Memorial Session for Michael Ium

This session commemorates Michael Ium, a historian of Tibetan Buddhism who passed at the age of 41 in April 2025. Speakers will provide brief comments that either: 1) overview his scholarship on Tibetan Buddhist Scholasticism; 2) share his contribution to various institutions and their surrounding communities (including the Austrian Academy of Sciences, the University of Toronto, the University of California, Santa Barbara, and Maitripa College); 3) discuss his pedagogy of love and sympathetic joy; 4) recognize his service to the field (e.g., co-editor for the Canadian Journal of Buddhist Studies); 5) call for scholars to contribute toward or continue his unpublished work and work in progress on Tibetan Buddhist pilgrimage and Gelukpa magic; or 6) highlight Michael as a human being, i.e., things not listed on his CV.