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Most studies of Buddhist communities tend to be limited to villages, individual temple communities, or a single national community. Buddhist monastics, however, cross a number of these different framings: They are part of local communities, are governed through national legal frameworks, and participate in both national and transnational Buddhist networks. Educating Monks makes visible the ways Buddhist communities are shaped by all of the above—collectively and often simultaneously. Educating Monks examines a minority Buddhist community in Sipsongpannā, a region located on China’s southwest border with Myanmar and Laos. Its people, the Dai-lue, are “double minorities”: They are rec...
Over the course of the nineteenth century, most of the Theravada world of Southeast Asia came under the colonial domination of European powers. While this has long been seen as a central event in the development of modern forms of Theravada Buddhism, most discussions have focused on specific Buddhist communities or nations, and particularly their resistance to colonialism. The chapters in this book examine the many different colonial contexts and regimes that Theravada Buddhists experienced, not just those of European powers such as the British, French, but also the internal colonialism of China and Thailand. They show that while many Buddhists resisted colonialism, other Buddhists shared ag...
This is one in a series of books that offers a quick way into a range of exciting stories. Fast-moving and accessible, each story is a shortened, dramatically illustrated version of the classic novel which loses none of the strength and flavour of the original.
Decolonising the Study of Religion analyses historical and contemporary discussions in the study of religion and Buddhism and critically investigates representations, possibilities, and challenges of a decolonial approach, addressing the important question: who owns Buddhism? The monograph offers a case-based perspective with which to examine the general study of religion, where new challenges require reflection and prospects for new directions. It focuses on Buddhism, one religion which has been studied in the West for centuries. Building on postcolonial theories and supplemented with a critical analysis of identity and postsecular engagement, the book offers new possibilities and challenge...
"This Handbook provides a state-of-the-art exploration of several key dynamics in current studies of the Buddhist tradition with a focus on practice. Embodiment, materiality, emotion, and gender shape the way most Buddhists engage with their traditions, in contrast to popular representations of Buddhism as spiritual, disembodied, and largely devoid of ritual. This volume highlights how practice often represents a fluid, dynamic, and strategic means of defining identity and negotiating the challenges of everyday life. Essays explore the transformational aims of practices that require practitioners to move, gesture, and emote in prescribed ways, including the ways that scholars' own embodied p...
Buddhist studies is a rapidly changing field of research, constantly transforming and adapting to new scholarship. This creates a problem for instructors, both in a university setting and in monastic schools, as they try to develop a curriculum based on a body of scholarship that continually shifts in focus and expands to new areas. Teaching Buddhism establishes a dialogue between the community of instructors of Buddhism and leading scholars in the field who are updating, revising, and correcting earlier understandings of Buddhist traditions. Each chapter presents new ideas within a particular theme of Buddhist studies and explores how courses can be enhanced with these insights. Contributor...
Around the first century BCE, Buddhist monks formed monasteries and established relationships with kings and lay people. The rules monks live by, the Vinaya, are a pivotal source of meaning for them and their dealings with society and form the basis of multiple monasticisms across geographical regions and throughout history. The ways in which the Vinaya is understood and practiced, therefore, must take into account the kind of monasticism that emerges from it. In Living with the Vinaya, Ryosuke Kuramoto examines the process of creating monasticism in contemporary Myanmar by focusing on how monks acquire, possess, and consume material goods. To live as a monk means to obtain resources from so...
Edited by Vanessa R. Sasson, Little Buddhas brings together a wide range of scholarship and expertise to address the question of what role children have played in Buddhist literature, in particular historical contexts, and their role in specific Buddhist contexts today.
Based on thirty-five years of intuitive research, this book explores the interface between healing, personal transformation, and the process of spiritual awakening. It proposes a new approach to psychology, and in particular the resolution of trauma: one that combines recent findings in neuroscience with time-honoured practices of meditation and contemplation, and a working understanding of subtle energy dynamics. Key topics are discussed at length and supported by thirty-nine accompanying illustrations, diagrams, and charts, plus additional explanatory notes. Large in scope, and practical in intention, Transcendence: Journey of the Soul provides essential information for those seeking to understand themselves more deeply, heal the hurts of their past, and express their full potential.
This is a collection of original, new studies about religious changes in Chinese societies, focusing on the role of the state and market in affecting religious developments. It will interest people who want to understand China and/or religious change in modernizing societies