An examination of the historical, religious, and philosophical foundations of Buddhist traditions in South and East Asia and exploration of the history of Buddhism with an emphasis on its basic doctrines, interpretive strategies, and philosophies. This course offers an introduction to canonical and non-canonical sources of Buddhist thought and practice from the discourses of the Buddha to later East Asian developments. We will explore key Buddhist concepts such as dependent origination, emptiness, no-self, loving-kindness, and compassion as well as philosophical questions concerning knowledge, language, ethics, and psychology (meditation and the mind) by closely reading and interpreting texts of various traditions of Buddhism, including Theravāda, Pudgalavāda, the two central schools of South Asian Mahāyāna Buddhist philosophy (Mādhyamika and Yogācāra), as well as Chinese and East Asian Buddhist philosophy in relation to their historical contexts, philosophical contents, and their significance for contemporary philosophical and social issues.