Table of Contents
- NEW BOOK>
Word Embodied: The Jeweled Pagoda Mandalas in Japanese Buddhist Art
- QUERY> Seeking
information about a publisher of Tibetan books in China
- JOBS> H-Net
Job Guide Weekly Report For H-Buddhism: 9 July - 16 July
- NEW BOOK>
The Buddha's Wizards: Magic, Protection, and Healing in Burmese Buddhism,
by Thomas Nathan Patton
NEW
BOOK> Word Embodied: The Jeweled Pagoda Mandalas in Japanese Buddhist Art
by Halle O'Neal
Dear colleagues,
With
apologies for cross-listing, I would like to announce the publication of
my new book Word Embodied: The
Jeweled Pagoda Mandalas in Japanese Buddhist Art (Harvard East
Asian Monographs 412) with Harvard University Press. Network subscribers might
find the investigations into Japanese relics, reliquaries, and artistic sutra
transcription practices of interest. Further description of the project can be
found below.
All
the best,
Halle
O'Neal
History
of Art
University
of Edinburgh
Word Embodied
In this study of the Japanese jeweled pagoda mandalas,
Halle O’Neal reveals the entangled realms of sacred body, beauty, and
salvation. Much of the previous scholarship on these paintings concentrates on
formal analysis and iconographic study of their narrative vignettes. This has
marginalized the intriguing interplay of text and image at their heart,
precluding a holistic understanding of the mandalas and diluting their full
import in Buddhist visual culture. Word Embodied offers an
alternative methodology, developing interdisciplinary insights into the social,
religious, and artistic implications of this provocative entwining of word and
image.O’Neal unpacks the paintings’ revolutionary use of text as picture to show how this visual conflation mirrors important conceptual indivisibilities in medieval Japan. The textual pagoda projects the complex constellation of relics, reliquaries, scripture, and body in religious doctrine, practice, and art. Word Embodied also expands our thinking about the demands of viewing, recasting the audience as active producers of meaning and offering a novel perspective on disciplinary discussions of word and image that often presuppose an ontological divide between them. This examination of the jeweled pagoda mandalas, therefore, recovers crucial dynamics underlying Japanese Buddhist art, including invisibility, performative viewing, and the spectacular visualizations of embodiment.
For ordering for yourself or your library from Harvard University Press, please see:
http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674983861
And from Amazon see:
QUERY>
Seeking information about a publisher of Tibetan books in China
by Constance Kassor
Dear Colleagues,
I have an edition of the collected works of
Gorampa Sonam Senge, and I’m trying to track down information about when it was
published. There’s no publication information in any of the texts
themselves; the only identifying information seems to be on the box that the
collection was shipped in.
The publication information on the outside of
the box is in Tibetan and Chinese (images of the box are here and
here).
The Tibetan reads as follows:
dpal sa skya'i rig mdzod/ mtsho sngon nang
bstan sa skya zhib 'jug khang nas bsgrigs/
'gro mgon chos 'phags thebs rtsa tshogs pas
par bsgrun mthun rkyen sbyar/
I’ve spoken with a handful of Sakyapa
khenpos, and they don’t know anything about the publisher. I’m at the Library
of Congress right now and I’ve asked the Tibetan and Chinese specialists for
help, but so far they’ve come up empty-handed too.
The texts appear to be based on the Derge
printings of Gorampa’s writings, but they’ve been typeset by a computer. They
don’t match anything I’ve been able to find at the Library of Congress or in
TBRC’s database.
I would be grateful to know if any of
you have information about the publisher or the foundation who appears to have
sponsored this publication.
Thank you,
Constance Kassor
Assistant Professor of Religious Studies
Lawrence University
JOBS> H-Net
Job Guide Weekly Report For H-Buddhism: 9 July - 16 July
by Charles DiSimone
The following jobs were posted to the H-Net Job Guide from9 July 2018 to 16 July 2018. These job postings are included here based on the categories selected by the list editors for H-Buddhism. See the H-Net Job Guide website at
http://www.h-net.org/jobs/ for more information. To contact the Job Guide,
write to jobguide@mail.h-net.msu.edu, or call +1-517-432-5134 between 9 am and 5 pm US Eastern time.
DIGITAL HUMANITIES
The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama - Digital Humanities
Postdoctoral Research Assistant
http://www.h-net.org/jobs/job_display.php?id=56945
RELIGIOUS STUDIES AND THEOLOGY
Occidental College - Assistant Professor in American Religions
http://www.h-net.org/jobs/job_display.php?id=56943
NONE
Pittsburgh Theological Seminary - Associate Dean of Academic Programs
and Assessment
http://www.h-net.org/jobs/job_display.php?id=56954
NEW
BOOK> The Buddha's Wizards: Magic, Protection, and Healing in Burmese
Buddhism, by Thomas Nathan Patton
by A. Charles Muller
The Buddha's Wizards: Magic, Protection, and Healing in Burmese Buddhism, by
Thomas Nathan PattonColumbia University Press
ISBN: 9780231187602
224 Pages
Hardcover List Price: $60.00£47.00
Pub Date: October 2018
https://cup.columbia.edu/book/the-buddhas-wizards/9780231187602
Wizards with magical powers to heal the sick, possess the bodies of their followers, and defend their tradition against outside threats are far from the typical picture of Buddhism. Yet belief in wizard-saints who protect their devotees and intervene in the world is widespread among Burmese Buddhists. The Buddha’s Wizards is a historically informed, ethnographic study that explores the supernatural landscape of Buddhism in Myanmar to explain the persistence of wizardry as a form of lived religion in the modern era.
Thomas Nathan Patton explains the world of wizards, spells, and supernatural powers in terms of both the broader social, political, and religious context and the intimate roles that wizards play in people’s everyday lives. He draws on affect theory, material and visual culture, long-term participant observation, and the testimonies of the devout to show how devotees perceive the protective power of wizard-saints. Patton considers beliefs and practices associated with wizards to be forms of defending Buddhist traditions from colonial and state power and as culturally sanctioned responses to restrictive gender roles. The book also offers a new lens on the political struggles and social transformations that have taken place in Myanmar in recent years. Featuring close attention to the voices of individual wizard devotees and the wizards themselves, The Buddha’s Wizards provides a striking new look at a little-known aspect of Buddhist belief that helps expand our ways of thinking about the daily experience of lived religious practices.
Table of Contents
Introduction
1. Vanguards of the Sāsana
2. The Buddha’s Chief Wizard
3. Women of the Wizard King
4. Pagodas of Power
5. Wizards in the Shadows
Conclusion
Notes
References
Index
Thomas Nathan Patton is assistant professor of Buddhist and Southeast Asian studies at the City University of Hong Kong.
