Masters and Doctoral Fellowships in Buddhist Studies (Florida) – Deadline : 15 January 2025

The Florida State University Buddhist Studies program is seeking candidates for the masters and doctoral fellowships. The deadline for application is January 15. Successful applicants start their graduate studies in August, 2025.

Florida State University was one of the first state universities in the nation to offer graduate study in religion and today the Department continues to play a leading role, nationally and internationally, in training the top tier of scholars in the academic study of religion. For Buddhist Studies, we provides interdisciplinary training in the historical and anthropological study of Buddhism under the rubric of the Department of Religion’s History and Ethnography of Religions (HER) track.

Our fellowships offer tuition waiver and a stipend for both masters and doctoral students. In fact, we are one of the few, if not the only, state universities in the nation that offers fellowships to masters students. Our MA program in Buddhist Studies typically takes two to three years to finish, equipping students with the necessary language trainings for advance doctoral studies. We also offer other graduate grants for talented students.

Students in our program choose to specialize in Tibetan, Chinese, Sino-Japanese, or Sino-Tibetan Buddhism as a major and Tibetan, Chinese, or South Asian religions as a minor. Students typically pursue advanced research in the social and cultural histories, rituals, practices, literatures, and philosophies relevant to these Buddhist traditions. Applicants can visit here to access our faculty members page for their research strengths.

Our program is specifically designed for students who intend to become scholars and teachers at the university level. The program, which cooperates closely with the Departments of Modern Languages and Linguistics and Asian Studies emphasizes the academic study of Buddhism across a broad spectrum of historical, doctrinal, and cultural formations. Language study is essential for advanced research in Buddhist Studies. All students in the Buddhist Studies program are thus required to gain facility in the primary Asian languages relevant to their area of specialization. These languages include Sanskrit, Tibetan, Chinese and Japanese. The specific combination of Asian languages required for students in the graduate program will depend on their research focus. Students will be required to develop precision skills in primary language research and close text-critical reading.

In addition to linguistic and philological competence, students in the program are expected to acquire a sophisticated understanding of the social and historical contexts of Buddhism through methodological theories and ethnographic and archival research abroad in a relevant Asian country.

Please pass this opportunity along to any students who may be interested. They are encouraged to email any one of our faculty members in the Buddhist Studies program with questions they may have.