Medicine, the Body, and the Senses: Asian Perspectives

The Asia Research Institute at The University at Buffalo, State University of New York (SUNY-Buffalo) invites scholars who work on medical ideas and practices in Asia, broadly conceived, to submit an application to participate in a 1.5-day conference on April 11-12, 2025 at SUNY-Buffalo (in-person only).

The conveners are particularly interested in research that speaks to how understandings of the body and its various senses (visual, auditory, olfactory, gustatory, haptic, etc.) in premodern and modern contexts shape healing outcomes, religious experiences, gender relations, and sociopolitical processes. We also welcome research that explores how social, political, religious, and cultural contexts frame and change perceptions of sensorial experience and embodied practice.

Taking a multidisciplinary approach and paying attention to both local features and transregional knowledge exchange, the conference is intended to foster fruitful conversation that advances crucial Asian perspectives on the body and the senses and offers fresh insights on the particular Asian societies under study.