Department of Religious Studies
Faculty
Clark Chilson
Assistant Professor
PhD, Lancaster University
(UK), 2004
2610 Cathedral of Learning
412.624.5977
e-mail
Fields
Religion in Japan, particularly Buddhism and popular religion
Teaching
Religion in Asia, Religion and Culture in East Asia, Japanese Religious Traditions, Popular Religion in a Changing Japan, and graduate seminars on the ethnographic study of religion and Japanese religions
Selected Publications
"Eulogizing Kūya as More than a Nenbutsu Practitioner: A Study and Translation of the Kūyarui," Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 34.2 (2007)
Asian Folklore Studies, "Special Issue Honoring Professor Peter Knecht, editor of Asian Folklore Studies, 1980-2006," 66.1-2 (2007) [coeditor with Scott Schnell]
Nanzan Guide to Japanese Religions, University of Hawai'i Press, 2006 [coeditor with Paul Swanson]. Selected as a 2007 Outstanding Academic Publication by Choice magazine.
Shamans in Asia, Routledge/Curzon, 2003 [coeditor with Peter Knecht]
"Religion Concealed and Revealed: The Uses of History by a Secretive Shinshū Leader," Japanese Religions 27 (2002)
"The Creation of a Holy Man: The Earlier Narratives on the Life of Kūya," Nanzan kyōiku sentō ronshū 1 (2000)
"Born-Again Buddhists: Secretive Shinshū Initiation Rites in Twentieth-Century Japan," Studies in Central and East Asian Religions 11 (1999)
Honors and Awards
Lilly Endowment, Wabash Center Grant to conduct workshops for university and college faculty on “Pedagogies for Civic Engagement: Developing Strategies within and beyond the Religious Studies Classroom,” 2008-2009 [with Reid Locklin, Forrest Clingerman, and Erin Runions]
Social Science Research Council, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Postdoctoral Fellowship for American Researchers, 2007-2008
Lilly Endowment, Wabash Center Grant for participation in the Workshop on Teaching and Learning for Pre-Tenure Religion Faculty at Colleges and Universities, 2006-2007
Current Projects
"The Consequences of Concealment: A Comparative Study of Two Underground Traditions of Shin Buddhism" (book ms)
University Affiliations
Core faculty member of the Japan Studies Program and Asian Studies Center of the University Center for International Studies
Overseas Experience
Before joining the faculty at Pitt in 2006, Clark Chilson lived in England for three years and in Japan for over thirteen years. In Japan he studied cultural anthropology, did fieldwork at a Zen temple and among secretive Buddhists, and for five years was the associate editor of Asian Folklore Studies and the Japanese Journal of Religious Studies. He also supplemented his income in Japan by doing jobs as diverse as interpreting for an F1 racecar driver, working on a documentary for the Japanese Broadcasting Company (NHK), and translating medical texts.