Pacifica Welcomes Dr. Kali Cape as Core Faculty for Mythological Studies Program
The Mythological Studies M.A./Ph.D. Program welcomes Dr. Kali Cape as its newest core faculty member. Dr. Cape is a historian of Buddhist philosophy specializing in transnational Tibetan Buddhism, women, and Buddhism outside the monastery. She was recently Assistant Professor at Georgia State University, and the Director of Graduate Studies in the Religious Studies Department.
She earned her MA from University of Virginia in the History of Religions, specializing in Tibetan Buddhism. She then entered the Ph.D. program in Religious Studies focusing on Buddhist Studies and finished in 2023. Her dissertation focused on women and sexuality in esoteric Tibetan contemplative literature, also known as Great Perfection (rdzogs chen).
Dr. Cape’s research focuses on Tibetan philosophical literature about ultimate reality, women, and meditation in the fourteenth century, a period of the formation of canons in Tibet. These were revealed texts full of traditional and innovative ontologies that reflected Tibetan reception and reinterpretation of Indian Buddhism along with the development of yogic techniques in a transnational exchange across East Asia.
“I found Pacifica Graduate Institute through my interest in the Western reception of Tibetan Buddhist manuscripts. My research focuses on fourteenth-century Tibetan texts that deal with women, sexuality, death, and liberation, including works of the Great Perfection (rdzogs chen). These texts were important in the early reception of Buddhism in America, since it is this genre that contained texts that later came to be known as the Tibetan Book of the Dead. Thus, although much of my research happens in caves, temples, and archives in Asia, it also intersects with great modern thinkers who have influenced how these texts are read today. Jung said about the Tibetan Book of the Dead that it was his constant companion to whom he owed his fundamental insights. In researching Jung’s engagement with these texts, I discovered Pacifica and was overjoyed to find an institution that, through those early courses on Jung, explored the dialogue between Eastern wisdom traditions and Western thinkers.
What drew me most deeply was Pacifica’s understanding that mythological narratives are not merely objects of study but living forces that shape both individual and collective transformation. This is attested to in my research as well since Buddhist mythologies became the building blocks of identity formation, personhood and maps for spiritual awakening across centuries of transmission, transformation, and reinterpretation. Because of this, it was mythologies of cosmic buddha-couples that allowed women to be included in esoteric Tibetan Buddhism. This is the power of myth to reshape cultures and societies.
I am also delighted to see Pacifica as a place where my approach to contemplative pedagogy could flourish since here there is a commitment to both rigorous scholarship and the cultivation of experiential understanding and the human imagination. I believe learning should not be just listening, memorizing and regurgitating, it should be joyful, engaging, and multi-modal. I see the classroom as a potential place to foster higher-level thinking, a meta-awareness about oneself, one’s beliefs, and one’s world so that students are not just learning new information, but also discovering themselves in the process.”
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For those interested in the Mythological Studies program please visit here. To learn more about Dr. Cape, please visit her website here.
Dr. Kali Cape is the newest core faculty member with the Mythological Studies program at Pacifica. Dr. Cape is a historian of Buddhist philosophy specializing in transnational Tibetan Buddhism, women, and Buddhism outside the monastery. She was recently Assistant Professor at Georgia State University, and the Director of Graduate Studies in the Religious Studies Department.
She earned her MA from University of Virginia in the History of Religions, specializing in Tibetan Buddhism. She then entered the Ph.D. program in Religious Studies focusing on Buddhist Studies and finished in 2023. Her dissertation focused on women and sexuality in esoteric Tibetan contemplative literature, also known as Great Perfection (rdzogs chen).
Dr. Cape’s research focuses on Tibetan philosophical literature about ultimate reality, women, and meditation in the fourteenth century, a period of the formation of canons in Tibet. These were revealed texts full of traditional and innovative ontologies that reflected Tibetan reception and reinterpretation of Indian Buddhism along with the development of yogic techniques in a transnational exchange across East Asia.
