Communities of interpretation in the study of religion in Burma

Journal of Southeast Asian Studies

Volumn 39, Issue 2, 2008, Pages 255-267

  Schober, Juliane ^a  

^a ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

COLONIALISM; CULTURAL TRADITION; DIASPORA; MODERNITY; RELIGION;

ASIA; EURASIA; MYANMAR; SOUTHEAST ASIA;

EID: 43049107569     PISSN: 00224634     EISSN: 14740680     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0022463408000209     Document Type: Article

References (66)

1. Tomoko Masuzawa, The invention of world religions (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005), p. xi.
2. Vincentius Sangermano, A description of the Burmese empire, compiled chiefly from British documents by Father Sangermano, trans. from his manuscript by William Tandy (London: Santiago de Compostela, Susil Gupta, 1966). An English translation of this work was published in 1833, Rome: Oriental Translation Fund of Great Britain and Ireland; reprinted at the Government Press Rangoon, n.d.
3. Ibid., p. 122.
4. In the discussion that follows, I group particular foci and subjects thematically in order to show the epistemological concerns of particular communities of interpretation. As a result, I inflict chronological injury on the publication dates of some authors. For that, I ask the indulgence of authors and audience.
5. See Bernard S. Cohn, Colonialism and its forms of knowledge: The British in India (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996).
6. Philip C. Almond, The British discovery of Buddhism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), p. 24.
7. Ananda Wickremeratne, The genesis of an orientalist: Thomas William Rhys Davids and Buddhism in Sri Lanka (Columbia, MO: South Asia Books, 1985).
8. Charles Hallisey, 'Roads taken and not taken', in Curators of the Buddha: The study of Buddhism under colonialism, ed. Donald S. Lopez, Jr (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995), p. 34.
9. Paul Ambrose Bigandet took many editorial liberties with his rendition of the Burmese text that informed his The life or legend of Gaudama, the Buddha of the Burmese, vols. 1 and 2, (Trübner's Oriental Series, 1880). The tradition of recounting older texts as part of a new rendition was also an established practice for redactors of Burmese versions that relied on Pali sources.
10. Charles Duroiselle published A practical grammar of Pali in 1906.
11. Taw Sein Ko was Charles Duroiselle's successor as director of the Archaeological Survey. See also Penny Edward's 'Relocating the interlocutor: Taw Sein Ko (1864-1930) and the itinerancy of knowledge in British Burma'. South East Asia Research 12, 3 (2004): 277-335.
12. Shwe Zan Aung (1871-1932) was born in Sittwe, Arakan, and received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Rangoon College in 1891. His translation into English of the Abhidhamma, the basket of philosophy of the Theravada canon (Tipitika), was published by the Pali Text Society as Shwe Zan Aung, The compendium of philosophy (London: For the Pali Text Society by H. Frowd, 1910).
13. Although he worked as a civil servant, Shwe Zan Aung was also a scholar of linguistics, philology, history and literature whose prolific writing engaged a broad range of subjects. Shortly before his death, he received an honorary doctorate from Rangoon University. For further biographical details, see The Irrawaddy, 9, 1 (2001).
14. For a discussion of his orientalist stance on the study of Burma, see Julie Pham, 'Ghost hunting in colonial Burma: Nostalgia, paternalism and the thoughts of J. S. Furnivall', South East Asia Research, 12, 2 (2004): 237-68.
15. Melford E. Spiro, Buddhism and society (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982).
16. Manning Nash, The golden road to modernity (New York: Wiley, 1965).
17. See Richard Carnac Temple, The thirty-seven nats: A phase of spirit workship prevailing in Burma (London: W. Griggs, 1906).
18. Melford Spiro, Burmese supernaturalism (New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 1996);
19. June C. Nash, Living with nats: An analysis of animism in Burman village social relations (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1960)
20. and Sarah Bekker's unpublished paper on Burmese traditional views of the supernatural (Association for Asian Studies, 1982).
21. See Les rituels de possession en Birmanie by Bénédicte Brac de La Perrière (Paris: Editions Recherche sur les civilisations, 1989) and her 'The Taungbyone festival' in Burma at the turn of the twenty-first century, ed. Monique Skidmore (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2005), pp. 65-89;
22. and Juliane Schober, 'Burmese spirit lords and their mediums', in Shamanism: An encyclopedia of world beliefs, practice and culture, ed. Mariko Namba Walter and Eva Jane Neumann Fridman (Santa Barbara: ABCCLIO, 2004): 803-6.
23. See Donald E. Smith, Religion and politics in Burma (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1965);
24. Michael E. Mendelson, Sangha and state in Burma, A study of monastic sectarianism and leadership (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1975);
25. John P. Ferguson, 'The symbolic dimensions of the Burmese Sangha' (Ph.D. diss., Cornell University, 1975):
26. and E. Sarkisyanz, Buddhist backgrounds of the Burmese revolution (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1965);
27. and Michael Aung-Thwin, Pagan: The origins of modern Burma (Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 1985).
28. Seminal works in the study of Theravada Buddhism include the following: Stanley J. Tambiah, World conqueror, world renouncer (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975);
29. and his Buddhist saints of the forest and the cult of amulets (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984);
30. as well as Frank Reynolds and Mani Reynolds, Three worlds according to King Ruan (Berkeley: Asian Humanities Press, 1982).
31. F. K. Lehman (Chit Hlaing), 'Doctrine, practice and belief in Theravada Buddhism' in Journal of Asian Studies, 31 (1972): 373-80; 'On the vocabulary and semantics of "field" in Theravada Buddhist Society' in Essays on Burma, ed. John P. Ferguson (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1981) and 'Burmese religion' in The encyclopedia of religion, ed. Mircea Eliade (New York: Macmillan, 1987).
32. See Juliane Schober, 'Venerating the Buddha's remains in Burma: From solitary practice to the cultural hegemony of communities', Journal of Burma Studies, 6 (2001): 111-39;
33. and 'In the presence of the Buddha: Ritual veneration of the Burmese Mahamuni image', in Sacred biography in the Buddhist traditions of South and Southeast Asia (Hawaii University Press, 1997): 259-88.
34. Hiroko Kawanami, 'Patterns of renunciation: The changing world of Burmese nuns' in Women's Buddhism, Buddhism's women (Somerville, MA: Wisdom, 2000), pp. 159-71.
35. For an elaboration of this argument, see Stephen Collins, 'On the very idea of the Pali canon', Journal of the Pali Text Society, 15 (1990): 89-126.
36. Royal orders of Burma, A. D. 1598-1885, ed. Than Tun, 9 vols. (Kyoto: Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Kyoto University, 1989).
37. Patrick A. Pranke, 'Treatise on the lineage of elders (Vamsadipani : Monastic reform and the writing of Buddhist history in eighteenth-century Burma' (Ph.D. diss., University of Michigan, 2004).
38. See Jacque Leider's essay in the Journal of Burma Studies, 9 (2004): 82-129.
39. Michael Charney, Powerful learning: Buddhist literati and the throne in Burma's last dynasty, 1752-1885 (Ann Arbor: Center for South and Southeast Asian Studies, University of Michigan, 2006).
40. Ingrid Jordt, Burma's mass lay meditation movement (Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 2007).
41. See Jason A. Carbine, 'An ethic of continuity: Shwegyin monks and the Sasana in contemporary Burma/Myanmar' (Ph.D. diss., University of Chicago, Illinois, 2004) and Carbine's essay, 'When the thread does not snap: Lineage, continuity and tradition from a Shewgyin perspective', in Traditions of knowledge in Southeast Asia (Yangon: Myanmar Historical Commission, 2004): 267-89.
42. Thant Myint-U, The making of modern Burma (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001).
43. First printed in Burmese in 1915, this translation by L. E. Bagshawe is from the version edited with a biographical preface by Maung Htin (U Htin Fatt) and published by the Sape U Publishing House in 1979. Online Burma/Myanmar Library, 5 Sept. 2004, http://www.ibiblio.org/obl/docs/ The_Rajadhammasangaha-print.pdf (last accessed on 6 Dec. 2007).
44. See Juliane Schober, 'The Theravada Buddhist engagement with modernity in Burma' in Buddhism in world cultures: Contemporary perspectives ed. Steven Berkwitz (ABC-Clio, 2006), pp. 73-100;
45. 'Colonial knowledge and Buddhist education in Burma' in Buddhism, power, and political order in Theravada Buddhist Asia, ed. Ian Harris (RoutledgeCurzon Critical Studies in Buddhism, 2007) pp. 52-70 and an unpublished paper entitled 'The dawn of nationalism: Transnationalism and colonial rule in the rise of the Young Men's Buddhist Association in Burma, 1906-1920' (American Academy of Religion, 2005). These concerns are also taken up in Juliane Schober's forthcoming book, 'Modern Buddhist conjunctures in Myanmar' (University of Hawai'i Press).
46. Chie Ikeya, 'Gender, history and modernity: Representing women in 20th century colonial Burma' (Ph.D. diss., Cornell University, New York, 2006).
47. Erik Braun, 'The birth of modern Buddhism: Ledi Sayadaw and the origins of insight meditation' (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 2008)
48. and Alicia Turner, 'Buddhism, colonialism and the boundaries of religion: Theravada Buddhism in Burma 1885-1920' (Ph.D. diss., University of Chicago, 2008).
49. Maitrii Aung-Thwin, 'Genealogy of a rebellion narrative: Law, ethnology, and culture in colonial Burma', Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 34, 3 (2003): 393-419.
50. Elizabeth Moore, 'Text and new contexts: Shwedagon and Kyaikhtiyoe today' in Traditions of knowledge in Southeast Asia (Yangon: Myanmar Historical Commission, 2004).
51. State ritual and the location of sacred icons in Burmese public space are also discussed by Juliane Schober in 'Buddhist just rule and Burmese national culture: State patronage of the Chinese tooth relic in Myanmar', History of Religions, 36, 3 (1997): 218-43.
52. See also Janette Philip and David Mercer in 'Politicised pagodas and veited resistance: Contested urban space in Burma, Urban Studies, 39, 9 (2002): 1587-610.
53. The Venerable Khammai Dhammasami, 'Idealism and pragmatics: A dilemma in the current monastic education system of Burma and Thailand' (Ph.D. diss., Oxford University, 2004).
54. See Gustaaf Houtman, Mental culture in Burmese crisis politics: Aung San Suu Kyi and the National League for Democracy (Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, Monograph Series no. 33, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, Institute for the Study of Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, 1999) and his doctoral dissertation on U Ba Khm. Gustaaf Houtman, 'Traditions of Buddhist practice in Burma' (Ph.D. diss., School of Oriental and African Studies, London, 1990).
55. Ingrid Jordt, Burma's mass lay meditation movement (Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 2007).
56. Sai Klima Maung, 'Changing Buddhist practice in Burma' (Honours thesis, Australian National University, Canberra, 2004).
57. See Aung San Sun Kyi, Letters from Burma (London: Penguin Books, 1997)
58. Houtman, Mental culture in Burmese crisis politics and Juliane Schober. 'Buddhist vision of moral authority and modernity in Burma', in Burma at the turn of the twenty-first century, ed. Monique Skidmore (Hawaii: University of Hawaii Press, 2005), pp. 113-33.
59. The Irrawaddy, 11 (Mar. 2003).
60. Guillaume Rosenberg, Renouncement et puissance. La quéte de la sainteté dans la Birmanie contemporaine (Geneva: Editions Olizane, 2005).
61. Contribution to the ethnography of the Arakanese, a population of contemporary Burma.
62. Thomas A. Borchert, 'Educating monks: Buddhism, politics and freedom ot religion on China's southwest border' (Universitv of Chicago, 2006).
63. Ba Shin, Coming of Islam to Burma down to 1700 A.D. (New Delhi: Azad Bhavan, 1961).
64. See Jean Berlie's presentation on 'Past and present of Rakine Muslims', International Burma Studies Conference, Northern Illinois University, 2004.
65. See Joseph Cheah, 'Cultural identity and Burmese American Buddhists', Peace Review, 14, 4 (20021): 415-19
66. Tamara Cynthia Ho, 'Through a Burmese looking-glass: Transgression, displacement, and transnational women's identities' (Ph.D. diss., University of California at Los Angeles, 2005).