Vanessa Sasson is a professor of Religious Studies in the Liberal Arts Department of Marianopolis College where she has been teaching since 1999. She is also a Research Fellow for the Institute for Studies in Race, Reconciliation, and Social Justice at the University of the Free State, as well as adjunct professor of Comparative Religion at McGill University. She has a strong publication record, with books, edited volumes, and a number of academic journal articles in her name.
Academic Reflections is published occasionally.
I was sparring in karate class. We were doing our usual thing, fighting each other happily as Kyokushin karatekas tend to do, smacking each other around in
A precious moment of female-focused inspiration in the…
A financial adviser once told me that most people only really begin saving for retirement in their mid-forties. It would be better to start earlier,
I stood in front of a life-sized plaster statue of a Chinese administrator. He was examining a scroll at his desk, while fellow administrators hovered
I knew very little about Buddhism in Malaysia before I landed in that lush green country. My visit was the result of some last-minute changes
When I was five years old, my grandmother gave me a shimmery red scarf with small silver charms attached along the edges. It was the
Life is pain. That is the first noble truth. Like most practitioners and scholars of Buddhism, I have given that truth a considerable amount of
There is a detail I have been pondering this semester. At least, it appears to be a detail, but it is one that challenges the
Kisa Gotami’s ghost has long haunted me. It has probably haunted many of us in the field of Buddhist Studies. She is the face of
As I try to adjust to living in a world dominated by Donald Trump’s presidency and the growing realities of right-wing governments in various parts
One of my students killed himself this year. He was 20 years old. A friend of his came by my office to tell me the
I know I am not alone in feeling overwhelmed by the results of the presidential election in the United States. The whole world, it seems,
