Naropa University
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Naropa University |
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| Established | 1974 |
| Type | Private |
| President | Thomas B. Coburn |
| Faculty | 198 |
| Undergraduates | 451 |
| Postgraduates | 634 |
| Location | Boulder, Colorado, United States |
| Website | http://www.naropa.edu |
Naropa University is a private, liberal arts university in Boulder, Colorado, which was founded in 1974 by Chögyam Trungpa. It is one of the few major accredited Buddhist-inspired universities in North America.
Accredited by the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools, Naropa University is a private, non-profit, non-sectarian liberal arts institution dedicated to advancing contemplative education. Contemplative education is an approach to learning that integrates the best of Eastern and Western educational traditions, helping students know themselves more deeply and engage constructively with others. True learning, as it is understood and practiced at Naropa, comes from a combination of study and practice; it is both academic and experiential; it engages both intellect and intuition.
[edit] Contemplative education
Contemplative education is a philosophy of higher education that infuses learning with the experience of awareness, insight and compassion for oneself and others through the practice of meditation and contemplative disciplines.
Naropa University's mission of advancing contemplative education manifests in classes, administration and other ways at the University.
[edit] Community practice day
Each semester, Naropa University closes offices and holds no classes for one day called Community Practice Day. On this day, members of the Naropa community -- students, faculty, staff and others -- are invited to participate in group sitting meditation practice during the morning. Other contemplative disciplines are offered throughout the day, such as Japanese tea ceremony, t’ai-chi ch’uan, Christian labyrinth, ikebana, pagan ceremony, Christian contemplative liturgy and Mudra Space Awareness. Panel discussions, departmental lunches and community service projects are often offered in the afternoon.
The object of the day is to emphasize both togetherness in the Naropa community and the importance of leading a mindful, aware life rather than a high-speed, cluttered one.
[edit] History
[edit] Origins
Naropa University's founder, Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche, was born in Tibet in 1940, a lineage holder of both the Kagyu and Nyingma Buddhist traditions. In 1959, after the Chinese invasion, he escaped Tibet through the Himalayas to northern India. Like the Dalai Lama and other exiled teachers, he continued to teach and transmit the wisdom of the Buddhist dharma. In 1963, he received a Spaulding sponsorship to study comparative religion, philosophy, and the fine arts at Oxford University where he became fluent in English and conversant with the particular needs of Western students.
In 1970, Trungpa began presenting Buddhist teachings in the United States. During the next 17 years, he taught extensively, and founded meditation centers throughout North America and Europe. A scholar and artist as well as meditation master, he became widely recognized as one of the foremost teachers of Buddhism in the West, a distinction that put him in the unique position of possessing and understanding the wisdom of both cultures.
Trungpa realized his vision of creating a university that would combine contemplative studies with traditional Western scholastic and artistic disciplines with the founding of the Naropa Institute in 1974.
[edit] The Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics
A quote famously attributed to Trungpa came on his first arrival in the United States: "Where are the poets? Take me to your poets!"[1]
During the two summer sessions Trungpa had an eye toward the future. He wanted to develop a plan for Naropa beyond the first summer. With Allen Ginsberg, Anne Waldman, John Cage and Diane di Prima already on hand for the Institute's summer offerings, Trungpa asked the contemporary masters of American letters to found a poetics department.
Ginsberg and Waldman, who roomed together that first summer, came up with the name for the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics.
[edit] Psychology and the first degree programs
In June of 1975, the Institute assembled its first degree program, an MA Psychology program designed originally as an extension of a program in Connecticut – one of the many seminars resulting from Trungpa’s prolific and charismatic teaching career in the West. It was a 16-week Maitri program, based on Buddhist teachings about basic patterns of energy.
Trungpa had created Maitri before Naropa existed. When he asked Marvin Casper – who went on to chair Naropa’s Contemplative Psychology department and edit two of Trungpa’s books – to help restructure it, Casper turned it into a degree program at the Naropa Institute. Initially, students were required to attend three of the Institute’s summer sessions, take two Maitri programs in Connecticut and complete a six-month independent project.
In January of 1976, the Institute offered its first group of degree programs as Trungpa pushed the Institute toward accreditation: BA degrees in Buddhist Studies and Visual Art, the MA in Psychology, an MFA in Visual art and Expressive Arts Certificates in Dance, Theater and Poetics.
[edit] Academic programs
[edit] Undergraduate Programs
Major courses of study at Naropa University deepen knowledge, skills, and wisdom in a specific area and prepare students for graduate school, careers, and overall personal growth. Most majors take a little more than a quarter of a typical four-year undergraduate career and students are also allowed the option of a double-major or may create their own focus of study in the Interdisciplinary Studies program.
Naropa undergraduate majors include:
[edit] Contemplative Psychology
This major supports students in self-discovery, inner wisdom, and the development of interpersonal skills. The program is founded on the mindfulness/awareness teachings of Buddhist and Shambhala lineages, world wisdom traditions, and western psychology. Students choose a concentration in Psychological Science; Psychology of Health and healing; Somatic Psychology; or Transpersonal and Humanistic Psychology.
[edit] Early Childhood Education
This department focuses on a non-sectarian, yet distinctly Shambhala Buddhist, approach to teacher education. Various western holistic pedagogies are studied in order to broaden the student’s awareness of the wide range of choices available in developing a meaningful and authentic teaching style. The intention of the program is for students to become courageously genuine and empathetically transformative teachers. Students are given the opportunity to participate in apprentice-style internships with master teachers from these traditions.
[edit] Environmental Studies
This program welcomes students who feel drawn to study, celebrate, and serve the earth. The program integrates the disciplines of natural science, ecology, horticulture, systems theory, ecopsychology, service learning, sustainable living, and wilderness rites of passage.
[edit] Interdisciplinary Studies
This program invites its students to design a unique major by selecting courses from two or three different disciplines. Students begin the program by taking the required gateway seminar which surveys the history of disciplines as they are studied and as they constitute major and minor degree programs. This approach ensures that students bring an informed and educated perspective to their own unique focus of study.
[edit] Music
At Naropa University, the practice of music encompasses the whole musician while focusing on the expressive world of the heart. This program offers a sense of creative freedom, examination of technical skills, emphasis on a multicultural perspective, and elements of composition and recording technology. The goal of this program is to make music that is a force for positive change in the world.
[edit] Peace Studies
This major explores the causes of violence and war while focusing on a path to peace. Within this major there are four related areas of inquiry: history and politics of social change; theory and practice of peacemaking; the arts in peacemaking; spiritual disciplines and contemplative practices in peacemaking.
[edit] Religious Studies
This department offers courses that examine the phenomenon of religion as it affects individuals, as it operates in culture, and as it addresses questions of life's ultimate values. Varying some by program, the approach is non-sectarian, scholarly, and critical, relying on the best of contemporary Western and traditional scholarship. Students experience a "hands-on" exploration of major meditation traditions and social service as well as being enriched by contact with the living lineages of Asian and Western teachers.
[edit] Theater and Dance Performance
This program offers rigorous technical training, an emphasis on a student-centered creative process, and a contemplative approach to performance. Through the practice of mindfulness and cultural studies, students are encouraged to consider the arts as a pathway for self-discovery and as a means for serving others.
[edit] Traditional Eastern Arts
The first degree program of its kind offered in the United States, this program allows the student to practice and study sitting meditation and examine the philosophy of meditative movement. This exploration establishes a ground of study from which each student chooses a major area of concentration from the following disciplines: t'ai-chi ch'uan, yoga, or aikido. The Traditional Eastern Arts program also includes the study of the history, philosophy, and culture of the major discipline.
[edit] Visual Arts
This major offers studio electives in several painting mediums, calligraphic forms, sculpture, pottery, and photography. Required courses in drawing, the history of visual art, meditation in conjunction with studio practice, and portfolio preparation form the foundation of the major.
[edit] Writing and Literature
This program emphasizes traditional and experimental approaches to creative writing in verse and prose within a variety of genres. Also emphasized is the development of competent critical writing in literature courses and in the critical thesis requirement of the student's final manuscript. All courses offered by the department are taught by active, published writers, giving an experienced practitioner's insight into literary art.
[edit] Minors
Students are given the opportunity to minor in Contemplative Education, Contemplative Psychology, Dance, Early Childhood Education, Ecology and Systems Science, Environmental History and Justice, Environmental Sustainability, Horticulture, Music, Religious Studies, Sacred Ecology, Sanskrit, Tibetan, Traditional Eastern Arts, Visual Arts, or Writing and Literature.
[edit] Graduate Programs
Naropa University offers sixteen master’s degree programs with both residency and low-residency programs available.
[edit] Master of Arts
[edit] Contemplative Education
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(low-residency program)
In the course of the Contemplative Education degree students study various western holistic pedagogies in order to broaden the awareness of the wide range of choices available in developing a meaningful and authentic teaching style. The intention of the program is for students to become courageously genuine and empathetically transformative teachers and the “Education Beyond the Classroom” program welcomes non-teachers to apply.
[edit] Contemplative Psychotherapy
The only graduate program in the United States that joins psychotherapy training with Buddhist meditation and deep understanding of the mind, this program caters to Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike. Meditation practice and Maitri retreats are an integral part of the program as they aid the student in preparation for the demands of the clinical world by meeting the academic requirements for the Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) credential in the state of Colorado. With the LPC students are then eligible to sit for the Colorado State Board licensing examination after graduation.
[edit] Environmental Leadership
This program employs an integrated, whole-systems perspective and aids students who wish to lead environmental organizations, as well as organizations and communities of all kinds, through the changes and the implementation of ongoing practices necessary for a just and sustainable society. The department’s educational philosophy and leadership skills are based on living systems models. The program offers a balance of theory, skills, and practical application, infused with contemplative and ecopsychological perspectives.
[edit] Indo-Tibetan Buddhism
The degree in Indo-Tibetan Buddhism spans two years involving the broad, in-depth study of Buddhism as a spiritual, theological, and cultural tradition. Course work emphasizes Indian and Tibetan Buddhism with opportunities to study Sanskrit and Tibetan. Students choose between the History of Religions or the Tibetan Tradition sequence of Buddhist Studies courses. An Indo-Tibetan Buddhism with Language degree is also available and includes training in either Sanskrit or Tibetan.
[edit] Interdisciplinary Studies
This program provides a creative and challenging invitation for students to design their own program of study by working within two or three Naropa disciplines. In the required Proseminar, students examine the theories and methodologies that are inherent in the diverse disciplines of the university. With this background, students then pursue a well-defined plan of study, called the Learning Agreement, which is an intensive investigation into the areas of their specific interdisciplinary focus.
[edit] Master of Divinity
This degree prepares students for professional work in the fields of pastoral care, chaplaincy, dharma teaching, and community development. This three-year program is firmly grounded in Buddhist philosophy and meditation practice. This program consists of 78 credits including significant internship and fieldwork experience designed to meet the interests and needs of individual students.
[edit] Religious Studies
This 45-credit degree focuses on the non-Buddhist student who wishes to join the study of comparative religions with related contemplative practices and inter-religious dialogue. Students of this degree program develop literacy about the living practice traditions of world religions with a special emphasis on dialogue skills and an appreciation for religious pluralism. Departmental course offerings examine the phenomenon of religion as it affects individuals, as it operates in culture, and as it addresses questions of life’s ultimate values. A Religious Studies with Language degree is also available and includes training in either Sanskrit or Tibetan.
[edit] Transpersonal Counseling Psychology
has three innovative graduate training programs in counseling, art therapy, and wilderness therapy. Each program offers state-of-the-art training in an engaging and supportive environment. The unique combination of transpersonal and contemplative approaches provides a larger view of the human experience as well as effective methods for working deeply with all dimensions of being. A Transpersonal Psychology degree (low-residency program) consists primarily of online classes and is available along with a Transpersonal Psychology, Concentration in Ecopsychology degree (low-residency program) centered around integrating theoretical, experiential, and service aspects of ecopsychology and transpersonal psychology.
[edit] Somatic Counseling Psychology
This program’s curriculum focuses on awareness practices, movement disciplines, counseling techniques, multicultural perspectives, and scholarly pursuits that prepare students to be of service both to self and others. This program offers two 60-credit concentrations: dance/movement therapy and body psychotherapy. Both programs integrate personal and professional learning in a contemplative and somatic framework stressing the interwoven nature of sensation, emotion, thought, and movement. Graduates are prepared to work with individuals and groups in a variety of mental health settings, including hospitals, schools, as well as treatment and rehabilitation facilities. The program meets the academic requirements for the Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) credential in the State of Colorado. With the LPC students are then eligible to sit for the Colorado State Board licensing examination after graduation.
[edit] Master of Fine Arts
[edit] Theater
Naropa University offers two MFAs in Theater programs: Lecoq Based Actor Created Theater and Contemporary Performance. Both programs share a deep commitment to technical rigor and the groundbreaking creation of new forms, yet each program is distinctive in its pedagogies, faculties, and student bodies. Both years of the MFA Theater: Lecoq Based Actor Created Theater occur in London, UK, in cooperation with the London International School of Performing Arts. The training is rigorously physical in its approach, focusing on the dramatic and image-making capabilities of the actor's body. The MFA Theater: Contemporary Performance is offered on Naropa's campus in Boulder, Colorado. This is the first graduate training program that integrates contemporary physical theater, viewpoints theory and practice, and traditional contemplative practices.
[edit] Writing and Poetics
The Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics, founded in 1974 by Allen Ginsberg and Anne Waldman, offers courses taught by active, published writers, giving an experienced practitioner's insight into literary art. The Kerouac School has as its mission the education of students as knowledgeable practitioners of the literary arts. Its objectives toward that mission include encouraging a disciplined practice of writing and cultivating a historical and cultural awareness of literary studies. A Creative Writing degree (low residency program) is also available. Students enrolling in this program will enjoy the benefits of the Naropa experience without having to relinquish other commitments, because coursework is fulfilled online.
[edit] Beat influences
Beat Generation poets Allen Ginsberg and Anne Waldman founded the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa. The Naropa Summer Writing Program celebrated its 30th anniversary in 2004.
Many classes taught by Ginsberg, William S. Burroughs and others, have been preserved and can be downloaded thanks to the Naropa University Archive Project[1].
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
[edit] References
- Kashner, Sam When I Was Cool: My Life at the Jack Kerouac School (2004) ISBN 0060005661 }
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- ^ Waldman, Anne (2001). Vow to Poetry.
