The Kumārila Studies Conference will be held at the Department of Philosophy at the University of Toronto, Mississauga, MN building, from May 27th to June 1st, 2024.
The conference will bring together experts who will lead two-hour reading sessions on key passages of Kumārila’s texts and provide participants with the necessary tools to understand the hidden gems of Kumārila’s philosophy. More in detail, these sessions will include the reading and commenting on selected passages on a given topic (e.g., adhikāra in Ṭupṭīkā 6.1) and a talk on the topic itself (e.g., mapping the intersection of adhikāra and sāmarthya) and then a discussion session. Besides, there will be opportunities for scholars and advanced students to present their research related to Kumārila in shorter sessions (60′ and 30′).
The conference will be coordinated by Professors Elisa Freschi and Nilanjan Das (Patrick Cummins also helped in the initial phase, and Munema Moiz in the final one) and will see the participation of other experts in Sanskrit philosophy and philology. Confirmed participants (so far) include Dan Arnold, Tarinee Awasthi, Hugo David, Alessandro Graheli, Kei Kataoka, Malcolm Keating, Lawrence McCrea, Sudipta Munsi, John Nemec, Monika Nowakowska, Andrew Ollett, Sarju Patel, Parimal Patil, Akane Saito, Jungju Seo, Vivek Shah, Taisei Shida, Long Yin Sin, Meera Sridhar, Elliot Stern, Alex Watson, Zhao Wu and Kiyotaka Yoshimizu.
Monday May 27th : Kumārila’s Philosophy of Language 1
| Time | Presenter | Chair | Title of talk |
| 9:00-12:00pm | Lawrence McCrea (Prof., Cornell U) | Elisa Freschi | The Limits of Language: Kumārila on “Splitting the Sentence” |
| 12–12:15 | Tea break | ||
| 12:15-12:45pm | Taisei Shida (Ass. Prof., Tsukuba U) | Kumārila’s Theory of Metaphor of the Unreal Entity | |
| 12:45–1:45 | Lunch break | ||
| 1:45-2:45pm | John Nemec (Prof., UVirginia) | Manasicha Akepiyapornchai | The Origin of Language: Kumārila against ex Nihilo Creation |
| 2:45–3 | Tea break | ||
| 3:00-6:00pm | Alessandro Graheli (Prof., U of T) | Kumārila and the Vyākaraṇādhikaraṇa: Friend or Foe of the Grammarians? |
Tuesday May 28th: Kumārila’s Philosophy of Language 2—Kumārila on Epistemology 1
| 9:00-12:00pm | Hugo David (ÉFEO) | Nilanjan Das | Kumārila’s attempts to refute Bhartṛhari’s theory of the sentence: Selections from the Vākyādhikaraṇa and Vyākaraṇādhikaraṇa |
| 12–12:15 | Tea break | ||
| 12:15–12:45 | Long Yin Sin | Kumārila and Śāntarakṣita on apoha | |
| 12:45–1:45 | Lunch break | ||
| 1:45-2:45pm | Malcolm Keating (Prof, Smith College) | Daniele Cuneo | Kumārila and the First Person |
| 2:45–3 | Tea break | ||
| 3:00-6:00pm | Dan Arnold (Prof., UChicago) | Reading Kumārila’s Epistemology through the Words of Pārthasārathi Miśra |
Wednesday May 29th: Kumārila on Epistemology 2
| 9:00-12:00pm | Alex Watson (Prof., Ashoka U) | Jesse Pruitt | I-Cognition in Kumārila and Umbeka; Self-Illumination in Prabhākara | |
| 12–12:15 | Tea break | |||
| 12:15-12:45pm | Discussion round | |||
| 12:45–1:45 | Lunch | |||
| 1:45–2:45 | Parimal Patil and Jungju Seo (Prof., Harvard) | Ajay Rao | Bhaṭṭa Jayanta on Kumārila’s definition of pramāṇa |
Thursday May 30th: Kumārila on Epistemology 3; Kumārila on how commands work
| 9:00-10:00am | Akane Saito (ÖAW) | Elisa Freschi | Kumārila on abhāva |
| 10:00—11:00 | Purushottama Bilimoria (Prof., University of San Francisco) | Kumārila on apūrva and its Nyāya opponents | |
| 11–11:15 | Tea break | ||
| 11:15-12:15pm | Monika Nowakowska (Prof., UWarsaw) | Similarity and comparison in Kumārila’s Tantravārttika | |
| 12:15—12:45pm | Zihao Wu (MA stud., Fudan University) | Kumārila on Upamāna | |
| 1–2 | Lunch break | ||
| 2:15-5:15pm | Tarinee Awasthi (Prof, FLAME University) | Liwen Liu | Kumārila on mantrādhikaraṇa and the three types of injunctions |
Friday May 31st: Kumārila on Subordination and on the Ritual System
| 9:00-12:00pm | Kei Kataoka (Prof., Kyushu U) | Munema Moiz | Kumārila on the Role of the Chapter on “Subordination” in the Mīmāṃsā System |
| 12–12:15 | Tea break | ||
| 12:15–12:45 | Vivek Shah (PhD Stud., U of T) | Kumārīla on the dharma of the ritually challenged | |
| 12:45–1:45 | Lunch break | ||
| 1:45-4:45pm | Akane Saito (Postdoc., Austrian Academy of Sciences) | Michael Torsten Much | Kumārila and Maṇḍana on Subordinate Application |
| 4:45–5 | Tea break |
Saturday June 1st: Kumārila on Philosophy of Ritual
| 9–10 | Kiyotaka Yoshimizu (former Prof., Tohoku U) | Jack Beaulieu | Śabara and Kumārila on Deities in the Vedic Sacrifice |
| 10–10:15 | Tea break | ||
| 10:15-1:15pm | Elliot Stern (Philadelphia) | Efficacy of fixed-interval and occasional rituals in Ṭupṭīkā 6.3.2 | |
| 1:15–2:15 | Lunch break | ||
| 2:15–3:15 | Andrew Ollett (Prof., Chicago) | Carrying over (anuṣaṅga-) in Kumārila’s Explanation of the System (Tantravārttika) | |
| 3:15-3:45 | Sarju Patel (PhD Stud., U of T) | An epistemology of action in Kumārila’s Tantravārtttika | |
| 3:45–4:30pm | Final round table on next steps and projects |
You can find the book of abstracts here.
The organizers gratefully acknowledge support for the conference from the Departments of Philosophy at UTSG and UTM, as well as the Office of the Vice-Principal, Research, and the Decanal Fund at UTM.
Practical matters
Venue: Maanjiwe nendamowinan, Room 3230, UTM 1535 Outer Circle, Mississauga, ON, Canada
How to reach UTM from the airport: https://www.utm.utoronto.ca/international/media/4020/download?inline
Map of the UTM campus: https://www.utm.utoronto.ca/media/11507/download?inline
Hotels close to UTM: https://www.utm.utoronto.ca/international/hotels-and-restaurants-near-utm
Restaurants close to UTM: 1. Apricot Tree (walking distance); 2. Capra’s Kitchen; 3. Rogues Restaurant; 4. East Tea Can; 5. Miga Korean BBQ Restaurant
Food on UTM campus with hours of operation: https://www.utm.utoronto.ca/hospitality/FoodHours
UTM shuttle bus timetable: https://www.utm.utoronto.ca/shuttle/media/885/download?inline
Info and texts to be read during the conference: elisa.freschi@utoronto.ca
The dropbox folder with texts to be read during the conference is accessible here. Email me for the password.