Category: Asia

Buddhism and Taoism Face to Face Now in Paperback

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Buddhism and Taoism Face to Face: Scripture, Ritual, and Iconographic Exchange in Medieval China, by Christine Mollier, is now available in paperback. The book is a recent recipient of the Prix Stanislas Julien, a prestigious prize from the French academic society Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, which recognizes Western-language scholarship on the Asian humanities.

“In Buddhism and Taoism Face to Face, Christine Mollier undertakes five detailed case studies, each one illuminating a different dimension of the ritual, iconographic, and scriptural interactions of Buddhists and Taoists in medieval China. Mollier does not simply assert that these traditions influenced one another; she reveals in breathtaking detail the wide array of techniques used by Buddhists and Taoists as they appropriated and transformed the texts and icons of their rivals. . . . Mollier’s work in this volume is brilliant. She deftly navigates through manuscripts, canonical texts, archaeological remains, and art-historical evidence. . . . Buddhism and Taoism Face to Face is an exhilarating display of Sinological erudition.” —H-Buddhism

May 2009 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3411-1 / $20.00 (PAPER)

Beijing Opera Costumes Short-listed for Costume Society of America Award

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Beijing Opera Costumes: The Visual Communication of Character and Culture, by Alexandra B. Bonds, was short-listed for this year’s Milla Davenport Publication Award from the
Costume Society of America. The award is given “to a published book or exhibition catalog that makes a significant contribution to the study of costume, reflects original thought and exceptional creativity, and draws on appropriate research methods and techniques.”

The journal Theatre Design & Technology called Beijing Opera Costumes “one of the most useful costume books on Beijing (Jingju) opera in the English language. . . . Alexandra Bonds has done a huge service to those who strive to learn more about twentieth- and twenty-first-century Jingju style and how it came to be. It is a beautifully detailed book that historians and novices alike will find invaluable.”

Jon Davidann at Pearl Harbor’s Pacific Aviation Museum Theater

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Hawai’i Pacific University professor Jon Davidann will hold a presentation at Pearl Harbor’s Pacific Aviation Museum Theater on Saturday, June 6, 2009, 2:00–4:00 p.m., and Sunday, June 7, 2009, 2:00-4:00 p.m. The presentation, entitled “From Perry to Pearl Harbor,” will trace the history of war in the Pacific from Admiral Perry’s arrival in Japan in 1853 to December 7, 1941. Dr. Davidann is the editor of Hawai`i at the Crossroads of the U.S. and Japan before the Pacific War, published this year by University of Hawai`i Press.

Call 808-441-1000 by June 3 for reservations. Attendance is free with paid admission to the Museum. For more information, click here.

The Cultural Resilience of Himalayan Hunter-Gatherers

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In today’s world hunter-gatherer societies struggle with seemingly insurmountable problems: deforestation and encroachment, language loss, political domination by surrounding communities. Will they manage to survive? This book is about one such society living in the monsoon rainforests of western Nepal: the Raute. Kings of the Forest: The Cultural Resilience of Himalayan Hunter-Gatherers, by Jana Fortier, explores how this elusive ethnic group, the last hunter-gatherers of the Himalayas, maintains its traditional way of life amidst increasing pressure to assimilate.

“Jana Fortier has made an important and original contribution to the ethnography of Nepal that focuses our attention on one of that country’s least known ethnic groups, the foraging people known as the Raute; indeed, her book is one of only a small handful of monographic-length treatments of foraging peoples in South Asia since Seligmann’s work on the Veddahs of Sri Lanka. In exploring the way the nomadic Raute have managed to resist the pressure of the wider world around them to settle down and to heed the seductive overtures of ‘development’, Fortier makes a compelling case for respecting the autonomy of foraging people and learning from a vanishing way of life. This is an exemplary work of scholarship based on meticulous and difficult fieldwork. Fortier’s prose is lucid, engaging and accessible, and this book will be an ideal text for undergraduate classes.” —Arjun Guneratne, Macalester College

May 2009 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3356-5 / $24.00 (PAPER)

Japan to 1600

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Japan to 1600: A Social and Economic History, by William Wayne Farris, surveys Japanese historical development from the first evidence of human habitation in the archipelago to the consolidation of political power under the Tokugawa shogunate at the beginning of the seventeenth century. It is unique among introductory texts for its focus on developments that impacted all social classes rather than the privileged and powerful few. In accessible language punctuated with lively and interesting examples, Farris weaves together major economic and social themes. The book focuses on continuity and change in social and economic structures and experiences, but it by no means ignores the political and cultural. Most chapters begin with an outline of political developments, and cultural phenomena—particularly religious beliefs—are also taken into account. In addition, Japan to 1600 addresses the growing connectedness between residents of the archipelago and the rest of the world.

May 2009 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3379-4 / $22.00 (PAPER)

A Companion to Grammata Serica Recensa

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“Minimal Old Chinese and Later Han Chinese: A Companion to Grammata Serica Recensa succeeds admirably in the goals the author has set for it. The introduction is the clearest and most useful document of its kind I have seen in recent years. It lays out in relatively few pages what others have heretofore taken reams to express. The body of the work gives the reader the entire syllable inventory of Old Chinese in a clear and useful format. The index and finding list are well organized and allow quick access to the material in the text. I predict that it will become a standard handbook for sinologists in general, just as Kalgren’s Grammata Serica and Grammata Serica Recensa have been during the past sixty years.” —W. South Coblin, University of Iowa

“The present work will fill the need for an updated and easy-to-use source for citing the various historically reconstructed stages of Chinese. It retains the basic structure of Karlgren’s early works with one big difference: the inclusion of an additional historical stage, Later Han Chinese. [Axel] Schuessler’s work will allow a much wider audience to access the most important result of Chinese historical phonology, especially those not interested in specializing in the study of historical phonology. It will also be a helpful resource for the linguist who, although familiar with the linguistic literature concerning Old Chinese, often needs a convenient way to look up reconstructions. Even those given to a more speculative turn of mind may well find that their work is greatly facilitated by Schuessler’s book. I believe that in a short time Minimal Old Chinese and Later Han Chinese will become a standard reference on the active sinologist’s bookshelf.” —Jerry Norman, University of Washington

April 2009 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3264-3 / $58.00 (CLOTH)

Fundamental Spoken Chinese

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Fundamental Spoken Chinese, by Robert Sanders and Nora Yao, introduces most of the basic grammatical patterns of modern spoken Mandarin in a carefully planned, graduated fashion. Every chapter follows the same organizational format and includes: key grammar points, new vocabulary items arranged by part of speech, sentence patterns, and four or five short dialogues illustrating contextual use of each new grammar pattern and vocabulary item. Non-technical explanations of grammar are written from the perspective of the English-speaking learner and are illustrated with multiple sentences in simple chart form. When appropriate, vocabulary and culture notes are provided, together with numerous drills, exercises, and in-class activities. Finally, English-Chinese translation exercises help determine how well students have mastered the chapter’s grammar and vocabulary.

“The course set out in Fundamental Spoken Chinese and Fundamental Written Chinese provides a thorough training in all the skills that a learner needs to reach a basic level of proficiency in Mandarin Chinese as well as a solid foundation for more advanced study. Fundamental Spoken Chinese is marvelously executed. The explanations of grammar and usage are exceptionally clear, the best I’ve ever seen in a textbook. The charts used to illustrate grammatical constructions are easy to follow, and the examples are well chosen for maximal clarity. The dialogues are naturalistic and well keyed to everyday situations, as is the vocabulary. Fundamental Written Chinese has many of the same virtues as its companion volume. Like Fundamental Spoken Chinese, Fundamental Written Chinese not only teaches the content of the lesson but also inculcates habits essential for further learning. The emphasis on explaining characters explicitly in terms of radicals and phonetics is an example of the kind of approach that makes for successful advanced learners. The two books are designed to be flexible so that teachers of various approaches can use them either to introduce the spoken and written skills simultaneously or to introduce writing after the spoken language has progressed to a certain level. Teachers and learners are provided with all the basic tools needed in one well-designed package.” —Mark Hansell, Carleton College

April 2009 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3156-1 / $39.00 (PAPER)

The Record of Linji Now Available in Paperback

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The Record of Linji, translation and commentary by Ruth Fuller Sasaki and edited by Thomas Y. Kirchner, is now available in paperback.

“A masterpiece of scholarship not only on Linji Chan, but also on Chinese Buddhist language and history—the annotations, which constitute almost two-thirds of the book, explain in astonishing detail the meanings, references, and grammar of each line of text. The edition preserves the excellent historical introduction, and includes a lengthy glossary, index, and table of names.” —Buddhadharma: The Practitioner’s Quarterly

Nanzan Library of Asian Religion and Culture
March 2008 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3319-0 / $25.00 (PAPER)

Voices from Okinawa

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Despite Okinawa’s long and close relationship with the United States, most Americans know little about the rich and remarkable culture of Japan’s southernmost islands. And they know even less about the Okinawan immigrants who brought their heritage to the U.S. over one hundred years ago. In this landmark publication—the first literary anthology showcasing Okinawan Americans—their voices are heard in plays, essays, and memoirs. Through the beauty, humor, and heartbreak in Jon Shirota’s award-winning plays, the experiences of an extraordinary people are illuminated. And in personal essays and interviews, the compelling life stories are told of June Hiroko Arakawa, Philip Ige, Mitsugu Sakihara, and Seiyei Wakukawa. The distinctive cultural perspectives and literary excellence of Voices from Okinawa, edited by Frank Stewart and Katsunori Yamazato, expand our definition of American literature, showing it to be more inclusive, complex, and multilayered than we have imagined.

Mānoa 21:1
February 2009 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3391-6 / $20.00 (PAPER)

Representations of the Exotic in Twentieth-Century Japanese Literature

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Readers worldwide have long been drawn to the foreign, the exotic, and the alien, even before Freud’s famous essay on the uncanny in 1919. Given Japan’s many years of relative isolation, followed by its multicultural empire, these themes seem particularly ripe for exploration and exploitation by Japanese writers. Their literary adventures have taken them inside Japan as well as outside, and how they internalized the exotic through the adoption of modernist techniques and subject matter forms the primary subject of The Alien Within: Representations of the Exotic in Twentieth-Century Japanese Literature, by Leith Morton.

“Leith Morton adds an exciting and valuable dimension to this field of criticism by introducing some relatively unknown but important writers and providing original and stimulating discussions of others who are under-treated but significant. By helping us look at these literary figures in a different light, he adds new layers to a fascinating subject.” —Susan Napier, Tufts University

February 2009 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3292-6 / $56.00 (CLOTH)

Ascetics and Social Memory in Early Medieval China

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By the middle of the third century B.C.E. in China there were individuals who sought to become transcendents (xian)—deathless, godlike beings endowed with supernormal powers. This quest for transcendence became a major form of religious expression and helped lay the foundation on which the first Daoist religion was built. Both xian and those who aspired to this exalted status in the centuries leading up to 350 C.E. have traditionally been portrayed as secretive and hermit-like figures. Making Transcendents: Ascetics and Social Memory in Early Medieval China, by Robert Ford Campany, offers a very different view of xian-seekers in late classical and early medieval China. It suggests that transcendence did not involve a withdrawal from society but rather should be seen as a religious role situated among other social roles and conceived in contrast to them. Robert Campany argues that the much-discussed secrecy surrounding ascetic disciplines was actually one important way in which practitioners presented themselves to others. He contends, moreover, that many adepts were not socially isolated at all but were much sought after for their power to heal the sick, divine the future, and narrate their exotic experiences.

“This pioneering study overturns conventional wisdom about ancient Chinese religious traditions by vividly portraying the social processes by which adepts could achieve recognition and legitimacy as transcendents (immortals). Campany convincingly demonstrates that some forms of self-cultivation and asceticism were culturally scripted performances that could have a profound impact on the audiences who observed or read about them, and that both adepts and the individuals they encountered were involved in constructing narratives about transcendence. Making Transcendents succeeds in bringing these seemingly ephemeral beings down from the summits and the clouds by locating them where they have always belonged: in the hearts of their worshippers and acquaintances. This eloquently written book should prove an invaluable resource for both teaching and research.” —Paul R. Katz, Academia Sinica

February 2009 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3333-6 / $48.00 (CLOTH)

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