Join WhatsApp Channel
The University of Montreal in Quebec, Canada, has become the first university in the world to launch a graduate-level course on Sikhism taught in French, according to supporters of the initiative. The course is offered as part of the university’s master’s and doctoral curricula.
Although several North American universities have established chairs in Sikh studies, the University of Montreal has taken the lead in introducing courses on Sikhism in French, said Montreal-based businessman Baljeet Singh Chadha and his wife, Mandeep “Roshi” Kaur Chadha.
“Sikh Studies in French will start with the current academic session beginning this month. It is a milestone representing an important step forward in the academic study of Sikhism and in making Sikh studies accessible to French-speaking students and scholars. Also, these courses create bridges for interreligious and intercultural understanding,” Baljeet Singh Chadha said.
According to a statement from the university, the graduate-level course will offer an in-depth examination of the Sikh tradition and its connections to the bhakti tradition. It will cover sacred texts as well as Sikh rituals, doctrines, philosophy and belief systems.
The course is being taught under the supervision of Professor Diana Dimitrova.
It will also examine the effects of colonialism on the Sikh tradition and the postcolonial period, including conflicts and nationalist movements. Other areas of study include contemporary Sikhism in India and the diaspora, along with representations of the Sikh tradition in popular films.
The course is taught in French, while students may complete examinations and papers in either French or English. Classes began September 2.
Dimitrova is a full professor of South Asian traditions and cultures at the University of Montreal and a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. She earned a doctorate in South Asian studies from Heidelberg University in Germany.
She has served as a visiting scholar at McGill University in Canada; the University of Miami in the United States; KU Leuven, the University of Liège and the Free University of Brussels in Belgium; the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences in Paris; and Heidelberg University.
Her academic interests include cultural identity, nationalism, discourses of otherness and South Asian perspectives on the body. Her recent publications include Cultural Identity in Hindi Plays: Poetics, Politics and Theatre in India, published by Oxford University Press in 2023, and the edited volume Mythologizing in South Asian Traditions: Myth, Gender, Power and Politics, published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2025. Her current research focuses on the Brahma Kumaris tradition in Canada and the United States.
Dimitrova has served as president and past president of the Canadian Society for the Study of Religion. She was also a member of the executive board of the Canadian Corporation for Studies in Religion and co-editor of the “Matière à pensée” series published by the University of Montreal Press.
She currently serves as editor of Routledge’s Series on South Asian Culture and Society and as an editor of De Gruyter Brill’s Culture, Religion and Society series.
