domingo, 31 de enero de 2016
Dear Members:
The UCLA
Center for Buddhist Studies is please to co-sponsor two upcoming events.
Please
check our website for more information.
Best,
CBS Staff
Virgin Mothers and Hell-bent Sons: Daoist Rituals for
Delivering Mothers from Blood Lake Hell
Colloqium talk by Professor Jessey Choo (Rutgers
University) A Center for the Study of Religion event cosponsored by the Center
for Buddhist Studies
Tuesday, February 02, 2016
12:00 PM - 1:30 PM
11348 Young Research Library, Presentation Room
UCLA
Los Angeles, CA 90095
12:00 PM - 1:30 PM
11348 Young Research Library, Presentation Room
UCLA
Los Angeles, CA 90095
In medieval China there appeared a curious and
apparently misogynous belief, namely, that all women were condemned to a
special hell after death because their menses and blood from childbirth
polluted all entities upon contact. Despite their offense being biological and
involuntary, women faced the inescapable punishment of drinking from a pool of
their own bloody discharge for all eternity. It was a cruel fate for all those
born female. Yet surprisingly, the belief enjoyed widespread popularity among
women that transcended religious, socio-economic, and cultural boundaries. This
lecture examines a particular group of Daoist rituals that claimed to be
efficacious in breaking women out of this bloody hell know as the Blood Lake.
Founded on the legends of virgin mothers and their sons, in which these mothers
invariably conceived without having sex and died during or immediately after
childbirth, these rituals were essential to the sons’ success in rescuing their
mothers from this hell. By highlighting the virgin birth and the mother-son
bond, this soteriology completely removed the father from the picture,
therefore undermining the patrilineal principle that was the linchpin of the
“Confucian” social order. Thus assisted by Daoist theologians and ritualists,
women were able to claim an unalienable right to their children and carve out a
space of their own where they were the sole objects of devotion.
Jessey J.C. Choo, received her Ph.D. (2009) from
Princeton University and is now Assistant Professor of Chinese History and
Religion at Rutgers University. Specializing in the cultural history of the
Chinese middle period (200–1000 CE), she studies four interrelated areas: women
and gender, memory and identity, childbirth and death rituals, and entombed
epigraphy. She is currently completing two monographs: “Inscribing Death:
Burials, Texts, and Remembrance in Late Medieval China, 500–1000 CE,” and
“Blood Debts: Childbirth, Filial Piety, and Women’s Salvation in Chinese
Religions, 500–1500 CE.” is a cultural historian specializing in medieval China
(ca. 200–1000 CE).
Cost : Free but RSVP to csr@humnet.ucla.edu
Conspicuous Dharma: Han Chinese Practitioners of
Tibetan Buddhism in the PRC
Lecture by John Osburg, University of Rochester
Wednesday, March 09, 2016
4:00 PM - 5:30 PM
Bunche Hall 10383
4:00 PM - 5:30 PM
Bunche Hall 10383
Public Lecture Series: Transformations and Innovations of Chinese
Cultural Tradition in the Era of New Media
Partially supported by the Education Section of the Chinese Consulate-General in Los Angeles and Dacheng Law Offices.
Partially supported by the Education Section of the Chinese Consulate-General in Los Angeles and Dacheng Law Offices.
In the context of a perceived spiritual and moral
crisis in Chinese society, growing numbers of Han Chinese are turning to
Tibetan Buddhism for ethical guidance. This talk is based on an ethnographic
study of a group of wealthy, urban Han Chinese who have become followers of
Tibetan Buddhism and patrons of reincarnated lamas and charismatic Tibetan
monks. I will examine the sources of the appeal of Tibetan Buddhism for wealthy
Chinese and the range of ways in which they integrate Buddhist principles and
ritual practice into their lives. For some, donations to monks serve as a form
of “spiritual protection money” that will safeguard their businesses and
enhance their careers, while for others Buddhist principles become the basis
for dramatic moral and social transformation.
John Osburg is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the
University of Rochester, USA. His is the author of Anxious Wealth: Money and
Morality Among China’s New Rich (Stanford, 2013). His research interests
include morality, political corruption, gender and sexuality, and spirituality
in contemporary China. His current research examines wealthy Han Chinese who
have become followers and patrons of Tibetan Buddhism.
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