TIBETAN CULTURE

Featured student projects from Columbia University

Featured Projects from Tibetan Civilization Coursework at Columbia University

Cosmological Scroll

Object biography by Corn Bronsther, view HERE. Introduction: "The Tibetan medical tradition represents an interesting intersection between fundamental Buddhist ideas and the empirical observation of the human body. Janet Gyatso writes about the medical tradition: “How can one adjudicate between the Buddha’s word and empirical observation? In Tibet these questions were never … [Read more...]

Neuroscience & Tibet

A website 'Neuroscience & Tibet' by Juliana Remark and Lindsey Remark. About: "A key component of Buddhist belief is that meditation literally transforms the mind. Thus, Buddhists are highly interested in scientific advances that could possibly help explain and/or provide evidence for this phenomenon. The question as to whether meditative phenomena have a biological … [Read more...]

A Guide to Tibetan Medicine

A website as an introductory guide to Tibetan medicine, by Luke Thorsell. In Tibet, medicine is one of the five major Tibetan sciences, and is known as gSo-ba Rig-pa – the science of healing. It's based mostly on the information contained in the Four Medical Tantras (rGyud-bzhi), the most prominent and authoritative Tibetan medical text. The four tantras are the root tantra, … [Read more...]

Sports & Recreation of Tibet

Solomon Rice & Chris Thompson A website reporting on the diversity of sports and recreation which are actively pursued in Tibet, including soccer, yak racing, basketball, wrestling, horse racing, and archery.   … [Read more...]

Tibet Art in NYC

A website 'Tibetan Art in NYC' serves to introduce various places to experience Tibetan art in New York, relevant news articles, and notable modern art pieces. By Jamie Kang. … [Read more...]

Visualization Project

A mapping visualization project based on locations referenced in biographical texts. Visualization Project Report The following is a summary of the steps I took over the course of the visualization project. It will be useful for understanding the final output, and for anyone who wants to pick up where I left off. Phase I: Location and Significance Extraction This phase was … [Read more...]

Jackson Heights: A Tibetan Perspective

A Brief History Over the past one-hundred and twenty-five years, Jackson Heights, a community situated in the northern part of Queens, New York, has become one the most ethnically diverse communities in the United States. In the early 20th Century, when Jackson Heights was first developed, nothing about its design or purpose precluded to the ethnic diversity it has today. … [Read more...]

To Build a Buddha

Adrian Garza The phrase “thangka painting” is used often to describe Buddhist and traditional Tibetan art, but the word thangka is actually much broader, and used to encompass anything from a simple painting to a complex three-dimensional piece of art. Generally, it includes the original painted or embroidered picture, mounted on some textile, and framed with anything from … [Read more...]

‘Game of Thrones’ Tibetan Plateau Flyover Tour

Hi! Our names are Chase Manze and John Avendano and for our East Asian Civilization: Tibet, final project, we created a digital Google Earth flyover of the Tibetan plateau and surrounding areas. We decided to do it "Game of Thrones" style for a creative twist, and take you from our humble abode at Columbia University to the peak of Mount Everest, major cultural areas like Kham … [Read more...]

Tibetan Human Cranium Prayer Beads

by Victoria Dombronski Michel's Adventures with Tibetan Human Cranium Prayer Beads Mala’s story begins with a traveling student, Michel, who finds a circle of beads on a dirt path while studying abroad in Tibet. Michel began to analyze the beads as he carefully manipulated them in his hands. Are these bone? It certainly looks like it. Did this ritual object really all start … [Read more...]

A Beginner’s Guide to Tibetan Art

Creation of the website: A Beginner's Guide to Tibetan Art This website is designed to help students better understand Tibetan Art as they encounter works of art in class and on field trips such as to the Rubin Museum of Art. By understanding what different Tibetan symbols represent and what went into the creation of the work, my hope is for students to gain a better … [Read more...]

Phurba with three faces of Vajrakila Buddha

by Ryan Hudson "Vajrakilaya, or kīla, means something sharp, and something that pierces – a dagger. A dagger that is so sharp it can pierce anything, while at the same time nothing can pierce it. That is the quality. This sharp and piercing energy is what is used to practice and out of the many infinite, endless Vajrayana methods this happens to be one of most important … [Read more...]

Chronology of Travel in Asia & Tibet

11th century Milarepa (1040-1123) "opened" Lapchi (la phyi) and spent years there and at Kailash, see Shabkar p. 443 12th century Drigung Jigten Gonpo (1143-1217) sent hermits to three holy mountains in southern Tibet: Kailash, Lapchi, Tsari with an administrator (Dordzin) as representative of Drigung Monastery to oversee them, see Shabkar 343 13th century 1213-1221 Drukpa … [Read more...]

Manhattan Meditator

Manhattan-Meditator website I’m a senior at Columbia University, and I’m student in Professor Tuttle’s class Intro to East Asian Civilization: Tibet. As a part of my final project in this class, I decided to explore the modern form of the ancient practice meditation. In this class, we’ve explored much of what has made Tibetan culture distinctive and unique, examining the … [Read more...]

The Headdress: Women’s Status Symbol

by Alexandra Cassutt for INTRO EAST ASIAN CIV: TIBET V2365- 001 While from the outset hundreds of years back Tibet's economy was run by and largely for patriarchal interests, there continues to this day a tradition of female adornment which expresses, through the use of a multitude of precious stones, a woman's status and that of her family. The women of the … [Read more...]

Tiny House Hunting

by Sara Novak Lerner View project in Mediathread My chosen object for this project, the Black Tent is unique because it's been photographed in its natural environment, which gives me the opportunity to discuss its surroundings as well. I also want to take this opportunity to do a bit of research on the Tibetan nomads, who comprise more than three-quarters of the … [Read more...]

Tibetan Ritual Dance

Welcome to my website about Tibetan ritual dance for my final project in Columbia University’s Intro to Tibetan Civilization class! On this main page you will find background information. At the top you will see tabs to other pages that delve into more specific topics! Have fun exploring! Please note that the reason videos are linked rather than embedded is that I would need to … [Read more...]

Mapping Tibetan Culture

The website Mapping Tibetan Culture was created in Fall 2015 as a final project for ASCE V2365: Intro to Tibetan Civilization with Professor Gray Tuttle. Motivation One of the class assignments in our semester required us to work together as a class to locate centers of Tibetan culture around the world. I saw value in assimilating these datasets and attempting to map them to … [Read more...]

Living in Sacred Space

Video by Bekah Mulberg. Description: Intended for Educational Purposes Only. This project began as an exploration. What is sacred space? What did it mean to our ancestors, to indigenous cultures who remain so entwined with their land? Modern, secularized society tends to ignore this idea, and paints most of the world around us as profane space. That which is "sacred" we … [Read more...]