Lessons from Shinto

What is Shinto, the traditional religion of Japan? How do Shinto cosmologies and ideas help us re-examine big questions like: What is a religion? How can spirituality help us think about ethics and justice? How can nature-based and ancestor-based spiritual ideas intersect? What exists in the space between ultranationalist, imperialist religion and completely exoteric, open religion? This session is not devotional and does not suggest that participants adopt Shinto, its deities, or its practices. Instead, by taking a cultural awareness and spiritual understanding approach, this workshop combines lecture and discussion to  provide a space for participants to consider key lessons that Shinto may contribute to big questions and understandings of religious, spiritual, and magical communities.

About the Presenter:

Shige Sakurai (they/them) is a social justice leader with international  and national accolades. They are a Unitarian Universalist with atheist, Shinto, Buddhist, and Christian heritages, and involvement in Druidry. Shige has presented workshops on Shinto to pagan and Asian American communities, and they have forthcoming publications on multi-religious identity, transgender issues in Shinto, and a ceremony for affirming  names and pronouns. Shige has conducted hundreds of speaking engagements  in dozens of cities globally, including at or for 40+ universities, such as UCLA, Georgetown, Princeton, Yale, Cornell, Columbia, NYU, University of Southern California, and University of Michigan. Sakurai has been interviewed by media around the world, including USA Today, Washington Post, Associated Press, CNN, CBS News, MTV, El País, NHK, and France Télévisions.

*This class is part of the General Admission & Sunday 8/15/21 Day Pass registrations, if you are interested in attending all of the events during this festival, or all of the events offered on Sunday 8/15/21, please select the appropriate registration type on our Events & Registration page.*

**Attendees will have access to this recording until the end of 2021 - class recording links will be emailed to attendees within 7 business days of the conclusion of the festival. To protect the IP of our presenters, class recordings will not be downloadable.**

***Your class link will be emailed to you in your confirmation email. If you have not received your registration confirmation email within 24 hours please email info@salemsummersymposium.com***

****PLEASE NOTE: We cannot guarantee that any class registration within 24 hours of the class start time will be admitted to the livestreaming of the class. You will however receive the class recording link within 7 business days of the conclusion of the festival and will have access to the recording for the remainder of 2021****