Buddhist Masculinities

In a series of fascinating essays, . . . scholars contend with how Buddhists have negotiated with masculine ideals and the effect that this has had on Buddhist culture. * Buddhadharma: Lion's Roar * This is the first book to critically explore masculinity across such a broad swath of the Buddhist tradition in different periods and cultures. The authors—experts in fields as diverse as philology, ethnography, archeology, art history, the study of popular culture, and film studies—provide us with new and important insights into the diverse and sometimes competing notions of maleness in different parts of the Buddhist world and how these notions have often functioned to subordinate women. A theoretically sophisticated yet accessible book, Buddhist Masculinities is must read for anyone interested in Buddhism and the comparative study of gender. -- José Ignacio Cabezón, author of <i>Sexuality in Classical South Asian Buddhism</i> This volume brings much needed attention to the diversities and continuities of Buddhist masculinity throughout Asia and beyond. Across four sections, Buddhist Masculinities shows how Buddhists generated masculine ideals, performed machismo, adapted to culturally specific definitions of masculinity, and responded to transgressive masculinities. This is a welcome and timely addition to the study of Buddhism and gender for a new generation of scholars. -- Bernard Faure, author of <i>The Red Thread: Buddhist Approaches to Sexuality</i> and <i>The Power of Denial: Buddhism, Purity, and Gender</i> Buddhist Masculinities sheds light on masculinity as an object of analysis, refusing to allow it to go unmarked as it so often does in Buddhist texts and scholarship. The book is bound to become an important reference for future work in this burgeoning field, as it maintains an expansive and critical definition of masculinity, engaging masculinity theorists to think about diverse Buddhist texts and contexts. -- Sarah Jacoby, author of <i>Love and Liberation: Autobiographical Writings of the Tibetan Buddhist Visionary Sera Khandro</i>