PhD, Cornell University, Anthropology/SE Asian Studies
MA, University of Hawaii, (Asian) Religions
BA, Gustavus Adolphus College, English/Education

According to anthropology, a culture may reach a point where it becomes too disconnected from its past.  When people come to this realization, they often turn back on themselves in an attempt to reclaim what was once meaningful.  We call such tendencies Revitalization Movements.  The Green Revolution is currently functioning in this way:  realizing that we have distanced ourselves from nature, we look for ways to reconnect with it, make amends and seek better balance and harmony.

On a personal level, middle age often brings on similar inclinations.  Go up on Goggle Earth and try to find the neighborhood you once grew up in.  The old homestead is now masked by mature trees.  The beach on Lake Minnewashta where you “borrowed” that canoe or rowboat is now privately owned and densely populated.  The benevolent people who lived nearby have moved away or passed on.  Tents, campfires, and late-night trysts are just a memory – but promises made on a glassy lake at midnight, overheard by too many, echo on forever.

We find ourselves in the mode of trying to reclaim all sorts of things, some potentially more fruitful than others.  And this process of reclamation can be perilous:  greener grass is the stuff of which aphorisms are made.  Still, turning back to look at the past while moving forward can help us charge the air of the present with lost vitality.  Similar to cultures trying to revitalize, there is much room for debate and renewal, but, ultimately, what we are able to reclaim and reapply is never quite the same.  Coming to a realization of how we are the same but different can help us resonate with the new direction of our future.

Past profiles

There is a first time for everyone...
After a three-year stint in the Peace Corps...

Some publications

Forthcoming: "Southeast Asian Literature" in The Lincoln Library of Essential Information. Cleveland: Lincoln Library Press.

"Unrequited Leadership, Nostalgia and Progress in Thailand," in Thai Challenge: Unity, Stability & Democracy in Times of Uncertainty. Edited by Thang Nguyen. Nova Publishers, 2008.

“An Aesthetics of Rice” reprinted in The Society of Siam:  Selected Articles for the Siam Society's Centenary. Edited by Chris Baker. Bangkok: Siam Society, 2004.

“Thai, Buddhist literature in” in Encyclopedia of Buddhism. Macmillan Reference, 2003.

“Filling the Void: Thai Khwan and Burmese Leip-pya, The Stuff of Which Souls are Made” in Socially Engaged Spirituality: Essays in Honor of Sulak Sivaraksa on His 70th Birthday. Edited by David W. Chappell. Bangkok: Sathirakoses-Nagapradipa Foundation, 2003, 271-302.

Editor, Modern Southeast Asian Literature in Translation: A Resource for Teaching, Arizona State University, 1997. For a syllabus of a class on Southeast Asian literature taught at NIU, go here.

A translation of Phra Prayudh Payutto's Buddhadhamma. SUNY Press, 1995.

"Thai Cremation Volumes: A Brief History of a Unique Genre of Literature." Asian Folklore Studies Vol. 51:2
(October 1992), 279-294.

Current projects and interests

Reclaiming music, relearning the guitar, working on an East-West comparative philosophy project, writing more poetry and prose.

Links

Bio info (in Thai)
Introduction to Thai Buddhism
Thai Studies
dekalb-sycamore.com

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Watson Hall 101
(815) 753-6455