NEW PUBLICATIONS IN 2009
Billioud, Sébastien & Joël Thoraval. "Lijiao: The Return of Ceremonies Honouring Confucius in Mainland China." China Perspectives 2009/4: 82-100.
Boltz, Judith. "On the Legacy of Zigu and a Manual of Spirit-writing in Her Name." In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour of Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 349-388.
Brereton, Brian Cosper. “From Flesh to Fantasy: Contemporary Conceptions of the Chinese Afterlife in Spirit-travelogues and Mythological Theme Parks.” Ph.D. dissertation, Cornell University, 2009.
Abstract: My dissertation analyzes the influence of conceptions and representations of the religious afterlife on individual and collective action in contemporary Taiwan. The critical study of representations of the Chinese afterlife has occurred almost exclusively in their anthropological locus classicus : the ancestral tablet, funerary ritual, and the underworld (Ahern 1973; Wolf 1974; Cohen 1988). My research, which builds on these foundtional inquiries, focuses on two alternative and fecund fields of otherworldly (re)production and representation: recent textual depictions of the afterlife and mythological theme parks. In this study, I will address both textual sources and ethnographic data to launch an inquiry into three key research questions concerning conceptions of the afterlife in Taiwan today: namely, (1) the struggle between individual desire and collective concerns, (2) the applicability and adaptability of traditional models of the religious afterlife, and (3) the processes by which representations of the afterlife illuminate and influence contemporary social systems. My analytical framework - inspired by practice theory, psychoanalytic thought, and psychological anthropology - illuminates an otherwise overlooked integrity in conventional Chinese conceptions of the afterlife and reveals the emotional correlates of their continuities and changes in current Taiwanese society.
Brook, Timothy. "The Politics of Religion: Late Imperial Origins of the Regulatory State.“ In: Ashiwa, Yoshiko & David L. Wank [eds.], Making Religion, Making the State: The Politics of Religion in Modern China. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2009. Pp. 22-42.
Bujard, Marianne. “State and Local Cults in Han Religion.” In: John Lagerwey and Marc Kalinowski [eds.], Early Chinese Religion: Part One: Shang through Han (1250 BC-220 AD). Leiden: Brill, 2009. Pp.777-811.
Bujard, Marianne. “Cultes d’État et cultes locaux dans la religion des Han.” In: John Lagerwey [ed.], Religion et société en Chine ancienne et médiévale. Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf/Institut Ricci, 2009. Pp. 305-337.
Chan, Kwok-shin. “Temple Festivals, Social Networks, and Communal Relationships: The Development of a Local Cult in Macau.” In China Networks, edited by Jens Damm and Mechthild Leutner, 118–126. Berlin: Lit, 2009. (Berliner China-Hefte/ Chinese History and Society, vol. 35)
Chang, Wen-Chun. "Religious Attendance and Subjective Well-being in an Eastern-Culture Country: Empirical Evidence from Taiwan." Marburg Journal of Religion 14.1 (2009): online.
Abstract: This paper investigates the relationship between religious attendance and subjective well-being in an Eastern-culture country. The findings of this study indicate that religious attendance has positive relationships with happiness as well as domain satisfactions with interpersonal relationship, health, and marital life, but it is not significantly related to the satisfaction with personal financial status. Interestingly, for believers of Eastern religions, those who have a higher level of relative income tend to have higher levels of satisfaction with financial status and health status, but are less satisfied with being free of worry and interpersonal relationship. Moreover, for the adherents of Eastern religions, those who have a higher educational attainment appear to report lower levels of overall happiness and the satisfaction with being free of worry. It appears that the differences in the religious practices and organizational settings between Eastern religions and Western Christianity lead to different patterns of the relationships between religious attendance and various measures of subjective well-being.
Chao, Shin-yi. "The Precious Volume of Bodhisattva Zhenwu Attaining the Way: A Case Study of the Worship of Zhenwu (Perfected Warrior) in Ming-Qing Sectarian Groups." In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour of Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 63-81.
Chau, Adam Yuet. “Expanding the Space of Popular Religion: Local Temple Activism and the Politics of Legitimation in Contemporary Rural China.” In: Ashiwa, Yoshiko & David L. Wank [eds.], Making Religion, Making the State: The Politics of Religion in Modern China. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2009. Pp. 211-240.
Chi, Chang-hui. “The Death of a Virgin: the Cult of Wang Yulan and Nationalism in Jinmen, Taiwan.” Anthropological Quarterly 82.3 (2009): 669-690.
Abstract: This article explores the impact of the global Cold War on local politics through the study of a state deified female ghost Wang Yulan in Jinmen, Taiwan. The liminal status of ghosts in the Chinese celestial order makes room for possible multiple meanings of state-local contestation. Civilians’ interpretations of the cult engaged with the official discourse to generate what Bakhtin called “dialogized heteroglossia,” revealing the limits of state control over interpretation and ambiguous relations between the state and local society under martial law.
Chia, Jack Meng-Tat. “Sacred Ties across the Seas: The Cult of Guangze Zunwang and its Religious Network in the Chinese Diaspora, 19th Century—2009.” M.A. Dissertation, Department of History, National University of Singapore, 2009. Website: https://scholarbank.nus.edu.sg/bitstream/handle/10635/16305/ChiaMT.pdf?sequence=1
Abstract: Large scale Chinese emigration began in the mid-nineteenth century and lasted through the first half of twentieth century. The migration of the Nan'an people contributed to the religious spread of Guangze Zunwang's cult from Southeast China to Southeast Asia in general, and Singapore and Malaysia in particular. The arrival and settlement of the Nan'an migrants prompted the establishment of Guangze Zunwang temples in the two host countries. This study examines the cult of Guangze Zunwang and its religious network connecting Southeast China and the Chinese communities in Singapore and Malaysia from the early nineteenth century to 2009. It argues that the diasporic religious network of the Guangze Zunwang's cult has a significant role in the trans-regional movement of resources between China and the Chinese overseas. As this research will illustrate, temples were important institutions for the Chinese diaspora, in which they served as important nodes in this diasporic network.
Chia, Jack Meng-Tat. "Managing The Tortoise Island: Tua Pek Kong Temple, Pilgrimage, and Social Change in Pulau Kusu, 1965-2007.” New Zealand Journal of Asian Studies 11, 2 (December 2009): 72-95.
Abstract: This article examines the Tua Pek Kong Temple and religious activities in Pulau Kusu as they intersect with the larger forces of social change, state management, and development of the Southern Islands since the independence of Singapore, from 1965 to the present. It argues that the state’s interest in the economic potential of the Tua Pek Kong Temple, and the attempt to seek profit from its religious activities, particularly over the last two decades, has very much affected the temple and contributed to the commercialization and “touristization” of the island. State authorities in mainland Singapore have tried to exert more control over the temple through the management of the island. Profit was made from the island’s religious activities through the authorities’ monopoly of goods and services, promotion of commercial activities, and their attempt to transform the island into a tourist site.
Chipman, Elana. "The De-territorialization of Ritual Spheres in Contemporary Taiwan." Asian Anthropology 8 (2009): 31-64.
Abstract: This article considers the transformations over time of ritual networks centered on the town of Beigang, Taiwan in dialogue with earlier treatments of ritual and social organization. The case of this pilgrimage center supports observations on contemporary Taiwanese ritual and belief spheres, but it also complicates the understanding that contemporary trans-local political and economic processes have strengthened pan-island belief spheres at the expense of local communal ritual organization. Ritual networks in contemporary Taiwan are increasingly de-territorialized, but in Beigang they remain linked to locality, even as worshippers and natives become de-territorialized as individuals in their relationship to Beigang Mazu. Thus, I argue, if a trans-local cult is strong enough, the deity’s perceived powers serves to bolster the local ritual community, as well as to bring outsiders into the fold and keep sojourners linked to it.
Chou, Hansen. “Politics of the Periphery: Religion and Its Place at a City’s Edge in Taiwan.” MA thesis, University of British Columbia, 2009.
Abstract: This thesis explores the recent revival of popular religion in Taiwan through broader anthropological concerns regarding place and space. Swift industrialization and rapid urbanization of past decades have not dissuaded religious practice; instead they have flourished on the island. This study pays specific attention to their proliferation at the urban margins. Drawing on historical and ethnographic data based on field research conducted in 2007, the present work examines the spatial politics of place at a community on the urban periphery, just outside of Taipei in northern Taiwan. More specifically, it analyzes two key sites within the community that locals often evoke as crucial locations in their cultural and social imaginings of place: a cultural heritage district and the local communal temple. It documents various “spatial practices” (de Certeau 1984) of place, and focuses particularly on the divination ritual at the temple. This work draws upon some of the ideas advanced by Henri Lefebvre (1991) in his theorization of urbanization, particularly his notion of “abstract space”: the expanding spaces of homogeneity created in the wake of global capitalism’s spread. By addressing the everyday experiences of space, this thesis addresses the dynamics between histories, affect and place. In all, it argues that, amidst the uncertainties of change brought on by their modern(izing) surroundings, people resort to rituals like divination in hopes to mitigate their maladies and misfortunes. By turning to the past in their attempts to make sense of the present, they further engage in a form of local production.
Clart, Philip. "The Eight Immortals between Daoism and Popular Religion: Evidence from a New Sprit-Written Scripture." In: Florian C. Reiter [ed.], Foundations of Daoist Ritual: A Berlin Symposium. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2009. Pp.84-106.
Clart, Philip. “Merit beyond Measure: Notes on the Moral (and Real) Economy of Religious Publishing in Taiwan.” In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour in Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 127-142.
Cook, Constance A. “Ancestor Worship during the Eastern Zhou.” In: John Lagerwey and Marc Kalinowski [eds.], Early Chinese Religion: Part One: Shang through Han (1250 BC-220 AD). Leiden: Brill, 2009. Pp.237-279.
Dean, Kenneth. “Further Partings of the Way: The Chinese State and Daoist Ritual Traditions in Contemporary China.” In: Ashiwa, Yoshiko & David L. Wank [eds.], Making Religion, Making the State: The Politics of Religion in Modern China. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2009. Pp. 179-210.
Dean, Kenneth. "The Growth of Local Control over Cultural and Environmental Resources in Ming and Qing Coastal Fujian." In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour in Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 219-247.
Dean, Kenneth. “The Role of Temple Networks in the Construction of the Minnan Coastal ‘Empire:’ Transnational Spaces of the Overseas Xinghua Chinese.” In Chen Yiyuan [ed.]. 2009 Minnan wenhua guoji xueshu yantaohui lunwenji. Tainan: Guoli Chenggong Daxue Zhongwenxi / Jinmenxian Wenhuaju, 2009. Pp. 759-787.
DeBernardi, Jean. "'Ascend to Heaven and Stand on a Cloud:' Daoist Teaching and Practice at Penang's Taishang Laojun Temple." In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour in Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 143-186.
DeBernardi, Jean. " Wudang Mountain and Mount Zion in Taiwan: Syncretic Processes in Space, Ritual Performance, and Imagination." Asian Journal of Social Science 37.1 (2009): 138-162.
Abstract: In this paper, I develop a detailed consideration of ways in which Chinese religious practitioners, including Daoists, Christians, and spirit mediums, deploy syncretism in complex fields of practice. Rather than focusing on doctrinal blending, this study emphasises the ways in which these practitioners combine elements from diverse religious traditions through the media of ritual performance, visual representation, story, and landscape. After considering the diverse ways in which syncretic processes may be deployed in a field of practice, the paper investigates three ethnographic cases, exploring ritual co-celebration at Wudang Mountain in South-central China, charismatic Christian practices in Singapore, and the recent development of Holy Mount Zion as a Christian pilgrimage site in Taiwan.
Dell’Orto, Alessandro. “Luoghi, poteri e rappresentazioni: Visioni del mondo e religione popolare in Taiwan tra antropologia e storia.” In Quinto Simposio Internazionale di Sinologia dell’Università Fu Jen: “L’incontro fra l’Italia e la Cina: il contributo italiano alla sinologia” (with Chinese translation), edited by Antonella Tulli & Zbigniew Wesolowski, 567-618. Xinzhuang: Fu Da chubanshe, 2009.
Dobbelaere, Karel. “China Challenges Secularization Theory.” Social Compass 56 (2009): 362-370.
Abstract: The author proposes a reflection on challenges that the three anthropological articles in this issue present for secularization theory. The first two discuss “performances” of religion in two different Chinese cultural periods: welfare services offered by recognized religious associations in the People’s Republic of China and the judicial rituals in colonial settings. The author suggests similarities with such “performances” in western culture. The second part of the article discusses some issues raised by Szonyi in his comparison of recent social research literature on Chinese religion and sociological literature on secularization: a critique of the concept of “modernity” in relation to secularization; a reflection on the possibility of establishing a secularization theory with universal validity; how to integrate rational choice theory and secularization theory; the validity of secularization in view of individual religious sensitivity; and secularization as an ideology and a discussion of the so-called “privatization of religion” in secularized settings. (Source: journal)
Epstein, Maram. “Writing Emotions: Ritual Innovation as Emotional Expression.” Nan nü 11.2 (2009): 155-196.
Abstract: This article examines the chronological biographies of the Qing ritualists Yan Yuan (1635-1704) and Li Gong (1659-1733) to witness how they negotiated and wrote about the ritual and emotional priorities in their relationships with various family members. It argues that rather than being just a form of ritual duty, filial piety was a core emotion at the center of many people's affective and spiritual lives. Although the conservative nature of nianpu (chronological biography) as a genre meant that some of the most intimate relationships in these two men's lives would get passed over in silence, the recording of their manipulation of ritual forms allowed them an indirect means of expressing their affective bonds.
Espesset, Grégoire. “Latter Han Religious Mass Movements and the Early Daoist Church.” In: John Lagerwey and Marc Kalinowski [eds.], Early Chinese Religion: Part One: Shang through Han (1250 BC-220 AD). Leiden: Brill, 2009. Pp.1061-1102.
Formoso, Bernard. "Ethnicity and Shared Meanings: A Case Study of the 'Orphaned Bones' Ritual in Mainland China and Overseas." American Anthropologist 111.4 (2009): 492–503.
Abstract: Several theories of ethnicity emphasize the analysis of intergroup relations. They neglect, however, the conflation of ideas and values structuring these relations—notably the cross-cultural aggregates of shared cultural meanings that underlie forms of cooperation and competition between interacting groups. In this article, I explore this kind of process through a multisite ethnography of the Xiu gugu (“refining of orphaned bones”), a ritual that the Chaozhou people of northeast Guangdong province, an ethnic subgroup of the Han, perform periodically. The celebration of this rite in Chaozhou is compared to versions resulting of the ritual in Malay Muslim and Thai Buddhist contexts. In the latter case, close conceptions of malevolent death underlie a fascinating interethnic cooperation, with most of the unfortunate dead whose bones are “refined” during the Chaozhou ritual being Thai.
Goh, Daniel P.S. "Chinese Religion and the Challenge of Modernity in Malaysia and Singapore: Syncretism, Hybridisation and Transfiguration." Asian Journal of Social Science 37.1 (2009): 138-162.
Abstract: The past fifty years have seen continuing anthropological interest in the changes in religious beliefs and practices among the Chinese in Malaysia and Singapore under conditions of rapid modernisation. Anthropologists have used the syncretic model to explain these changes, arguing that practitioners of Chinese "folk" religion have adapted to urbanisation, capitalist growth, nation-state formation, and literacy to preserve their spiritualist worldview, but the religion has also experienced "rationalisation" in response to the challenge of modernity. This article proposes an alternative approach that questions the dichotomous imagination of spiritualist Chinese religion and rationalist modernity assumed by the syncretic model. Using ethnographic, archival and secondary materials, I discuss two processes of change — the transfiguration of forms brought about by mediation in new cultural flows, and the hybridisation of meanings brought about by contact between different cultural systems — in the cases of the Confucianist reform movement, spirit mediumship, Dejiao associations, state-sponsored Chingay parades, reform Taoism, and Charismatic Christianity. These represent both changes internal to Chinese religion and those that extend beyond to reanimate modernity in Malaysia and Singapore. I argue that existential anxiety connects both processes as the consequence of hybridisation and the driving force for transfiguration.
Goossaert, Vincent & Ling Fang. “Temples and Daoists in Urban China since 1980.” China Perspectives 2009/4: 32-41.
Abstract: Since 1980, the revival of Daoist temples in China’s urban environment has been developing in two different directions. On the one hand, “official” temples operated by the Daoist Association claim to embody a modern form of Daoism and offer a number of different religious services to the people. On the other hand, community temples refashion the religious life of neighbourhoods, often on the outskirt of cities. This article explores the complex relationships between these different kinds of temples, the lay groups who visit them, and the Daoist clergy who serve them.
Goossaert, Vincent. "The Destruction of Immoral Temples in Qing China." ICS Visiting Professor Lectures Series, 2, Hong Kong, Chinese University Press, 2009 (Journal of Chinese Studies Special Issue), pp. 131- 153.
Haar, Barend J. ter. "The Dragon Flower Teachings and the Practice of Ritual." Minsu quyi (Journal of Chinese Ritual, Theatre and Folklore) 163 (2009): 117-159.
Hall, Christopher A. “Tudi Gong in Taiwan.” Southeast Review of Asian Studies 31 (2009): 97-112.
Abstract: Studies of Tudi Gong ??? in English are relatively rare. This article reports the his- tory, faces, roles, and duties of Tudi Gong, one of the lowest-ranked gods of the tradi- tional Taiwanese pantheon, whose name can be translated as “Earth Lord.” Tudi Gong is the most ubiquitous and one of the most commonly worshipped gods in Taiwan; he is the approachable genius loci with access to the higher gods. This article brings together various perspectives on Tudi Gong from previous studies of Chinese or Taiwanese reli- gion. To these portrayals it adds notes from the author’s observations of worshippers and informal interviews at temples, homes, and other places around Taiwan in 2008.
Han, Seunghyun. “Shrine, Images, and Power: The Worship of Former Worthies in Early Nineteenth Century Suzhou.” T’oung Pao 95 (2009): 167-195.
Abstract: In the 1820s, the literati of Suzhou embarked on a project to build a shrine devoted to the worship of local former worthies and engraved almost six hundred portraits of the latter on the shrine's inner walls. Since the locality already had a paired shrine of eminent officials and local worthies, as had become the case across the empire since the mid-Ming period, why did they need to create a shrine of a similar nature? What was the cultural significance of introducing visual representations of the worthies in the worship? By analyzing the multiple layers of meaning surrounding this shrine-building activity, the present study attempts to illuminate an aspect of the changing state-elite relations in the early nineteenth century.
Jochim, Christian. "Popular Lay Sects and Confucianism: A Study Based on the Way of Unity in Postwar Taiwan." In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour in Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 83-107.
Jones, Stephen. Ritual and Music of North China, Volume 2: Shaanbei. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2009.
Abstract: This second volume of Stephen Jones' work on ritual and musical life in north China, again with an accompanying DVD, gives an impression of music-making in daily life in the poor mountainous region of Shaanbei, northwest China. It conveys some of the diverse musical activities there around 2000, from the barrage of pop music blaring from speakers in the bustling county-towns to the life-cycle and calendrical ceremonies of poor mountain villages. Based on the practice of grass-roots music-making in daily life, not merely on official images, the main theme is the painful maintenance of ritual and its music under Maoism, its revival with the market reforms of the 1980s, and its modification under the assaults of TV, pop music, and migration since the 1990s.
The text is in four parts. Part One gives background to the area and music-making in society. Parts Two and Three discuss the lives of bards and shawm bands respectively, describing modifications in their ceremonial activities through the twentieth century. Part Four acclimatizes us to the modern world with glimpses of various types of musical life in Yulin city, the regional capital, illustrating the contrast with the surrounding countryside.
The 44-minute DVD, with its informative commentary, is intended both to illuminate the text and to stand on its own. It shows bards performing at a temple fair and to bless a family in distress, and shawm bands performing at a wedding, at funerals, and a shop opening - including their pop repertory with the 'big band'. Also featuring as part of these events are opera troupes, geomancers, and performing beggars; by contrast, the film shows a glimpse of the official image of Shaanbei culture as presented by a state ensemble in the regional capital. [Source: publisher's website]
Kalinowski, Marc. “Diviners and Astrologers under the Eastern Zhou: Transmitted Texts and Recent Archaeological Discoveries.” In: John Lagerwey and Marc Kalinowski [eds.], Early Chinese Religion: Part One: Shang through Han (1250 BC-220 AD). Leiden: Brill, 2009. Pp.341-396.
Kalinowski, Marc. “La divination sous les Zhou orientaux (770-256 avant notre ère).” In: John Lagerwey [ed.], Religion et société en Chine ancienne et médiévale. Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf/Institut Ricci, 2009. Pp. 101-164.
Kang Xiaofei. "Two Temples, Three Religions, and a Tourist Attraction: Contesting Sacred Space on China's Ethnic Frontier." Modern China 35 (2009): 227-255.
Kang Xiaofei. "Rural Women, Old Age, and Temple Work: A Case from Northwestern Sichuan." China Perspectives 2009/4: 42-52.
Abstract: This article examines the interface of religion, gender, and old age in contemporary China through the case of a group of rural Han elder women and their community temple in northwestern Sichuan. Without access to monastic resources and charismatic leadership, the women have made the temple a gendered ritual space of their own to obtain social company, spiritual comfort, and moral capital for themselves and their families. Neither victims of feudal superstition nor obstacles to modernisation, they are a dynamic transformative force in contemporary rural China.
Katz, Paul R. Divine Justice: Religion and the Development of Chinese Legal Culture. London, New York: Routlege, 2009.
Abstract: This book considers the ways in which religious beliefs and practices have contributed to the formation of Chinese legal culture. It does so by describing two forms of overlap between religion and the law: the ideology of justice and the performance of judicial rituals.
One of the most important conceptual underpinnings of the Chinese ideology of justice is the belief in the inevitability of retribution. Similar values permeate Chinese religious traditions, all of which contend that justice will prevail despite corruption and incompetence among judicial officials in this world and even the underworld, with all wrongdoers eventually suffering some form of punishment. The second form of overlap between religion and the law may be found in the realm of practice, and involves instances when men and women perform judicial rituals like oaths, chicken-beheadings, and underworld indictments in order to enhance the legitimacy of their positions, deal with cases of perceived injustice, and resolve disputes. These rites coexist with other forms of legal practice, including private mediation and the courts, comprising a wide-ranging spectrum of practices. [Source: publisher's website]
Katz, Paul R. "Banner Worship and Human Sacrifice in Chinese Military History." In: Perry Link [ed.], The Scholar's Mind: Essays in Honor of F. W. Mote. Hong Kong: The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press, 2009. Pp.207-227.
Katz, Paul R. "Religion, Recruiting and Resistance in Colonial Taiwan: A Case Study of the Xilai An Incident, 1915." In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour in Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 249-282.
Katz, Paul R. “Ritual? What Ritual? Secularization in the Study of Chinese Legal History, from Colonial Encounters to Modern Scholarship.” Social Compass 56 (2009): 328-344.
Abstract: The author explores the reasons why scholars have overlooked the importance of judicial rituals in Chinese legal culture and considers this neglect in the light of scholarship on secularization. He explores the issue by analysing the interaction between Chinese and western judicial practices in the colonial histories of the Straits Settlements (now Malaysia and Singapore) and Hong Kong. The concept of secularization appears to be of relevance to the study of Chinese legal culture, given that secularized societies tend to become differentiated into autonomous sub-systems, religion being restricted in influence to its own sub-system. In fact, however, religion has continuously interacted with a range of other sub-systems in China, including legal ones, which indicates that, in modern Chinese legal culture, religion and the law have not evolved into separate sub-systems. (Source: journal)
Kennedy, Brian L. & Elizabeth Nai-Jia Guo. "Taiwanese Daoist Temple Parades and Their Martial Motifs." Journal of Daoist Studies 2 (2009): 197-209.
Kominami, Ichirô. “Rituals for the Earth.” In: John Lagerwey and Marc Kalinowski [eds.], Early Chinese Religion: Part One: Shang through Han (1250 BC-220 AD). Leiden: Brill, 2009. Pp.201-234.
Kühner, Hans. “Sorcerers, Bandits and Rebels: Anti-Heretical Discourse and Practice in Late Qing China.” Bochumer Jahrbuch für Ostasienforschung 33 (2009): 17-38.
Kuo, Cheng. “A Study of the Consumption of Chinese Online Fortune Telling Services.” Chinese Journal of Communication 2.3 (2009): 288-306.
Abstract: This study examines consumer behavior in the online fortune telling market. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected and analyzed through a content analysis of websites, in-depth interviews with website owners, and online consumer surveys. Focus group discussions were conducted to uncover a general profile of and the motives for users who visited fortune telling websites in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and mainland China. In addition, a survey of 6,088 members of major fortune telling websites was conducted in order to identify a dynamic psychological model to explain online fortune telling behavior and attitudes. Three types of explanatory variables were used as predictors - demographics, psychological orientations, and motivations. Results from the analyses indicate that the majority of users were attracted to the fortune telling websites by free trial services. Personal relationship fortunes were the most popular service item consumed by both male and female users. Some consistent patterns regarding the effects of the predictor variables on online fortune telling behavior and attitudes were reported and discussed. The three types of predictors in question all contributed to different online fortune telling behavior and attitudes. Results and implications are reported and discussed.
Lagerwey, John. "The History and Sociology of Religion in Changting County, Fujian." In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour in Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 189-218.
Lewis, Mark Edward. “The Mythology of Early China.” In: John Lagerwey and Marc Kalinowski [eds.], Early Chinese Religion: Part One: Shang through Han (1250 BC-220 AD). Leiden: Brill, 2009. Pp.541-594.
Lin, Fu-shih. “The Image and Status of Shamans in Ancient China.” In: John Lagerwey and Marc Kalinowski [eds.], Early Chinese Religion: Part One: Shang through Han (1250 BC-220 AD). Leiden: Brill, 2009. Pp.397-458.
Lin, Wei-Ping. "Local History through Popular Religion: Place, People and Their Narratives in Taiwan." Asian Anthropology 8 (2009): 1-30.
Abstract: This paper explores how popular religion can offer a different interpretation of history than the macro politico-economic perspective. It draws on ethnography from rural Taiwan to discuss how the local people have their own ways of understanding history. The author examines religious narratives, the revelations of spirit mediums, and changes in the governance of temples to show how the social histories of the region and the wider society are reconstituted locally. These religious narrations and practices, grounded in ideas of place and in the social relations between deities and their adherents, are important means of constructing local identity and conveying people’s agency.
Liu, Tseng-kuei. “Taboos: An Aspect of Belief in the Qin and Han.” In: John Lagerwey and Marc Kalinowski [eds.], Early Chinese Religion: Part One: Shang through Han (1250 BC-220 AD). Leiden: Brill, 2009. Pp.881-948.
Mathieu, Rémi. “Les wu: fonctions, rites et pouvoirs, de la fin des Zhous au début des Hans (env. Ve – env. Ier siècle): approche d’un chamanisme chinois.” In: John Lagerwey [ed.], Religion et société en Chine ancienne et médiévale. Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf/Institut Ricci, 2009. Pp. 277-304.
Meyer, Christian. “‘Religion’ and ‘Superstition’ in Introductory Works to Religious Studies in Early Republican China.“ Bochumer Jahrbuch zur Ostasienforschung 33 (2009): 103-125.
Nadeau, Randall L. "A Critical Review of Daniel L. Overmyer's Contribution to the Study of Chinese Religions." In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour of Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 23-35.
Nedostup, Rebecca. Superstitious Regimes: Religion and the Politics of Chinese Modernity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, distributed by Harvard University Press, 2009.
Abstract: We live in a world shaped by secularism—the separation of numinous power from political authority and religion from the political, social, and economic realms of public life. Not only has progress toward modernity often been equated with secularization, but when religion is admitted into modernity, it has been distinguished from superstition. That such ideas are continually contested does not undercut their extraordinary influence. These divisions underpin this investigation of the role of religion in the construction of modernity and political power during the Nanjing Decade (1927–1937) of Nationalist rule in China. This book explores the modern recategorization of religious practices and people and examines how state power affected the religious lives and physical order of local communities. It also looks at how politicians conceived of their own ritual role in an era when authority was meant to derive from popular sovereignty. The claims of secular nationalism and mobilizational politics prompted the Nationalists to conceive of the world of religious association as a dangerous realm of “superstition” that would destroy the nation. This is the first “superstitious regime” of the book’s title. It also convinced them that national feeling and faith in the party-state would replace those ties—the second “superstitious regime.” [Source: publisher's website]
Olles, Volker. "Das Dao des Herrn von der Schnurbaumgalerie: Die konfuzianisch-daoistische Liumen-Bewegung im China des 19. und 20. Jahrhunderts." Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 159.1 (2009): 129-140.
Olles, Volker. "The Way of the Locus Tree Studio: Preliminary Remarks on the Foundations and Functions of the Popular Religious Liumen Movement." In: Florian C. Reiter [ed.], Foundations of Daoist Ritual: A Berlin Symposium. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2009. Pp. 107-117.
Palmer, David A. “China’s Religious Danwei: Institutionalising Religion in the People’s Republic.” China Perspectives 2009/4: 17-30.
Abstract: This article is a study of the continuities and changes in the state-led institutionalisation of religion in the PRC from 1979 to 2009 and their effects on the structuring of China’s religious field. A normative discourse on religion is constituted by a network of Party leaders, officials, academics, and religious leaders. Official religious institutions have become hybrids of religious culture with the institutional habitus of work units ( danwei) in the socialist market economy. A wide range of religious practices have found legitimacy under secular labels such as health, science, culture, tourism, or heritage. Religious affairs authorities have begun to acknowledge the existence of this expanding realm of religious life, and to accord discursive legitimacy to the previously stigmatised or ignored categories of popular religion and new religions, but hesitate to propose an explicit change in policy.
Pan, Chiou-Lang. “Attaining the Dao: An Analysis of the Conversion Experiences of Adherents of Yiguan Dao.” Ph.D. dissertation, Trinity International University, 2009.
Abstract: Yi-guan Dao is one of the most popular examples of self-consciously syncretistic movements involving three Chinese religions: Daoism, Buddhism, and Confucianism. It has become one of the largest religious movements among the Chinese in just a few decades. Although the study of Yi-guan Dao is growing, the socio-cultural significance of the popularity of Yi-guan Dao and its challenge to Christianity are still largely unexplored. Therefore, this research is an attempt to study the experiential dimension of Yi-guan Dao in order to discover why Yi-guan Dao is attractive to Chinese people. The findings of this research give readers a glimpse of the deeper socio-cultural structure of Chinese religiosity and provide some insights for the Chinese churches to reflect on with respect to their theories and practices of contextualization and evangelism. The central concern of this research is: How do adherents of Yi-guan Dao understand their conversion experiences and the significance of Yi-guan Dao teaching and practice for their lives? Combining study of available published literature and my own ethnographic fieldwork of a temple in New York City, I employ an interdisciplinary approach to Yi-guan Dao by examining its doctrines, rituals, and symbolism as well as the experiential discourses of the respondents. The theoretical framework of this research is drawn from Dawson's detailed case study approach, focusing on a group of believers within a temple as the immediate context, and Harding's insight on the recruiting rhetoric which views conversion as acquiring a religious language. By examining when and how a listener of religious language becomes a speaker through analyzing the conversion narratives of these respondents, I develop a model of conversion to Yi-guan Dao as a process of "self-persuasion spiral." That is, these respondents chose to believe Yi-guan Dao for reasons of psychological or spiritual satisfaction more than for reasons of rationality. In addition, this research also found that Yi-guan Dao seems to be able to grow, especially among the Chinese diaspora, according to Stark's ten propositions. Finally, some missiological implications and theological reflections on the construction of a Chinese theology are provided. Several suggestions for further research are also provided.
Paper, Jordan. "The Role of Possession Trance in Chinese Culture and Religion: A Comparative Overview from the Neolithic to the Present." In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour in Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 327-345.
Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens, Michèle. “Death and the Dead: Practices and Images in the Qin and Han.” In: John Lagerwey and Marc Kalinowski [eds.], Early Chinese Religion: Part One: Shang through Han (1250 BC-220 AD). Leiden: Brill, 2009. Pp.949-1026.
Pirazzoli-t’Serstevens, Michèle. “Autour de la mort et des morts: pratiques et images à l’époque des Qin et des Hans.” In: John Lagerwey [ed.], Religion et société en Chine ancienne et médiévale. Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf/Institut Ricci, 2009. Pp. 339-393.
Poo, Mu-chou. “Ritual and Ritual Texts in Early China.” In: John Lagerwey and Marc Kalinowski [eds.], Early Chinese Religion: Part One: Shang through Han (1250 BC-220 AD). Leiden: Brill, 2009. Pp.281-313.
Reed, Carrie. “Messages from the Dead in Nanke Taishou zhuan.” Chinese Literature: Essays, Articles, Reviews 31 (2009): 121:130.
Robson, James. Power of Place: The Religious Landscape of the Southern Sacred Peak (Nanyue) in Medieval China. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, distributed by Harvard University Press, 2009.
Abstract: Throughout Chinese history mountains have been integral components of the religious landscape. They have been considered divine or numinous sites, the abodes of deities, the preferred locations for temples and monasteries, and destinations for pilgrims. Early in Chinese history a set of five mountains were co-opted into the imperial cult and declared sacred peaks, yue, demarcating and protecting the boundaries of the Chinese imperium. The Southern Sacred Peak, or Nanyue, is of interest to scholars not the least because the title has been awarded to several different mountains over the years. The dynamic nature of Nanyue raises a significant theoretical issue of the mobility of sacred space and the nature of the struggles involved in such moves. Another facet of Nanyue is the multiple meanings assigned to this place: political, religious, and cultural. Of particular interest is the negotiation of this space by Daoists and Buddhists. The history of their interaction leads to questions about the nature of the divisions between these two religious traditions. James Robson’s analysis of these topics demonstrates the value of local studies and the emerging field of Buddho-Daoist studies in research on Chinese religion. [Source: publisher's website]
Seiwert, Hubert. "Religiöse Bewegungen im frühmodernen China. Eine prozesstheoretische Skizze." In: Manfred Hutter [ed.], Religionswissenschaft im Kontext der Asienwissenschaften. 99 Jahre religionswissenschaftliche Lehre und Forschung in Bonn. Berlin: LIT-Verlag, 2009. Pp. 179-196.
Seiwert, Hubert. "The Transformation of Popular Religious Movements of the Ming and Qing Dynasties: A Rational Choice Interpretation." In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour of Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 39-62.
Soo Khin Wah. "The Recent Development of the Yiguan Dao Fayi Chongde Sub-Branch in Singapore, Malaysia, and Thailand." In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour in Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 109-125.
Sterckx, Roel. “The Economics of Religion in Warring States and Early Imperial China.” In: John Lagerwey and Marc Kalinowski [eds.], Early Chinese Religion: Part One: Shang through Han (1250 BC-220 AD). Leiden: Brill, 2009. Pp.839-880.
Stewart, Pamela J., and Andrew Strathern. “Growth of the Mazu Complex in Cross-Straits Contexts.” Journal of Ritual Studies 23 (2009): 67-72.
Sutton, Donald S. & Xiaofei Kang “Recasting Religion and Ethnicity: Tourism and Socialism in Northern Sichuan, 1992-2005.” In: Thomas David DuBois [ed.], Casting Faiths: Imperialism and the Transformation of Religion in East and Southeast Asia. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. Pp. 190-214.
Szonyi, Michael. “Secularization Theories and the Study of Chinese Religions.” Social Compass 56 (2009): 312-327.
Abstract: The author proposes a dialogue between recent literature on the history of Chinese popular religion and recent sociological debates about secularization theory, asking whether a better understanding of concepts, theories and evidence from one field may be productive in interpreting those of the other. The author suggests on the one hand that certain elements of secularization theory can be useful tools in understanding the modern history of religions in China and on the other that thinking about what secularization has meant in China is crucial to a comparative global history of religion and modernity. He also argues that attention to secularization both as a historical process and as a political ideology may help us to better understand the religious policies of the People’s Republic of China today. (Source: journal)
Thote, Alain. “Shang and Zhou Funeral Practices: Interpretation of Material Vestiges.” In: John Lagerwey and Marc Kalinowski [eds.], Early Chinese Religion: Part One: Shang through Han (1250 BC-220 AD), vol.1. Leiden: Brill, 2009.
Thote, Alain. “Les pratiques funéraires Shang et Zhou: interprétation des vestiges matériels.” In: John Lagerwey [ed.], Religion et société en Chine ancienne et médiévale. Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf/Institut Ricci, 2009. Pp. 47-76.
Tsai, Yi-Jia. "Healing and the Construction of the Ethical Self: the Mediums' Modulation of Spirit and Exercise of Body." In: Religious and Ritual Change: Cosmologies and Histories, ed. by Pamela J. Stewart & Andrew Strathern. Durham, N.C.: Carolina Academic Press, 2009. Pp. 245-273.
Wang Chien-ch'uan. "The White Dragon Hermitage and the Spread of the Eight Generals Procession Troupe in Taiwan." In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour in Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 283-302.
Yeh, Chuen-rong. "Ritual Exchanges between the Han and the Siraya Pingpu: Bottle Worship in Taiwan." In: Religious and Ritual Change: Cosmologies and Histories, ed. by Pamela J. Stewart & Andrew Strathern. Durham, N.C.: Carolina Academic Press, 2009. Pp. 275-308.
Yeung, Tuen Wai Mary. "Rituals and Beliefs of Female Performers in Cantonese Opera." In: The People and the Dao: New Studies in Chinese Religions in Honour in Prof. Daniel L. Overmyer, edited by Philip Clart & Paul Crowe. Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2009. Pp. 303-325.
Yi, Sumei, “The Making of Female Deities in North China, 800—1400.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Washington, 2009.
Abstract: In order to study the multiplicity and controversy in the making of female deities, this dissertation takes both a longer perspective, the six centuries from 800 to 1400 as a whole as opposed to a single dynasty, and a broader perspective, writing about female deities in collections of hagiographies and making offerings to them and praying to them in local temples (traceable largely from temple inscriptions) rather than a single coherent body of texts. It starts with a search for continuities and transformations in representations of female deities and moves to an exploration into temple cults to female deities in North China. The examination of female cult deities includes an analysis of views and practices of various actors (the state, elites, clergy, and ordinary devotees) and influence of gender as well as a case study of the Two Transcendent cult in southeastern Shanxi.
Zhang Zhenjun. “A Textual History of Liu Yiqing’s You ming lu.” Oriens Extremus 48 (2009): 87-101.