Asian Cultural Traditions

Asian Cultural Traditions
Author: Carolyn Brown Heinz
Publisher: Waveland Press
Total Pages: 529
Release: 2018-05-30
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1478637641

The Second Edition of Asian Cultural Traditions expands our understanding of the bewildering diversity that has existed and continues to exist in the cultures of South Asia, East Asia, and Southeast Asia. In a single volume, the authors pull together some of the major cultural strands by which people in Asian societies have organized their collective life and made their lives meaningful. With new sections on Central Asia, Islam, Korea, and Insular Southeast Asia, this first survey of its kind draws on multiple disciplines to contextualize the interplay of culture, historical events, language, and geography to promote better understanding of a realm often misunderstood by Westerners. The skillful synthesis of a vast amount of information, boxed items featuring popular culture or current events, abundant in-text illustrations, and vivid color plates make Asian Cultural Traditions, 2/E an outstanding introduction to Asian cultures. The Second Edition welcomes the editorial collaboration of Jeremy Murray and is sure to have continued broad classroom appeal.

The Religious Traditions of Asia

The Religious Traditions of Asia
Author: Joseph Kitagawa
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 385
Release: 2013-09-05
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1136875905

This essential student textbook consists of seventeen sections, all written by leading scholars in their different fields. They cover all the religious traditions of Southwest Asia, Southeast Asia, Central Asia, Tibet, and East Asia. The major traditions that are described and discussed are (from the Southwest) Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism, Sikhism and Islam, and (from the East) Taoism, Confucianism and Shinto. In addition, the tradition of Bon in Tibet, the shamanistic religions of Inner Asia, and general Chinese, Korean and Japanese religion are also given full coverage. The emphasis throughout is on clear description and analysis, rather than evaluation. Ten maps are provided to add to the usefulness of this book, which has its origin in the acclaimed Encyclopedia of Religion, edited by Mircea Eliade of the University of Chicago.

Asian Traditions of Meditation

Asian Traditions of Meditation
Author: Halvor Eifring
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Total Pages: 273
Release: 2016-10-31
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 082485568X

Meditation has flourished in different parts of the world ever since the foundations of the great civilizations were laid. It played a vital role in the formation of Asian cultures that trace much of their heritage to ancient India and China. This volume brings together for the first time studies of the major traditions of Asian meditation as well as material on scientific approaches to meditation. It delves deeply into the individual traditions while viewing each of them from a global perspective, examining both historical and generic connections between meditative practices from numerous historical periods and different parts of the Eurasian continent. It seeks to identify the cultural and historical peculiarities of Asian schools of meditation while recognizing basic features of meditative practice across cultures, thereby taking the first step toward a framework for the comparative study of meditation. The book, accessibly written by scholars from several fields, opens with chapters that discuss the definition and classification of meditation. These are followed by contributions on Yoga and Tantra, which are often subsumed under the broad label of Hinduism; Jainism and Sikhism, Indian traditions not usually associated with meditation; Buddhist approaches found in Southeast Asia, Tibet, and China; and the indigenous Chinese traditions, Daoism and Neo-Confucianism. The final chapter explores recent scientific interest in meditation, which, despite its Western orientation, remains almost exclusively concerned with practices of Asian origin. Until a few years ago a major obstacle to the study of specific meditation practices within the traditions explored here was a widespread scholarly orientation that prioritized doctrinal issues and sociocultural contexts over actual practice. The contributors seek to counter this bias and supplement concerns over doctrine and context with the historical study of meditative practice. Asian Traditions of Meditation will appeal broadly to readers interested in meditation, mindfulness, and spirituality and those in the emerging field of contemplative education, as well as students and scholars of Asian and religious studies.

Sources of East Asian Tradition: The modern period

Sources of East Asian Tradition: The modern period
Author: Wm. Theodore De Bary
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 1196
Release: 2008
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780231143233

"Wm. Theodore de Bary offers a selection of essential readings from his immensely popular anthologies Sources of Chinese Tradition, Sources of Korean Tradition, and Sources of Japanese Tradition so readers can experience a concise but no less comprehensive portrait of the social, intellectual, and religious traditions of East Asia."--

Humour in Asian Cultures

Humour in Asian Cultures
Author: Jessica Milner Davis
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2022-06-03
Genre: Humor
ISBN: 9781032009162

Using examples from China, Korea, Japan and Indonesia, the contributors to this book explore the cultural rules for creating and sharing humour in different Asian cultures.

Asian Culture and Psychotherapy

Asian Culture and Psychotherapy
Author: Suk Choo Chang
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Total Pages: 328
Release: 2005-04-30
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 0824873866

This volume brings to light the impact of Asian culture on psychotherapy. Scholars and clinicians from East Asia and India go beyond technical dimensions to examine culture and psychotherapy at the theoretical and philosophical levels. An overview, invaluable for understanding some of the nuances of Asian culture, is followed by chapters on Asian personality and psychopathology, Asian psychology (in particular parent-child relations), the impact of Asian traditional thought and philosophy on psychotherapy, the unique psychotherapeutic approach of Asian culture, and psychotherapeutic experiences from various parts of Asia.

Confucian Traditions in East Asian Modernity

Confucian Traditions in East Asian Modernity
Author: Weiming Tu
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 436
Release: 1996
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780674160873

Seventeen scholars from varying fields here consider the implications of Confucian concerns--self-cultivation, regulation of the family, social civility, moral education, well-being of the people, governance of the state, and universal peace--in industrial East Asia.

Material Culture and Asian Religions

Material Culture and Asian Religions
Author: Benjamin J. Fleming
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2014
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9780203753033

Traditionally, research on the history of Asian religions has been marked by a bias for literary evidence, privileging canonical texts penned in 'classical' languages. Not only has a focus on literary evidence shaped the dominant narratives about the religious histories of Asia, in both scholarship and popular culture, but it has contributed to the tendency to study different religious traditions in relative isolation from one another. Today, moreover, historical work is often based on modern textual editions and, increasingly, on electronic databases. What may be lost, in the process, is the visceral sense of the text as artifact - as a material object that formed part of a broader material culture, in which the boundaries between religious traditions were sometimes more fluid than canonical literature might suggest. This volume brings together specialists in a variety of Asian cultures to discuss the methodological challenges involved in integrating material evidence for the reconstruction of the religious histories of South, Southeast, Central, and East Asia. By means of specific 'test cases,' the volume explores the importance of considering material and literary evidence in concert. What untold stories do these sources help us to recover? How might they push us to reevaluate historical narratives traditionally told from literary sources? By addressing these questions from the perspectives of different subfields and religious traditions, contributors map out the challenges involved in interpreting different types of data, assessing the problems of interpretation distinct to specific types of material evidence (e.g., coins, temple art, manuscripts, donative inscriptions) and considering the issues raised by the different patterns in the preservation of such evidence in different locales. Special attention is paid to newly-discovered and neglected sources; to our evidence for trade, migration, and inter-regional cultural exchange; and to geographical locales that served as "contact zones" connecting cultures. In addition, the chapters in this volume represent the rich range of religious traditions across Asia - including Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Shinto, and Chinese religions, as well as Islam and eastern Christianities.

Asian Power and Politics

Asian Power and Politics
Author: Lucian W. PYE
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 431
Release: 2009-06-30
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0674042417

In a major new book, Lucian Pye reconceptualizes Asian political development as a product of cultural attitudes about power and authority. He contrasts the great traditions of Confucian East Asia with the Southeast Asian cultures and the South Asian traditions of Hinduism and Islam, and explores the national differences within these larger civilizations. Breaking with modern political theory, Pye believes that power differs profoundly from one culture to another. In Asia the masses of the people are group-oriented and respectful of authority, while their leaders are more concerned with dignity and upholding collective pride than with problem-solving. As culture decides the course of political development, Pye shows how Asian societies, confronted with the task of setting up modern nation-states, respond by fashioning paternalistic forms of power that satisfy their deep psychological craving for security. This new paternalism may appear essentially authoritarian to Western eyes, but Pye maintains that it is a valid response to the people's needs and will ensure community solidarity and strong group loyalties. He predicts that we are certain to see emerging from Asia's accelerating transformation some new version of modern society that may avoid many of the forms of tension common to Western civilization but may also produce a whole new set of problems. This book revitalizes Asian political studies on a plane that comprehends the large differences between Asia and the West and at the same time is sensitive to the subtle variations among the many Asian cultures. Its comparative perspective will provide indispensable insights to anyone who wishes to think more deeply about the modern Asian states.