Race and Religion in American Buddhism: White Supremacy and Immigrant Adaptation
Joseph Cheah
Abstract
In Race and Religion in American Buddhism: White Supremacy and Immigrant Adaptation, the author maintains that while race is often bracketed in the works on American Buddhism, the issues concerning race and racialization have remained not far below the surface of the wider discussion among white Buddhists and sympathizers regarding representations of American Buddhism and adaptations of Buddhist practices to the American scene. The book argues that the prevailing ideology of white supremacy that has been operative in these and other issues reflects the intimate ways in which race and religion ... More
In Race and Religion in American Buddhism: White Supremacy and Immigrant Adaptation, the author maintains that while race is often bracketed in the works on American Buddhism, the issues concerning race and racialization have remained not far below the surface of the wider discussion among white Buddhists and sympathizers regarding representations of American Buddhism and adaptations of Buddhist practices to the American scene. The book argues that the prevailing ideology of white supremacy that has been operative in these and other issues reflects the intimate ways in which race and religion has been circumscribed in representations of American Buddhism. Focusing primarily on Therav?da tradition, this book examines rearticulations of Asian Buddhism by white Buddhists and sympathizers through the lens of race and racialization. Using Omi and Winant’s racial formation theory, this book illustrates how Asian meditative practices have been rearticulated into specific but deliberately chosen form that helps preserve the prevailing system of racial hegemony. Furthermore, this book offers a complex view of Burmese immigrant community as they resist to not only assimilation forces in the United States but also to the Burmese military junta’s transnational reach.
Keywords:
race,
racialization,
white supremacy,
ideology,
immigrant adaptation,
white Buddhists,
sympathizers
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2011 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780199756285 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: January 2012 |
DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199756285.001.0001 |
