M.A. Susanne Ott

  Her one-year study of Buddhism at Chiang Mai University in Northern Thailand and several stays in Thai monasteries led Susanne Ott (née Götz) to resume her studies at the University of Hamburg in 2001. There she completed her M.A. degree in October 2007, majoring both in Thai studies and classical indology. Her M.A. thesis (entitled “The Significance of Pali and Sanskrit in the Word Coining Process of the Royal Institute of Thailand”) describes the importance of “neo-Indic” elements in the process of coining Thai technical terms and thereby deals with linguistic features, the historical context and the linguo-political background of the modern word-coining process in Thailand.

Inspired by practical experiences gained through teaching Sanskrit as a guest lecturer at the Sanskrit Studies Centre of Silpakorn University in Bangkok during the term of 2007/2008, Susanne Ott is currently working on her Ph.D. in Thai studies at the AAI (Asia-Africa Institute) of the University of Hamburg. Her dissertation is interdisciplinary in the way it draws on and combines current research from Thai studies and translation studies and hence bears the tentative title: "Between Tradition and Transition: A Descriptive Translation Studies Perspective on Contemporary Thai Translations of the Complete Pali Canon (Tipitaka) Viewed in Their Socio-cultural Context."