International encounters in the Himalayas and beyond

Dr. Péter-Dániel Szántó (1980, Cluj/Kolozsvár) first studied at ELTE Budapest (Diploma in Tibetology 2004, Diploma in Indology 2006) and obtained his doctorate at the University of Oxford (Balliol, 2006-2010, defended in 2012). He was a Junior Research Fellow at Merton College (2010-2013), a Nachwuchsinitiative Stipendiant at Hamburg University (2013-2014), and a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at All Souls College (2014- 2019). He is currently a post-doc with the Open Philology Project at Leiden University. His main area of study is Indo-Tibetan Tantric Buddhism, but he has also published papers about Mahāyāna Buddhism, Indo-Tibetan poetics, Indian epigraphy, South Asian material culture, and Śaivism.

The Society of Friends of the Kern Institute (Vereniging Vrienden van het Instituut Kern or VVIK) supports and promotes the study of South Asia, in particular India and Tibet. The society organises lectures and excursions, provides subsidies for study trips, supports the expansion and public use of the VVIK library collections, and brings out a Newsletter and other publications. She also supports, via de ‘Dr. de Cock-fundatie’, the website ‘Dutch Studies on South Asia, Tibet and classical Southeast Asia’. The VVIK acts in close cooperation with the South Asian and Tibetan Studies program of the Leiden University Institute for Area Studies (LIAS).