Nepal: Tibetan and Himalayan Peoples

Faculty and Staff

Isabelle Onians, Ph.D., Academic Director
Isabelle Onians received her doctorate in Oriental Studies from the University of Oxford. She first came to Kathmandu in 1990 to work as a volunteer teacher in a Tibetan monastery school and returned in 1992-1993 to study Tibetan (and Sanskrit) at Tribhuvan University. Isabelle is delighted to be joining this program as its academic director.

Her own research and professional experience have always centered on the study of classical philosophical, religious, and literary texts. But her textual scholarship has been undertaken in the context of ongoing intense exposure to and interaction with contemporary cultures, people, and landscapes, principally along the Himalayas, both to the north in the Tibetan regions and neighboring areas, as much as in South Asia. It is in fact a noteworthy feature of the civilizations of both Tibet and the Indian subcontinent that their textual traditions continue to have a dynamic existence in the life of the individual and of society. Her dissertation examined a particular and infamous apparent paradox in historical Tantric Buddhism, using both Indian and Tibetan sources.

Isabelle has taught graduate and undergraduate courses in Indo-Tibetan Buddhist Studies at the Universities of Oxford and London and at Mahidol University in Bangkok. She has made research and lecturing trips to a large number of institutions across the world, including leading a Royal Geographical Society Oxford University expedition to the Tibetan plateau, in collaboration with the Tibetan Academy of Social Sciences, Lhasa.

Hubert Decleer, Senior Faculty Advisor
A Belgian national, Mr. Decleer received his B.A. in history and European literature from the Regent School in Ghent, Belgium, and his M.A. in oriental philosophy and history from the University of Louvain. He has pursued classical Tibetan and Buddhist studies under a number of tutors in Kathmandu. Mr. Decleer has worked as a fine arts apprentice, art critic, language instructor, and translator and has lectured for the SIT Nepal program. He was the academic director for the Tibetan and Himalayan Studies program from its inception in the fall of 1987 until the spring of 2001.

Recent publications by Mr. Decleer include:

1992 "The Melodious Drumsound All-Pervading", Sacred Biography of Rwa Lo ts ba: about early Lo ts ba rnam thar and chos 'byung", in: Ihara, Shôren & Zuihô Yamaguchi (eds.) 1992, Tibetan Studies. Proceedings of the 5th Seminar of the International Association for Tibetan Studies, Narita 1989, vol. I, pp. 13-28. [rnam thar means "sacred biography"; chos 'byung means "Dharma Transmission history"]

1994 "Bajrâchârya transmission in XIth century Chobhar: Bharo 'Maimed Hand's main disciple Vajrakirti, the translator from the Rwa clan", Buddhist Himalaya (Kathmandu), vol. VI, nos. 1-2 (1994-1995), pp. 1-16.

1995 "Atisha's Journey to Sumatra", in: Lopez, Donald S., Jr. (ed.) 1995, Buddhism in Practice, Princeton: Princeton University Press (Princeton Readings in Religion, vol. 2), pp. 532-540.

1996 "Master Atisha in Nepal: The Tham Bahil and Five Stûpas Foundations according to the "'Brom ston Itinerary", Journal of the Nepal Research Centre (Kathmandu), vol. X (1996), pp. 26-54.

1996 "Tibetan "Musical Offerings" (Mchod-rol): the indispensable guide" [Review article of Helffer, Mireille 1994, Mchod-rol. Les instruments de la musique tibétaine, Paris: CNRS & Éditions de la Maison des Sciences de l'Homme (Collection Chemins de l'ethnologie)], Studies in Central and East Asian Religions--Journal of The Seminar for Buddhist Studies (Copenhagen), vol. 9 (1996), pp. 75-88.

1997 "Atisha's Journey to Tibet", in: Lopez, Donald S., Jr. (ed.), Religions of Tibet in Practice, Princeton: Princeton University Press (Princeton Readings in Religion, vol. 4) 1997: 157-177.

1998 "Tibetan Literature: Studies in Genre" [Review article of Cabezón, José I. & Roger R. Jackson (eds.) 1996, Tibetan Literature: Studies in Genre. Essays in Honor of Geshe Lhundup Sopa, Ithaca, NY: Snow Lion Publications], The Tibet Journal (Dharamsala), vol. XXIII, no. 1 (Spring 1998), pp. 67-106.

1998 "The Vajra Bhairava Tantras" [Review article of Siklós, Bulcsu (transl.) 1996, The Vajrabhairava Tantras, Tibetan and Mongolian Versions, English Translation and Annotations, Tring: The Institute of Buddhist Studies (Buddhica Britanica, Series Continua VII)], Indo-Iranian Journal (Canberra), vol. 41 (1998), pp. 290-301.

2000 "Situ Panchen's translation of the Svayambhû Purâna and his role in the development of the Kathmandu Valley pilgrimage guide (gnas yig) literature", Lungta (Dharamsala), vol. 13 (Summer/Winter 2000. Special issue: "Situ Panchen: his contribution and legacy"), pp. 33-64.

2003 "Ajanta the Ancestor" [Review article of Schlingloff, Dieter 2000, Ajanta. Handbuch der Malereien, 1. Band, Erzählende Wandmalereien ('Narrative Wall-paintings') (3 vols.), Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag], The Tibet Journal, vol.XXVIII, nos.1 & 2 (Spring & Summer 2003), pp.173-200 (Dharamsala).

2006 "Thangka, by Kenji Babasaki", catalogue text for the exhibitions in Tokyo and Düsseldorf 2006, Tokyo: Private Press (English & Japanese versions).

2006 "The sacred frya Wati image and temple in Kyirong - Franz-Karl Ehrhard's magisterial magnum opus" [Review article of Franz-Karl Ehrhard 2004, Die Statue und der Tempel des Arya Va-ti Bzang-po. Ein Beitrag zu Geschichte und Geographie des Tibetischen Buddhismus, Wiesbaden: Dr. Ludwig Reichert Verlag], The Tibet Journal, vol.XXXIX, no.3 (Autumn 2006), pp.77-116.

2006 Entry "Marpa the Translator", Encyclopedia of Religion, Second edition.

Mr. Decleer invites future students to contemplate ISPs on some of the following specific topics:

Monastic universities for secular students from abroad: the case of the International Buddhist Academy in Tinshuli and its strong contingent of Chinese and Korean disciples.
Sherpa Mountaineering encounters the World Wildlife Fund. In Nepal and elsewhere in the Eastern Himalayas.
The politics of lavish sponsorship: a California-based Tibetan foundation renovating the Newar Buddhist hill shrine of Swayambhu.
HH the 17th Karmapa's daring reforms. And his manifesto in favor of a vegetarian diet & environmental preservation.
The Mind & Life Conferences: Buddhism as "a science of Mind & mental transformation" encounters Neuroscience and cognitive psychology.
No longer mindless copying: original grand commissions for alumni at the Thangka Painting School, Szechen Gompa.

Tenzin Youdon, Senior Program Assistant
Tenzin la was born and raised in Dharamsala, India and has been working with SIT students ever since she can remember: her family has hosted SIT students for over 15 years. She went to TCV (Tibetan Children’s Village) for school and then graduated with a B.A. in English literature from Delhi University. After working briefly in the Indian capital, she participated in different research projects in Dharamsala, such as Professor Melvyn Goldstein's Oral History Project. Tenzin has also coordinated the Miss Tibet Beauty pageant for the last 5 years and hosted the event twice. She completed her M.A. in history from Himachal University and has been working with the SIT Tibetan Studies program as program assistant since spring 2007.

Chelsea Ferrell, Teaching Assistant and Program Coordinator
Chelsea graduated from Swarthmore College in 2005 with a B.A. in political science and a minor in English literature. She worked in the for-profit sector before acting as the international exchange advisor at Stony Brook University; she later worked as the program coordinator for Asia and the Pacific at SIT Study Abroad. In 2010, Chelsea received a Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) fellowship from the US government to study Tibetan language. She completed her M.A. in social anthropology from the School for African and Oriental Studies (SOAS) in London in the fall of 2011. Her dissertation was on conceptions of identity in the London Tibetan exile community.

Thupten Tsering, Language Instructor and Homestay Coordinator
Thupten Tsering was born in Tibet and throughout his childhood studied at the Tibetan Children's Village school in Dharamsala, India. Thupten graduated with a B.A. in Tibetan from the Central Institute of Higher Tibetan Studies in Sarnath, Varanasi, India. He subsequently worked for many years at the Himalayan International Model School, one of Nepal's private schools, as a Tibetan teacher. Since 2009, Thupten has worked as a Tibetan language instructor for the SIT Tibetan Studies program. In 2011, he additionally assumed the role of homestay coordinator.

Mingyur Dorjee, Senior Language Instructor
Mingyur Dorjee has been teaching Tibetan to foreigners for many years. He is currently completing two books, one on the spoken language and another on the written form. He has also released five music albums for the Tibetan market and is working on more. Mingyur la has studied thangka painting as well as Buddhist teachings.

The SIT Tibetan Studies program is also lucky to be supported by the following individuals:

Pasang Rinzi Sherpa, Office and Finance Manager
Ang Nyima Sherpa, House Manager
Tenzing Sherpa, Cook
Phulu Sherpa, Housekeeper