Karma Lekshe Tsomo


Karma Lekshe Tsomo is a Buddhist nun, scholar and social activist. She is a professor at the University of San Diego, where she teaches Buddhism and World Religions. She is co-founder of the Sakyadhita International Association of Buddhist Women and the founding director of the Jamyang Foundation, which supports the education of women and girls in the Himalayan region and the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh. She took novice precepts as a Buddhist nun in France in 1977 and full ordination in Korea in 1982.

Scholarly career

Karma Lekshe Tsomo is a professor of Buddhist Studies at the University of San Diego, where she has taught since 2000. After fifteen years studying Buddhism at Dharamsala, she did her postgraduate work at the University of Hawai'i at Manoa, gaining a PhD in Comparative Philosophy in 2000. Her research has primarily concerned women in Buddhism, death and dying, and Buddhist philosophy and ethics.

Social activism

In 1985 Karma Lekshe Tsomo founded the Jamyang Foundation, a non-profit organisation that works to improve the education of women and girls in the Himalayan region and currently runs several schools and study programmes in India and Bangladesh. At a gathering at Bodh Gaya in 1987 she became one of the founding members of the international organisation Sakydhita, which campaigns for gender equality in Buddhism.

Major publications

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