Hamburg’s Bhutanese professor

1 September: A Bhutanese lecturer in a German university will officially assume office as a professor for Tibetology at the department of Indian and Tibetan studies, Asia-Africa institute in university of Hamburg from October 1.

Dorji Wangchuk, 42, from Trashigang, who teaches Tibetan textual studies and intellectual history of Tibetan Buddhism, has accepted the professorship offered by the university last month.
“To be recognised as a professor, one needs a Ph.D. in the relevant field, have teaching and research experience, and fit into the academic profile of the department,” said Dorji Wangchuk, in an email interview with Kuensel.

Dorji Wangchuk completed his Ph.D. in Classical Indology, with a focus on Buddhist studies, under the supervision of professor Lambert Schmithausen at the same university in 2005. He completed his master’s in Classical Indology in 2002.

Asked how he ended up teaching in Germany, professor Dorji Wangchuk said that his desire to study Buddhist philosophy took him to the traditional monastic seminary (Ngagyur Nyingma institute) at Penor Rinpoche’s Namdroling monastery in Mysore, India. His desire to trace the Indian roots of Tibetan Buddhism brought him to the university of Hamburg in 1998. “There, I wrote my M.A. (2002) and Ph.D. (2005) dissertations under the supervision of professor Lambert Schmithausen, one of the leading Buddhologists worldwide,” said Dorji Wangchuk.

He said that, after his studies he was fortunate to get the position of an academic employee at the same university, where he taught and did research in the field of Tibetan Buddhism.

Dorji Wangchuk was awarded the Karl H Ditze-Preis for his outstanding doctoral dissertation in the field of humanities by the university of Hamburg in 2008 and German academic exchange service prize for outstanding academic achievement of an international student in Germany in 2000.

Dorji Wangchuk went to study Tibetan Buddhism in Ngagyur Nyingma Institute, Mysore, under a six-year scholarship from the department of education after completing ICSE with first division from Samtse high school in 1987.

source: kuensel