"There is no Buddhism without Women" with Dr. Paula Arai (Part 1)

Dr. Paula Arai talks with Dana about being brought up by her
Japanese mother, and how she realized the way that she embodied
Buddhism in her body and mind not through intellectual study or
what Westerners view as formal practice, but through the simple
actions and embodied guidance of her mother.

PAULA ARAI (she/her) (Ph.D., Buddhist Studies, Harvard
University) holds the Eshinni & Kakushinni Chair of Women and
Buddhist Studies at the Institute of Buddhist Studies. Steeped in
ethnographic research, she takes an embodied approach to her work
and finds poetic immersive storytelling a potent medium for
conveying experiences of transformative healing.

Her publications include:

Women Living Zen (Oxford University Press)
Bringing Zen Home (University of Hawaii Press)
Painting Enlightenment: Healing Visions of the Heart Sutra
(Shambhala Publications)
The Little Book of Zen Healing: Japanese Rituals for Beauty,
Harmony, and Love (Shambhala Publications)

Explore her website to read some of Paula's poetry, stay up to
date on appearances, and learn more about her.


Your host
REVEREND DANA TAKAGI (she/her) is a
retired professor of Sociology and zen priest, practicing zen
since 1998. She spent 33 years teaching sociology and Asian
American history at UC Santa Cruz, and she is a past president of
the Association for Asian American Studies.