Ruth Denison

USA

Ruth Denison (born 1922) was the first Buddhist teacher in the United States to lead an all women’s retreat for Buddhist meditation and instruction. Her center Dhamma Dena Desert Vipassana Center is located in the Mojave Desert, in Joshua Tree, California. She was also a teacher at the Insight Meditation Society in Barre, Massachusetts. She sometimes teaches at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Woodacre, California.

After spending her youth in Germany she immigrated to the United States. In the 1960s and 1970s she was part of the alternative and counter culture scene.

She is one of four Westerners who received permission to teach from Burmese master U Ba Khin, a lay person known for a particular method of awareness practice, called “sweeping,” in which the meditator closely observes bodily sensations.

She is among the pioneers who introduced vipassana meditation to the United States.