Dissertationsprojekt von Silke R. G. Hasper, M.A.

"Between Self-Orientalism and Self-Improvement. A Transcultural Analysis of Mindfulness and Therapy in Contemporary Japan"

Mindfulness has become a billion-dollar industry. Diverse stakeholder groups utilize mindfulness as a concept or as a practice for a broad range of reasons. Therapists focus psychological-medical effects ascribed to mindfulness, global companies sell mindfulness as both stress reduction and performance enhancement method, and magazines promote mindfulness as a Buddhist inspired lifestyle.

Given the rising economic interest, mindfulness has gained increasing attention among scholars of various disciplines. Detrimental to our understanding, research to date tends to apply a dualistic perspective of mindfulness' Asian origin and its Western adaptation. Those approaches fail to capture the complexity of the matter, since they neglect the transculturally intertwined shifts occurring in mindfulness practices in Asian countries today.

Silke R. G. Hasper's research focuses on transculturally intertwined practices and discourses of mindfulness in Japan. She discusses concepts and practices of mindfulness in relation to the religious landscape and therapeutic culture in Japan. The aim is to show the multifaceted relationships between scientific/therapeutic and religious/spiritual semantics of self-improvement on the one hand, and transcultural flows on the other hand by describing practices and discourses concerning mindfulness in a broader global context.