pre-Buddhist) conceptions and cult co-exist with normative

Buddhism.

Or:

5. The cult of mountains; discuss origins, developments and contemporary

ritual practices in one or two Buddhist communities.

Or:

6. Describe the cult of sacred texts in Buddhism in a historical and a

contemporary perspective. Use examples from one or several Buddhist

communities.

Or:

7. Describe the cult of relics in one or several Buddhist traditions in a

historical and a contemporary perspective.

Or:

8. Describe and analyze the worship of sacred texts, amulets, relics or

trees in one or two Buddhist traditions and discuss how it materializes

an aspect of Buddhism.