Annabella Pitkin is Assistant Professor of Buddhism and East Asian Religions at Lehigh University. Her current research focuses on Tibetan Buddhist modernity, Buddhist ideals of renunciation, miracle narratives, and Buddhist biographies. She received her B.A. from Harvard and Ph.D. in Religion from Columbia, and has lived and traveled extensively in the Himalayan region, China, India, and Nepal. Her articles include “Dazzling Displays and Mysterious Departures: Bodhisattva Pedagogy as Performance in the Biographies of Two Twentieth Century Tibetan Buddhist Masters” (Religions 2017); “The 'Age of Faith' and the 'Age of Knowledge': Secularism and Modern Tibetan Accounts of Yogic Power" (Himalaya 2016), and "Lineage, Authority and Innovation: The Biography of Khunu Lama Tenzin Gyaltsen" (Mapping the Modern in Tibet, 2011). She is completing a book manuscript titled “Beggar Modern: Modernity, Renunciation, and Love in the Life of a 20th Century Tibetan Buddhist Saint.”