Thomas B. Coburn

Dr. Thomas B. Coburn is president of Naropa University,serving since 2003. Coburn also serves as a faculty member in the Graduate Religious Studies program. Coburn served from 1996 to 2002 as the vice president of the university and dean of academic affairs at St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York. He was also the Charles A. Dana Professor of Religious Studies and had served on the faculty since 1974.¹

Naropa University announced in May 2008 that Coburn would step down after the 2008-09 school year.²

Dr. Coburn is a scholar and academician in the field of religious studies, and an author specializing in South and East Asia and the Islamic world. He is considered one of the world's leading experts on the Hindu tradition of the great goddess, having written both "Encountering the Goddess: a translation of the Devi-Mahatmaya and a Study of its Interpretation" and "Devi Mahatmya, The Crystallization of the Goddess Tradition". Coburn contributed to writings about the art of teaching in "Leading from Within: Poetry that Sustains the Courage to Lead".³ Dr. Coburn also spent time as the director of the New York State Independent College Consortium for Study in India, was a visiting faculty member on the University of Pittsburgh Semester at Sea and spent a year as a visiting scholar at the Harvard Divinity School. Coburn holds a BA from Princeton University, and an MA and PhD from Harvard University.⁴ He grew up in Amherst, MA.

Books and Articles Published

Coburn, Thomas B. Encountering the Goddess: A translation of the Devi-Mahatmya and a Study of Its Interpretation. State University of New York Press, 1991. (ISBN 0791404463) ----. "Devī Māhātmya, The Crystallization of the Goddess Tradition" , South Asia Books, 2002. (ISBN 81-208-0557-7) ----. "'Scripture' in India: Towards a Typology of the Word in Hindu Life", "Journal of the American Academy of Religion", 42,3 (September 1984): 435-460.

References

1. http://www.naropa.edu/academics/graduate/mars/faculty.cfm

2.http://www.naropa.edu/news/pressreleases/052308coburnresigns.cfm

3. Intrator, Sam M. and Megan Scribner. "Leading from Within: Poetry that Sustains the Courage to Lead". San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2007.

4. http://www.naropa.edu/academics/graduate/mars/faculty.cfm