Speakers and Participants
Harold D. Roth is a professor of religious studies and the Director of the Contemplative Studies Initiative at Brown University. Roth is a specialist in Methods of Textual Criticism and Textual History, Classical Chinese Religious Thought, Classical Daoism, the Comparative Study of Mysticism and one of the pioneers of the new interdisciplinary academic field of Contemplative Studies. Roth has not only been a leader in developing the new academic field of Contemplative Studies, he is also the person who first coined the term. Combining the disciplines of the relevant Brain Sciences, Humanities, and Creative Arts around the systematic third and first-person study of contemplative experiences, across cultures and across time, this new field presents bold new pedagogies and research techniques that return the unbiased perspective of the experiencing subject to both classroom and laboratory. Inspired by the work of scientists such as Francisco Varela, James Austin, and Richard Davidson, philosophers such as William James and Evan Thompson, and educators such as John Dewey and Parker Palmer, Brown Contemplative Studies has served as a model for research institutes and academic programs at many institutions of higher education throughout North America. Roth has helped pioneer the field through such publications as “Contemplative Studies: Prospects for a New Field”, Columbia Teacher’s College Record (2006); “Against Cognitive Imperialism”, Religion East and West (2008); “Contemplative Studies: Can It Flourish in the Religious Studies Classroom?” Meditation and the Classroom: Contemplative Pedagogy for Religious Studies (2011); and “A Pedagogy for the New Field of Contemplative Studies”, Contemplative Approaches to Learning and Inquiry across Disciplines (2014).
Chloe Zimmerman BA ’15 graduated from Brown University with an undergraduate degree in Contemplative Psychsomatic Medicine. She worked for three years in Catherine Kerr’s Embodied Neuroscience Lab at Brown on a clinical trial designed for fatigued cancer survivors comparing a qigong course to a standard exercise course. Together with Ellen Flynn MD and the Alpert Medical School at Brown University, they also began in integrated mindfulness curriculum with medical students to help improve mental health, stress levels, and moral injury that occurs during medical training. Using EEG, EMG, ECG, blood measures of inflammation, and musculoskeletal strength, the research with medical students and cancer survivors examines underlying dynamical interactions between brain and bodily systems that are associated with therapeutic changes commonly reported from participants taking part in such brain-body interventions. After the untimely passing of Dr. Kerr, she has continued the research in the Computational Neuroscience Laboratory of Stephanie Jones, PhD. She is currently enrolled in Brown University’s MD/PhD program.
PANEL RESPONDENT AND COMMUNITY PARTICIPANTS
Marcelo Gleiser is a Brazilian physicist and astronomer who is the Appleton Professor of Natural Philosophy at Dartmouth College. He directs the Institute for Cross-Disciplinary Engagement and is a recipient of the Templeton Prize.
Peter Ulric Tse is Professor of Psychology and Brain Sciences at Dartmouth College and a Guggenheim Fellow.
Sonu Bedi is the Joel Parker 1811 Professor in Law and Political Science and Associate Professor of Government, as well as Director of the Ethics Institute at Dartmouth College.
Greg Seton is a Senior Lecturer in Religion at Dartmouth College who received his PhD in Sanskrit and Tibetan Buddhist Studies from Oxford University and is a teacher of Tibetan Buddhism.
Terry Osborne is Senior Lecturer in the Environmental Studies Program at Dartmouth College.
Bill Hammond is an Upper Valley educator who has served on the faculty of Hanover High School and as the Principal of the Marion Cross School in Norwich, VT.
Karen Wilson is an Upper Valley educator who has served on the faculty of the Ray School in Hanover, NH.
Brad Choyt is Head of School at Crossroads Academy and a practitioner of Tibetan Buddhism who is also trained in Tibetan Buddhist art.
Manish Mishra is Assistant Professor at Geisel School of Medicine, Director of Professional Education at The Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice, and Co-Director of the Foundations in Health Care and Eichler Fellows Program at Dartmouth College. He trained in psychiatry, surgery, preventative medicine, and public health. Prior to medical school, he studied Sanskrit and Religion at Harvard University, and is ordained in the Hindu tradition.
James Stahl is Associate Professor of Medicine at Geisel and Section Chief of Internal Medicine at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, NH. He is also a practitioner and teacher of East Asian contemplative movement practices and trained in Mind-Body Medicine with Herbert Benson.
Kari Gleiser is founder and director of the Center for Integrative Health in Hanover, NH, a trauma center dedicated to multi-modal healing of mind, body and spirit.
Jane Masters is clinical social worker who works in Palliative Care at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center. Jane uses her practice of mindfulness to see and capture the world in her Haiku and photography.
Amanda Lape-Freeberg is Senior Pastor at the United Church of Christ at Dartmouth College.
Adam Knowlton-Young is a Student Affairs professional at Dartmouth College with an avid interest in mindfulness both in his personal and professional life.
Syed Rakin Ahmed (Dartmouth ’18) is a second-year medical student at Geisel School of Medicine.
Marie Fourcaut is a yoga teacher and practitioner with three decades of experience. Born in Algeria and raised in France, she began her professional dance career at 16 and has worked with leading international contemporary dance companies around the world.
This conference is co-organized by Gendo Allyn Field and Associate Professor of Anthropology Sienna R. Craig.
Field is a lay monk and teacher in the Rinzai Zen tradition. He is a member of the American Zen Teachers Association and currently chair of its program committee. Field is the founder of the Upper Valley Zen Center in White River Junction, VT. He serves as a Buddhist Chaplain at both Dartmouth College and Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center. He teaches meditation at Concord State Prison, and he is currently leading an interest group for medical students called Mind, Body, and the Physician, at Geisel.
Craig is a cultural and medical anthropologist who has spent more than 25 years working in Himalayan communities in Nepal, Tibetan areas of China, and among diasporic communities from this region now living in the United States. A Guggenheim Fellow, she has also collaborated as a scholar-teacher with Geisel faculty and DHMC clinicians. She is currently serving as the House Professor for South House. Professor Roth served as Craig’s undergraduate mentor at Brown, where she pursued a BA in Religious Studies.
Together with other colleagues and institutions across campus, Field and Craig have facilitated seminars on topics related to Medicine, Health and Illness; Buddhism and Science; and Death and Dying.
SPONSORS
This conference has been sponsored by the Departments of Anthropology and Religion; the Lincoln Filene Human Relations Fund within the Department of Psychology and Brain Sciences; Asian Societies, Cultures, and Languages Program; Dartmouth Centers Forum: Tucker Center, Leslie Center for the Humanities, Center for Social Impact, Ethics Institute; Institute for Cross-Disciplinary Engagement; Norris Cotton Cancer Center at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center; Dartmouth College Student Wellness Center; and the Eric Eichler ’57 Fellowship for Health Care Leaders. This conference has been organized in collaboration with the Upper Valley Zen Center.
