Overview
The scientific study of Buddhist forms of meditation has surged in recent years, capturing the popular imagination and reshaping conceptions of what meditation is and what it can do. For perhaps the first time in history, meditation has shifted from Buddhist monasteries and practice centers to some of the most prominent and powerful modern institutions in the world, as well as non-institutional settings. As their contexts change, so do the practices-sometimes drastically. New ways of thinking about meditation are emerging as it moves toward more secular settings, ways that profoundly affect millions of lives all over the world.To understand these changes and their effects, the essays in this volume explore the unaddressed complexities in the interrelations between Buddhist history and thought and the scientific study of meditation. The contributors bring philosophical, cultural, historical, and ethnographic perspectives to bear, considering such issues as the philosophical presuppositions behind practice, the secularization of meditation, the values and goods assumed in clinical approaches, and the sorts of subjects that take shape under the influence of these transformed and transformative practices-all the more powerful for being so often formulated with the authority of scientific discourse.
Full Product Details
Author: David L. McMahan (Charles A. Dana Professor of Religious Studes, Charles A. Dana Professor of Religious Studes, Franklin and Marshall College) ,
Erik Braun (Associate Professor of Religious Studies, Associate Professor of Religious Studies, University of Virginia)
Publisher: Oxford University Press Inc
Imprint: Oxford University Press Inc
Dimensions:
Width: 23.10cm
, Height: 1.30cm
, Length: 15.50cm
Weight: 0.318kg
ISBN: 9780190495800
ISBN 10: 0190495804
Pages: 272
Publication Date: 09 November 2017
Audience:
Professional and scholarly
,
Professional & Vocational
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: To order
Stock availability from the supplier is unknown. We will order it for you and ship this item to you once it is received by us.
Reviews
McMahan and Braun's multi-dimensioned collection grounds meditation practice in historical time and social place. The essays include historical, cultural, philosophical, textual, cognitive, psychological, and sociological critiques of the all-too-often decontextualized scientific study of meditation. These perspectives enable us to better understand how the complexities of lived human existence influence meditation practice and meditation experiences. Taken together the essays further demonstrate the importance of interdisciplinarity for the study of Buddhism. --Richard K. Payne, Yehan Numata Professor of Japanese Buddhist Studies at the Institute of Buddhist Studies
The editors are to be commended for ensuring that the essays are, by and large, brief and accessible, ensuring that the book will be digestible for researchers, students, and nonscholarly readers alike. Oxford's decision to release a reasonably-priced paperback copy of this book simultaneously with the hardcover is also appreciated. This alone is enough to ensure that this book will eclipse other scholarly introductions to the sociocultural dimensions of Buddhist meditation that are currently being sold at prohibitively expensive prices. Given these advantages of breadth, accessibility, and price, I am of the opinion that this book would be put to particularly good use in the classroom. * C. Pierce Salguero, Reading Religion * This top-rate collection is essential reading for researchers of modern Buddhism and highly recommended for undergraduate and graduate classes on Buddhism in the West, religion and science, and religion and medicine. * Ann Gleig (University of Central Florida), Religious Studies Review Vol. 44.1 *
The editors are to be commended for ensuring that the essays are, by and large, brief and accessible, ensuring that the book will be digestible for researchers, students, and nonscholarly readers alike. Oxford's decision to release a reasonably-priced paperback copy of this book simultaneously with the hardcover is also appreciated. This alone is enough to ensure that this book will eclipse other scholarly introductions to the sociocultural dimensions of Buddhist meditation that are currently being sold at prohibitively expensive prices. Given these advantages of breadth, accessibility, and price, I am of the opinion that this book would be put to particularly good use in the classroom. * C. Pierce Salguero, Reading Religion *
Author Information
David L. McMahan is the Charles A. Dana Professor of Religious Studies at Franklin & Marshall College in Pennsylvania. He is the editor of Buddhism in the Modern World and author of The Making of Buddhist Modernism and Empty Vision: Metaphor and Visionary Imagery in Mahayana Buddhism. Erik Braun is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Virginia. He is the author of The Birth of Insight: Meditation, Modern Buddhism, and the Burmese Monk Ledi Sayadaw , which won a Toshihide Numata Book Award in Buddhism.
