A Mandala of Literacy Practices in Premodern Vietnam

Abstract

Based on an analysis of historical materials written in Literary Sinitic and vernacular Vietnamese (Chữ Nôm), this article examines the contexts of Buddhist knowledge and Buddhist literacy practices in premodern Vietnam. I argue that Buddhist monks were key agents in a complex system of literacy practices that mimic the conceptual form of the mandala. They taught Literary Sinitic (and sinographic characters) as well as vernacular Vietnamese (Chữ Nôm), translated texts from the Buddhist canon into Vietnamese, composed Buddhist works, made handwritten books, carved woodblocks, and published woodblock texts. Meanwhile, the Buddhist temple in traditional culture was a marvelous place not only for self-cultivation, but also to educate Buddhist novices and lay people, and to expand the Buddhist order. The Buddhist temple was a multifunctional space, existing as a hall of reverence, a place of Buddhist worship, and a temple to the forefathers, as well as a center of translation, a Buddhist school, printshop, publisher, archive, library and bookshop. There were, furthermore, complex mandalas of Buddhist temples in traditional Vietnamese society, since virtually every village contained a Buddhist temple. Thus, the network of literacy practices of a given temple directly affected the cultural life of the community of the village in which it was located, including its religious beliefs, economy, and especially its literate education. The structure of these interactions form a complex mandala of Buddhist literacy practices in Vietnamese traditional culture.