Science and Development in Thai and South Asian Buddhism

Science and Development in Thai and South Asian Buddhism PDF Author: David L Gosling
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 0429626843
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 297

Get Book Here

Book Description
Becoming a Buddhist monk in Thailand has for a long time provided the opportunity for access to a good education and to social advancement, both to bright, poor rural youths and to members of the urban elite whose youth often become monks for a few months as a rite of passage into adulthood. Moreover, although women are not allowed to become fully fledged monks, recent developments have encouraged a special status akin to nuns for many devout Thai Buddhist women. All this has resulted in large numbers of well-educated, well-motivated Buddhist religious people, keen both to engage in religious contemplation and also determined to contribute to this-worldly social, economic, educational and medical development goals. This book, by a leading authority on the subject, considers the role of Thai Buddhist religious people in development within Thailand. It discusses how Thai Buddhism has evolved philosophically and in its organisation to allow this, examines various examples of Buddhist people's engagement in development projects, and assesses how the situation is likely to unfold going forward. In addition, the book considers the relationship between science and religion in Thai Buddhism and also some aspects of the parallel situation in Sri Lanka.

Science and Development in Thai and South Asian Buddhism

Science and Development in Thai and South Asian Buddhism PDF Author: David L Gosling
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 0429626843
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 297

Get Book Here

Book Description
Becoming a Buddhist monk in Thailand has for a long time provided the opportunity for access to a good education and to social advancement, both to bright, poor rural youths and to members of the urban elite whose youth often become monks for a few months as a rite of passage into adulthood. Moreover, although women are not allowed to become fully fledged monks, recent developments have encouraged a special status akin to nuns for many devout Thai Buddhist women. All this has resulted in large numbers of well-educated, well-motivated Buddhist religious people, keen both to engage in religious contemplation and also determined to contribute to this-worldly social, economic, educational and medical development goals. This book, by a leading authority on the subject, considers the role of Thai Buddhist religious people in development within Thailand. It discusses how Thai Buddhism has evolved philosophically and in its organisation to allow this, examines various examples of Buddhist people's engagement in development projects, and assesses how the situation is likely to unfold going forward. In addition, the book considers the relationship between science and religion in Thai Buddhism and also some aspects of the parallel situation in Sri Lanka.

Tourism and Development in Southeast Asia

Tourism and Development in Southeast Asia PDF Author: Claudia Dolezal
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 0429559224
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 191

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book analyses the role tourism plays for sustainable development in Southeast Asia. It seeks to assesses tourism’s impact on residents and localities across the region by critically debating and offering new understandings of its dynamics on the global and local levels. Offering a myriad of case studies from a range of different countries in the region, this book is interdisciplinary in nature, thereby presenting a comprehensive overview of tourism’s current and future role in development. Divided into four parts, it discusses the nexus of tourism and development at both the regional and national levels, with a focus on theoretical and methodological foundations, protected areas, local communities, and broader issues of governance. Contributors from within and outside of Southeast Asia raise awareness of the local challenges, including issues of ownership or unequal power relations, and celebrate best-practice examples where tourism can be regarded as making a positive difference to residents’ life. The first edited volume to examine comprehensive analysis of tourism in Southeast Asia as both an economic and social phenomenon through the lens of development, this book will be useful to students and scholars of tourism, development, Southeast Asian culture and society and Asian Studies more generally.

Encyclopaedia of the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine in Non-Western Cultures

Encyclopaedia of the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine in Non-Western Cultures PDF Author: Helaine Selin
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 140204559X
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 2428

Get Book Here

Book Description
Here, at last, is the massively updated and augmented second edition of this landmark encyclopedia. It contains approximately 1000 entries dealing in depth with the history of the scientific, technological and medical accomplishments of cultures outside of the United States and Europe. The entries consist of fully updated articles together with hundreds of entirely new topics. This unique reference work includes intercultural articles on broad topics such as mathematics and astronomy as well as thoughtful philosophical articles on concepts and ideas related to the study of non-Western Science, such as rationality, objectivity, and method. You’ll also find material on religion and science, East and West, and magic and science.

Ethnographies of Development and Globalization in the Philippines

Ethnographies of Development and Globalization in the Philippines PDF Author: Koki Seki
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000090914
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 203

Get Book Here

Book Description
The contributors to this volume examine the actual workings and on-the-ground effects of contemporary political economic shifts in the Global South, and implications for reconfiguring social networks, conceptions and practices of governance, and burgeoning social movements. How do various groups in the Global South respond to and manage chronic states of insecurity and precarity concomitant with contemporary globalization processes? While drawing on diverse ethnographic viewpoints in the Philippines, the authors analyze the impact of these processes through the conceptual framework of "emergent sociality," a purported connectedness among individuals fostered through interactions, copresence, and conviviality within a community over a long duration. In so doing, the case studies in this volume suggest, illuminate, and debate insecurities that may be commonly shared among populations in the Philippines and throughout the Global South. This anthology will be of great interest to students and scholars of cultural anthropology, globalization and Philippines society.

Agent Orange and Rural Development in Post-war Vietnam

Agent Orange and Rural Development in Post-war Vietnam PDF Author: Vu Le Thao Chi
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000045013
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 251

Get Book Here

Book Description
Vu tells the story of Vietnamese farmers who have survived a 30-year war of independence and unification, its damaging legacies in their living environment, and the unfamiliar pressure of the market economy. Vietnamese famers are neither simply obedient beneficiaries of policy decisions made by higher authorities nor convention-ridden cyphers. Rather, they are sophisticated decision-makers capable of navigating the changes threatening to disrupt their lives over multiple generations. Vu’s research pays particular attention to those farmers whose families have suffered from direct and indirect exposure to the toxic herbicides popularly known as Agent Orange. She demonstrates that their priority has tended to be the protection of their existing assets, rather than pursuing the promise of new riches, and that this tendency has helped them maintain stability in a turbulent economic environment. A fascinating study for scholars of Vietnamese anthropology and society, the book will also be of interest to sociologists and economists with a broader interest in the impact of economic and political change on rural lifestyles.

Contemporary Socio-Cultural and Political Perspectives in Thailand

Contemporary Socio-Cultural and Political Perspectives in Thailand PDF Author: Pranee Liamputtong
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 9400772440
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 538

Get Book Here

Book Description
This volume examines contemporary Thailand. It captures aspects of Thai society that have changed dramatically over the past years and that have turned Thailand into a society that is different from what most people outside the country know and expect. The social transition of Thailand has been marked by economic growth, population restructuring, social and cultural development, political movements, and many reforms including the national health care system. The book covers the social, cultural, and economic changes as well as political situations. It discusses both historical contexts and emerging issues. It includes chapters on social and public health concerns, and on ethnicity, gender, sexuality and social class. Most chapters use information from empirical-based and historical research. They describe real life experiences of the contributors and Thai people who participated in the research.

ASEAN and Power in International Relations

ASEAN and Power in International Relations PDF Author: Jamie Stacey
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000178056
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 339

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book analyses the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) as a powerful actor in International Relations by examining how the ASEAN community has evolved, looking specifically at its relationship with the EU with regards to human rights. The book adds to important contemporary debates within constructivist theory, shedding light on the need for ‘critical’ constructivism that emphasises language and contestation and what that may entail. On an empirical level, it challenges the idea of an 'EU-centrism,' demonstrating how ASEAN is the major driving force behind its human rights and community aspirations, as well as within the ASEAN-EU relationship. Furthermore, this book engages with the introspection surrounding constructivism by addressing the trouble with 'norms,' and instead unpacking the relationship between ASEAN and the EU to show language power in play. In particular, the book looks at how language, or rather coercive language, helps us ‘see’ contestation in action, something that researchers sympathetic towards the idea of ASEAN’s ‘resistance’ have been unable to show through a focus on norms. Tracing the evolution of the ASEAN community and human rights aspirations in a new light, showing how exactly the EU remains an inspiration, but not a model, and more interestingly how ASEAN demonstrates power in the relationship, the book will be of interest to academics working on Asian Studies, European Studies, International Relations Theory and human rights.

Buddhism Illuminated

Buddhism Illuminated PDF Author: San San May
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780295743783
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Get Book Here

Book Description
The British Library has one of the richest collections of Southeast Asian Buddhist manuscripts, principally from Thailand and Burma.

Islam, Blasphemy, and Human Rights in Indonesia

Islam, Blasphemy, and Human Rights in Indonesia PDF Author: Daniel Peterson
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000765024
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 209

Get Book Here

Book Description
Using the high-profile 2017 blasphemy trial of the former governor of Jakarta, Basuki ‘Ahok’ Tjahaja Purnama, as its sole case study, this book assesses whether Indonesia’s liberal democratic human rights legal regime can withstand the rise of growing Islamist majoritarian sentiment. Specifically, this book analyses whether a 2010 decision of Indonesia’s Constitutional Court has rendered the liberal democratic human rights guarantees contained in Indonesia’s 1945 Constitution ineffective. Key legal documents, including the indictment issued by the North Jakarta Attorney-General and General Prosecutor, the defence’s ‘Notice of Defence’, and the North Jakarta State Court’s convicting judgment, are examined. The book shows how Islamist majoritarians in Indonesia have hijacked human rights discourse by attributing new, inaccurate meanings to key liberal democratic concepts. This has provided them with a human rights law-based justification for the prioritisation of the religious sensibilities and religious orthodoxy of Indonesia’s Muslim majority over the fundamental rights of the country’s religious minorities. While Ahok’s conviction evidences this, the book cautions that matters pertaining to public religion will remain a site of contestation in contemporary Indonesia for the foreseeable future. A groundbreaking study of the Ahok trial, the blasphemy law, and the contentious politics of religious freedom and cultural citizenship in Indonesia, this book will be of interest to academics working in the fields of religion, Islamic studies, religious studies, law and society, law and development, law reform, constitutionalism, politics, history and social change, and Southeast Asian studies.

The Arab Uprisings and Malaysia’s Islamist Movements

The Arab Uprisings and Malaysia’s Islamist Movements PDF Author: Mohd Irwan Syazli Saidin
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000754057
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 193

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book examines the attitude of Malaysia’s Islamist movements – The Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS); The National Trust Party (AMANAH); The Muslim Youth Movement of Malaysia (ABIM) and the Malaysian Muslim Solidarity Front (ISMA) – towards the Arab Uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa. The book analyses the perceptions of Islamist movement activists, politicians and members in Malaysia towards the 2011 Arab Uprisings, popularly known as the ‘Arab Spring’. A questionnaire based-survey as well as in-depth interviews with activists and leaders ranging from individuals in opposing political parties (PAS and AMANAH) to non-government Islamist organisations (ABIM and ISMA) informs the findings of the book. Using quantitative and qualitative methods, the author analyses how the events impacted the activism, political approach and attitudes of the members of Islamic movements towards the issues of regime change, civil disobedience, political revolution, democracy, Islamism and political stability. The book demonstrates that Malaysian Islamists are mainly in support of free and democratic elections as a medium for political change as opposed to overthrowing the previous BN-led regime via civil disobedience, street demonstration or ‘revolution’. A novel approach in examining the connections between Islamic movements in Southeast Asia and the Middle East and Africa, this book will be of interest to academics in the fields of Politics, History, Social Movements, Political Islam, Middle Eastern Studies and Southeast Asian Studies.