Dreaming Me: An African-American Woman's Buddhist Journey - Hardcover

Jan Willis, the first African American Indo-Tibetan scholar, is a professor of religion at Wesleyan University, where she is one of the school's most popular teachers. She is the author of several books on Buddhism.

Raised in segregated Alabama, as an adult Willis journeyed to the monasteries of Kathmandu. In this memoir, she remembers the segregated South of the 1950s and 1960s. She lets readers travel back with her: growing up with TV channels that had "trouble along the cable" whenever a black performer appeared, avoiding getting swatted by the spirited "shouters" in her church or marching with Martin Luther King Jr. in Birmingham. She takes readers inside the Cornell black students' protests of the late 1960s and reveals the temptations of the Black Panthers. Ultimately she chose inner peace over carrying a piece: it was the Buddhist path, which acknowledged suffering but focused on healing, that won her heart. While her Tibetan mentor, Lama Yeshe, had no personal experience with American racism, he saw his student's wounded self-esteem and helped her cope with her perfectionism. Willis returned to America, becoming one of the first tenured Buddhist scholars in academia (she is currently a professor of religious studies at Wesleyan University). Although she recounts several difficult experiences from her early days as an African-American professor and practicing Buddhist, Willis is strong. She realizes that the Baptist she was raised to be and the Buddhist she has become share basic beliefs: "We are all human beings... all wish to have happiness and to avoid suffering." (Apr.)Forecast: Hailed by Time magazine as one of the top innovators in religion for the new millennium, Willis delivers a gripping, intimate account of her spiritual journey that will move anyone who is compelled by the examined life. The Buddhist audience will discover her through an upcoming book excerpt in Tricycle, but with a whisper to Oprah, she could be the first African-American Buddhist feminist guru to be embraced by reading groups across America.

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