Multiple Liminalities of Lay Buddhism in Contemporary China: Modalities, Material Culture, and Politics

Author:   Kai Shmushko
Publisher:   Leiden University Press
ISBN:  

9789087284565


Pages:   360
Publication Date:   12 November 2024
Format:   Hardback
Availability:   Not yet available   Availability explained
This item is yet to be released. You can pre-order this item and we will dispatch it to you upon its release.

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Multiple Liminalities of Lay Buddhism in Contemporary China: Modalities, Material Culture, and Politics


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Overview

In the past decades, various forms of Buddhism have emerged in-between, above, and beyond conventional conceptions of religious and spiritual life in China. This book is a qualitative study exploring manifestations of the massive revival of Buddhism among non-monastic people and communities. The book wishes to answer the central question: How do Chinese groups and individuals practice Buddhism under the socio-political and cultural circumstances of contemporary China? This inquiry is based on a sample of case studies from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China (Taiwan, ROC), exploring Buddhist communities, individual practitioners, materials, spaces, practice modalities and relationships. Each chapter examines a significant paradigm that plays a role in the revival of Buddhism in China, highlighting how lay practitioners negotiate their spaces, resources, moral and ethical beliefs, and values, in the face of rapid societal changes. The research reveals how state policies, economic shifts, local trends, and global developments, such as environmental concerns and technological advances impact and transform older Buddhist traditions. Overall, the author argues for the concept of multiple liminalities as a framework to describe the contemporary predicament of lay Buddhism in Chinese societies. Accordingly, lay Buddhist actors occupy liminal positions or operate across ambiguous boundaries where realms of in-betweenness, serve as avenues for religious responses to the complex challenges Buddhism in China faces.

Full Product Details

Author:   Kai Shmushko
Publisher:   Leiden University Press
Imprint:   Leiden University Press
ISBN:  

9789087284565


ISBN 10:   908728456
Pages:   360
Publication Date:   12 November 2024
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Forthcoming
Availability:   Not yet available   Availability explained
This item is yet to be released. You can pre-order this item and we will dispatch it to you upon its release.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents; List of Figures; List of Abbreviations; Introduction; Chapter One: The Roots – Buddhism in Modern China; Chapter Two: The Tibetan Buddhist Fever and the Living Hall Model; Chapter Three: The COVID-19 Pandemic – Resilience and Adaptation; Chapter Four: The Rise of a New Urban China – Shenzhen and Hongfa Temple; Chapter Five: The Rise of Urban China – Zooming into an Urban Village in Shenzhen; Chapter Six: Cyberspace and Technology – Micro-Practices of Belonging; Chapter Seven: Between Science and Supernatural Power – Tea and Buddhist Communities in Taiwan; Conclusion – Multiple Liminalities; Bibliography; Index

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Author Information

Kai Shmushko is a Post-doctoral Researcher and Lecturer at the Sociology Department at the University of Amsterdam. Her academic grounding is China Studies, Religious studies, and Cultural Sociology with a strong orientation towards ethnographic and mixed methods research, including digital ethnography. Her research stands in the nexus of several primary interests: religion and spirituality among Chinese societies and diasporic Chinese communities; heritage and material culture of Chinese religions; Chinese religious and cultural production in new media and religion and politics of the Chinese sphere. She furthermore held research periods and received research grants from Renmin University, Fudan University and Taiwan Chengchi University, and before her current position she worked as a lecturer at Leiden University.

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