[INDOLOGY] Job opportunity for a Ph.D. student in the Kuča murals project

[Eli Franco]

With apologies for crossposting:

The Saxon Academy of Sciences and Humanities in Leipzig offers – at  
the earliest possible date – the following position in the research  
project Buddhist Murals of Kuča on the Northern Silk Road  
(Wissenschaftliche Bearbeitung der buddhistischen Höhlenmalereien in  
der Kuča-Region der nördlichen Seidenstraße):
Postgraduate/Doctoral candidate

Duration: Two years with an option of extension of another (third) year.
Salary group: TV-L 13, 50%.

Job description:
The project “Buddhist Murals of Kuča on the Northern Silk Road ” is  
the first comprehensive research project focussing on the Buddhist  
wall paintings of Kuča (Xinjiang, PR China). It aims at exploring the  
paintings in a series of scholarly studies and at creating an  
extensive information system that documents the murals in situ as well  
as the parts that were removed from the sites by a series of  
expeditions at the beginning of the 20th century. The project also  
aims at documenting current research in European and Asian languages  
and archival materials. The project will provide an overview of the  
original image programmes of the caves, identifications of the  
individual narratives depicted and their literary sources, an analysis  
of iconographic, stylistic and compositional concepts in order to  
identify artistic developments within the corpus of paintings as well  
as influences from other contemporary cultures and regions such as the  
Indian subcontinent, Iran, Central Asia, the Mediterranean and China.
The doctoral candidate is expected to finish a Ph.D. thesis related to  
the field of the Kuča murals within the specified duration of the  
contract and to prepare the materials collected in the course of his  
research for inclusion in the project database. The final manuscript  
can be included in the publication series of the project.
Requirements:
The candidate must hold a university degree in a relevant field (Asian  
Art History or Indology) and have sound knowledge of the art history  
and archaeology of Central and South Asia, especially the Buddhist art  
of the Silk Roads. Knowledge of another cultural area (Mediterranean /  
Persia / East Asia) interrelated to the Kuča region is of advantage.
A good working knowledge of English and of at least one classical  
Buddhist language is essential; candidates with proven experience in  
the organization and structuring of large volumes of art historical  
data are particularly encouraged to apply.

Attention is paid to the preferential consideration of severely  
handicapped persons with equal qualifications. Women are particularly  
encouraged to apply.
Applications including the usual documents and a short (max. two A4  
pages) outline of your doctoral project have to be submitted by  
January 20, 2019 to: Dr. Christian Winter, Saxon Academy of Sciences  
Leipzig, Karl-Tauchnitz-Straße 1, 04107 Leipzig or by e-mail to:  
bewerbung at saw-leipzig.de

For further information, please contact Prof. Monika Zin at m.zin at t-online.de


-- 
Prof. Dr. Eli Franco
Institut für Indologie und Zentralasienwissenschaften
Schillerstr. 6
04109 Leipzig

Ph. +49 341 9737 121, 9737 120 (dept. office)
Fax +49 341 9737 148