Belief In China Research Articles

Empreintes du tantrisme en Chine et en Asie orientale: Imaginaires, rituels, influences by Vincent Durand-Dastès

Reviewed by: Empreintes du tantrisme en Chine et en Asie orientale: Imaginaires, rituels, influences by Vincent Durand-Dastès Martin Lehnert Vincent Durand-Dastès, ed., Empreintes du tantrisme en Chine et en Asie orientale: Imaginaires, rituels, influences. Institut Belge de Hautes Études Chinoises, Mélanges Chinois et Bouddhiques, vol. 32. Leuven, Paris, and Bristol, CT: Peeters, 2016. vi, 380 pp. €80 (pb). ISBN 978-90-429-3034-6 As a follow up to a symposium held at the Centre d’études chinoises of INALCO, Paris, on May 15, 2009, this volume traces Tantric practices and beliefs in China and East Asia by focusing on the related imaginations, rituals, and influences in the wider religious contexts both in pre-modern and (to a lesser extent) modern society. The variety of contexts requires a heuristic, subject-related approach that would allow one not to get lost in the diversity of particular phenomena. In his “Introduction,” Vincent Durand-Dastès defines a set of criteria that help to delimit the subject: (1) the importance of sophisticated rituals, in particular rituals of consecration and for the evocation of deities; (2) a particular pantheon related to such rituals; (3) the importance of thaumaturgical practices; (4) the purported immediate “magical” efficacy of ritual actions and objects; (5) affirmation of “passions” and practices in soteriological terms which Buddhist doctrine would not [End Page 73] otherwise consider; (6) implementation of such means for individual as well as governmental ends, the latter often based on notions of sacral kingship. As none of these criteria exclusively apply to Buddhist formations, the editor and authors prefer the concept of “Tantrism” (instead of, e.g., esoteric Buddhism, although this terminological decision is not adhered to in a strictly programmatic manner), which also allows for more flexibility in tracing the variety of relations to Daoism, Shintō, and vernacular religion. Such an approach, on the one hand, keeps up the tradition of Michel Strickmann’s groundbreaking studies (to the memory of whom the volume is also dedicated), and, on the other hand, further differentiates scholarly conceptions of “Tantrism” in the context of East Asian religion. The volume is divided into three sections. The first section, “Imaginaires,” comprises three chapters dealing with Tantric influences on the iconography, literature, and mythology of pre-modern China: Caroline Gyss examines liturgical furnishings and paintings (largely from Baoningsi 寶寧寺) pertaining to the “purificatory ritual of water and land” (shuiluzhai 水陸齋) and highlights local dynamics that helped to define the status of Tantric and/or Daoist deities during the Ming period. Vincent Durand-Dastès gives a detailed analysis of the perceived moral ambiguity of Tantric practices as they are described in sixteenth and seventeenth-century Chinese novels. Finally, Meir Shahar maps out the background, sources, and developments which nourished the Chinese imagination about the Nezha 那吒 deity with particular regard to Kṛṣṇa and Indian mythology. The second section, “Rituels,” deals with the socio-historical aspects of ritual practice: With special focus on the “Records of Yijian” (Yijian zhi 夷堅志), a famous collection of stories about things divine and supernatural compiled around 1198, Liu Hong examines lay Buddhist uses of the still popular “Dhāraṇī of Great Compassion” (Dabei zhou 大悲咒) and highlights its therapeutic and apotropaic significance in the context of medical practice vis-à-vis shamanism. In the only chapter written in English, Ester Bianchi discusses pre-modern as well as modern Chinese versions of the “Chanting of the Names of Mañjuśrī” (Mañjuśrī-nāma-saṃgīti) and their reception in twentieth-century China, which was also motivated by the growing interest in Tibetan Buddhism. Addressing contemporary Daoist ritual and the influence of Tantric mūdra-practice, Brigitte Baptandier gives an account of the various thaumaturgic and therapeutic competences maintained by the ritual experts of the Lüshan pai 閭山派 tradition located in Fujian and Taiwan. The third section, “Contrepoints: Japon et Corée,” comprises two chapters addressing Tantric practices in Japan and Korea, respectively: François Macé outlines certain synthetic aspects of Tantric Buddhism in Japan which reflect the ambiguity of tutelary deities venerated for their protective as well as transgressive assistance to the clergy and the lay people. With a length of 86...

Empreintes du tantrisme en Chine et en Asie orientale: Imaginaires, rituels, influences

As a follow up to a symposium held at the Centre d’etudes chinoises of INALCO, Paris, on May 15, 2009, this volume traces Tantric practices and beliefs in China and East Asia by focusing on the rel...

Barriers to Hospital Deliveries among Ethnic Minority Women with Religious Beliefs in China: A Descriptive Study Using Interviews and Survey Data

Background: China has made great progress in improving hospital delivery-the coverage of hospital delivery has increased to above 95% in most regions- some regions lag behind owing to geographic and economic inequality, particularly the poor ethnic minority areas of the Sichuan Province. This study explores factors which may influence hospital delivery from multiple perspectives, with implications for practice and policy. Methods: A framework analysis approach was used to identify and categorize the main barriers and levers to hospital delivery. Our analysis draws on basic information from the sampled counties (Butuo and Daofu). Results: The hospital delivery rate was below 50% in the two sampled areas. In both areas, the “New Rural Cooperative Medical Scheme” and “Rural hospital delivery subsidy” were introduced, but only Butuo county had a transportation subsidy policy. Socioeconomically disadvantaged women in both counties who delivered their babies in hospitals could also apply for financial assistance. A lack of transport was among the main reasons for low hospital delivery rates in these two counties. Furthermore, while the hospital delivery costs could be mostly covered by “New Rural Cooperative Medical Scheme” or “Rural Hospital Delivery Subsidy”, reimbursement was not guaranteed. People in Daofu county might be affected by their Buddhism religion for hospital delivery. Women in Butuo following the Animism religion would refuse delivery in hospitals because of language barriers. Traditional lay beliefs were the main factor that influenced hospital delivery; their understandings of reproductive health varied, and many believed that childbirth should not be watched by strangers and that a home delivery was safe. Conclusions: This study has highlighted a number of barriers and levers to hospital delivery in rural poor ethnic minority areas which could inform and improve the access and rate of hospital delivery rate; thereby reducing health inequalities in maternal and child health in China.

Chinese Ghosts and Tibetan Buddhism

This article examines three narratives about ghost beliefs in China, including those of ancestral time, the state, and certain Tibetan Buddhist masters. It focuses on the ghost experiences of Chinese Tibetan Buddhist practitioners and examines how their conceptualizations of ghosts may both overlap with and differ from those of the state and their Tibetan Buddhist masters. Just as ghosts have traditionally symbolized both a fear of being forgotten and of malevolent reprisals after death, these respective narratives also selectively remember and forget elements of ghost beliefs and stories in order to propagate a wider agenda. Chinese practitioners, who have often been exposed to the state and modernist Tibetan Buddhist narratives, as well as a narrative of ghosts according to ancestral time, appear to mark out a space between these three narratives, revealing their own ambivalence, caught between “tradition” and “progress,” and “superstition” and “scientific rationalism.”

Effects of Media Exemplars on the Perception of Social Issues With Pre-Existing Beliefs

Exemplification studies usually examined the influence of media exemplars on people’s perceptions of fictional or controversial issues, but neglected the circumstances when people have prior beliefs. The present research tested the effects of media exemplars on people’s perceptions of Chengguan–vendor conflicts, a social issue with strong prior beliefs in China. The typical between-group exemplification effect was not evident; a relative, within-group exemplification effect was found; and a progressively decaying exemplification effect emerged. Yet, when evaluating belief/attitude formation and change beyond the media context, initial belief emerged as the most prominent and the only consistent predictor of subsequent perceptions.

Dissemination and aggregation: Some reflections on the transformation processes affecting folk belief in China

The relevance of investigating the religious life of the common people in China has long been underestimated. This paper first examines the concepts of folk belief and folk religion and their characteristics based on historical and empirical materials. Then it addresses the possible patterns affecting the changeable religious elements – dissemination and aggregation. Finally, it describes the differing dynamics of integration within certain specific religions. The author argues that the social permeability of ‘little traditions’ and ‘great traditions’ has provided a substantial orientation for the establishment of people’s religious lives, and may also serve as a lens through which we may better understand the processes of social transformation in China.

Country of origin and brand image influences on perceptions of online game quality

AbstractThe authors of this study investigate online game consumption in Korea and China, the two key Asian markets, to analyze relationships among country of origin (COO), brand image, belief toward online games, and perceived game quality. Perceived game quality includes three dimensions of quality: product quality, service quality, and gratification quality. The authors survey 355 Korean and Chinese online game users and find that brand image influences quality perceptions directly or indirectly through brand belief. Compared with brand image, COO seems to have indirect and weaker effects on perceptions of game quality. The multigroup research model reveals several cross‐country differences. COO significantly affects beliefs in China but not in Korea. Brand image more highly impacts brand beliefs in Korea than it does in China. To signal superior product or service quality to Chinese users, game developers should highlight COO along with other product information. To appeal to Korean users, game developers should strengthen symbolic aspects of brand image because Koreans react more positively to brand personality, brand content, and corporate identity. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Extreme weather experiences and climate change beliefs in China: An econometric analysis

This paper examines the extent and the determinants of global climate change beliefs. In contrast to former studies for the U.S. and other western countries, we focus on China due to its crucial role in international climate policy in conjunction with its vulnerability to global warming. The empirical analysis is based on unique data from a survey among more than 1000 adults in five Chinese cities. In line with former studies, our results reveal that the vast majority of almost 90% of the Chinese respondents believes in the existence of global warming. This seems to be a convenient and necessary basis for the support of costly public adaptation activities in China. Our econometric analysis reveals that already perceived experiences with extreme weather events (and particularly heatwaves) alone are strongly correlated with climate change beliefs and that physical or financial damages due to these events lead to even stronger relationships. Our estimation results additionally suggest females as well as people with a lower education, in medium ages, with higher household incomes, and from Chengdu or Shenyang to be more skeptical toward the existence of climate change.

Deviation and Rectification of Education for College Students’ Ideal and Belief From the Perspective of New Media: A Case Study of “the Hongyan Spirit”

The Hongyan Spirit of Chongqing is a significant part of education for college students’ ideal and belief in China. Against the background of new media, this very spirit is thrown into the realistic crisis of being dispelled, entertained and forgotten. In order to strengthen the efficiency of education of college students’ ideal and belief in real earnest, it is of paramount importance, based on the deep understanding of the times’ implication for the Hongyan Spirit from the perspective of new media, to switch the system of communication utterance, innovate the way how dissemination vehicles integrate and explore an educational path tallied with features of new media.

A consideration of hoarding disorder symptoms in China

BackgroundHoarding disorder is rarely examined in populations of non-European and/or non-Euro-American descent, especially in East Asian nations like China. Across two studies, the current investigation sets out to examine the psychometric properties of a Chinese version of a widely used measure of hoarding symptoms—the Savings Inventory Revised (SIR)—and to explore the nature of hoarding beliefs compared to a separate US sample. ProceduresFor the first study, 1828 college students in China completed a Mandarin translation of the SIR and measures of anxiety, depression, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. For the second study, 303 students from China and 87 students from the US completed the SIR and a novel hoarding beliefs questionnaire. FindingsIn the first study, the Chinese-version of the SIR demonstrated convergent and discriminant validity, as well as internal reliability and preliminary construct validity. However, evidence of temporal stability was modest and requires further investigation. In the second study, the Chinese sample endorsed greater hoarding symptoms and hoarding beliefs compared to the US sample, although only themes of usefulness and wastefulness were associated with hoarding in the Chinese samples, whereas a wider range of beliefs was linked with hoarding in the US sample. In addition, the factor structure of the SIR from the first study did not replicate in second study, suggesting that construct validity of the Chinese SIR may require further corroboration. ConclusionsThe current study established preliminary evidence for the reliability and validity of the Chinese SIR, although future research is needed to confirm its temporal stability and factor structure. Hoarding beliefs in China may be centered on themes of usefulness and wastefulness compared to more heterogeneous themes in the West, suggesting differential manifestations of hoarding tendencies in cultures of non-European and/or non-Euro-American descent.

The Mercantile Enlightenment in Late Qing and Early Republican China

Although late Qing and Republican China failed to witness an enlightenment movement in the European sense, China did go through an enlightenment process of its own. Chinese mercantilism, in close association with industrialization and the rise of capitalism, constituted an intellectual movement that cannot be overlooked. The mercantile enlightenment expressed in mercantilism went through various evolutionary stages, from birth to development to maturation. In this process, the values and beliefs of China’s feudal agrarian society were rejected and attacked and the new values championed by industrialists and merchants grew and spread. Although China’s enlightenment movement had its limitations, it played an important role in promoting the country’s transformation from an agrarian to an industrialized society and helped lay the foundation for China’s modernization. It also has implications for the rebuilding of commericial morality in China.

The Rural Cooperative in China under the Governance of the Christ Ethic Value

Based on the analysis on the basic information, problems and characters of rural cooperative in China, the paper finds that the cooperative governance by the blood, institution should be changed into the governance by civil ethic. We compare the relation between Christ ethic and the rural cooperative in China and find the close relation between them. The cooperation, equality and devotion in cooperatives are also shown in Christ. With the case of the cooperatives found by Chinese Christians, we also find that the belief in China should be of freedom, the traditional ethic should be innovated and the religions could promote the daily public good affairs without the political intervention.

The Study of College Students’ Beliefs in China

The beliefs of college students is an important issue that is followed closely by the Government of China (GOC). In recent years, the GOC increasingly has encouraged the investigation of religious problems of college students. This phenomenon relates to college students’ special position in Chinese social structure. In the past decade, research on college students’ beliefs from the perspective of psychology has achieved initial success. These research projects include studies on the current state and characteristics of college students’ beliefs, the religious beliefs of college students, the spirituality of college students, the relationship between belief and mental health, and cross-cultural research on the beliefs of college students who are of the Han and Zang nationalities. The results of these studies suggest that college students’ social beliefs dominate other beliefs; the number of college students who hold religious belief is increasing; people tend to form religious belief when encountering challenging events; there is a certain relationship between belief and mental health; and there are both common and distinguishing characteristics between Han and Zang college students.

Luck of the Draw: Creating Chinese Brand Names

<h3>ABSTRACT</h3> In the Asia-Pacific region, supernatural beliefs traditionally are believed to have a strong influence on product sales performance. In particular, name-giving—whether to a person or a product—has a strong perceived connection to fate. This study examined the relationship between branding practices and supernatural beliefs in China. In more than 50 percent of the cases we studied, the creation of brand names was based, in part, on a “lucky” number of total strokes drawn in creation of the characters that spelled out the brand name. Reinforcing that finding was the discovery that brand names comprising a lucky total-stroke number were more common in high-uncertain than low-uncertain market environments.

Discourse on Privacy by Women Writers in Late Twentieth-Century China

There is a common belief in China and the West that “the Chinese” have no concept of privacy, although there is a well-established tradition of private property and privacy values in China. In the twentieth century, especially in the PRC, rhetoric on the public good prevailed over individualism and subjectivity, but both privacy and private property have been reevaluated in the post-Mao era. In the 1990s, writing about private life became associated with fiction and journalism by women, and privacy became publishers’ shorthand for sexual revelations. By the end of the century, interest in the public at large showed a wider appreciation of the values and functions of privacy. At the same time, the status of private property in the constitution and in law was restored to precommunist respectability. This article analyzes the meanings and function of privacy in writing by women in the 1990s and comments on gender aspects of privacy as well as the relationships between authors, publishers, and readers in the late twentieth century.

Seeking Lost Codes in the Wilderness: The Search for a Hainanese Culture

Regional and provincial cultures have (re)emerged in China since the 1980s, regardless of their previous existence or articulation. Although it is not yet clear whether this represents the seemingly powerful trend of fragmentation or nothing but a superficial phenomenon generated by the unprecedented pace of economic integration throughout the country, there is every reason to believe that regional and provincial cultures, or identities, in China have been (re)shaped by the new process of modernization, decentralization and international interactions that have characterized the reform era. Competition for resources, markets and preferential policies have forced every locality to mobilize support from their local populations; reform, decentralization, marketization, internationalization, growing provincial autonomy and the decline of state ideology have combined to challenge some time-honoured traditions and provide an opportunity for the discourse of regional cultures and identities. While it is almost a common belief in China that a construction of a glorious past will inevitably lead to the self-confidence needed for a nation or community to build a better future, some see the current reforms as an opportunity to rid themselves of, or distance themselves from, the anti-commerce, anti-individual conservatism assumed to be inherent in the Chinese state ideology; others, those in the south-east coastal area in particular, find themselves natural heirs to the open and dynamic entrepreneurial culture suppressed by the centralized state in the past.

Civic Education and Social Diversity

How can civic education in a liberal democracy give social diversity its due? Two complementary concerns have informed a lot of liberal thinking on this subject. Liberals like John Stuart Mill worry that "the plea of liberty" by parents not block "the fulfillment by the State of its duties" to children. They also worry that civic education not be conceived or conducted in such a way as to stifle "diversity in opinions and modes of conduct."' Some prominent contemporary theorists add a new and interesting twist to these common--concerns. They criticize liberals like Mill and Kant for contributing to one of the central problems, the stifling of social diversity, that they are trying to resolve.2 The comprehensive liberal aim of educating children not only for citizenship but also for individuality or autonomy, these political liberals argue, does not leave enough room for social diversity. Would a civic educational program consistent with political liberalism accommodate significantly more social diversity than one guided by comprehensive liberalism?3 Political liberals claim that it would, and some recommend political liberalism to us largely on this basis. This article shows that political liberalism need not, and often does not, accommodate more social diversity through its civic educational program than comprehensive liberalism. Section I examines the defining difference between political and comprehensive liberalism and suggests why we might expect to find a significant difference in the accommodation of social diversity by political and comprehensive liberalism through civic education.