Maria Sharapan – University of Jyväskylä, Finland
Keywords
cultural identity, flows, Buddhism, West, Tibetan Buddhism
Abstract
Conversion into a foreign religion, which carries distinct non-modern discourses, is an interesting case for looking into the process of construction of new cultural identities. The focus of this study is how the boundaries of being “Buddhist” are negotiated between convert religious followers in two Tibetan Buddhist groups in Helsinki, Finland, and their teachers as perceived carriers of this identity. The study is based on 16 interviews with students in the two groups, and 5 interviews with Tibetan Buddhist teachers, collected as part of a dissertation project in 2016 and in 2017-2019 respectively. The results are based on thematic analysis of the semi-structured interviews, as well as participant observation. My epistemological take on the data is rooted in a classic understanding of social constructionism (Berger & Luckmann, 1966/1991), seeing knowledge and meaning as products of cycles of institutionalization, socialization and individualization, specifically focusing on the phenomenological (individualization) reflection of the matter (Blum, 2012). The stereo focus of the study, namely the voices of the teachers and the students allow to trace a formation of how an institutionalized understanding of a “Buddhist” is received and made personal by new adepts.
A brief look into the subject of Buddhism in the West reveals a predominance of “Westernization” perspective (Capper, 2002; Gleig, 2013). Prominent scholars tend to focus on the inevitable change that Buddhism(s) undergo in their “assimilation” to the new cultural realms, and formation of distinct geographical “Western” Buddhisms (Seager, 2012). Another prominent perspective is a critical discussion in the spirit of “cultural appropriation” (Konik, 2009; Mullen, 2001; Zablocki, 2009), which discusses the problematics of adopting a Tibetan Buddhist identity with its meaning systems in view of the post-colonial power imbalance and incompatibility with the modern Western discourse. While there can be value to such research and it could shed light on important problems in the issue at hand, its ontological underpinnings are open to debate. Both perspectives (“assimilation” and “cultural appropriation”) lean heavily on an understanding of one’s worldview and religious practice as tied to the perceived cultural belonging of the subjects. And both perspectives lack explanatory power with respect to the this study.
Instead, the findings reveal a process of dialogical construction of a Buddhist worldview and identity, which are just as clearly avowed as they are shaped in context, negotiated and constructed. This paradoxical relationship between one’s embrace of being a “Buddhist” and the negotiation of traditional and individual understanding of what it means is better explained not through the boundaried categories of “religion” and “culture”, but through the concept of flows (Tweed, 2011). This study demonstrates how the symbols, narratives, historical and modern figures, and most importantly, meaning and systems of meaning transcend geographical and historical boundaries. These cultural flows, traversing space and time, shape peculiar and counter-intuitive cultural phenomena, which, nevertheless, only seem odd in view of our fixated notions of culture (Tibetan versus Western) and age (21st century versus pre-modernity). Contrary to that, this study invites the reader to re-imagine these notions as discursive ways of talking about reality, rather than reality itself. This kind of shaping of identities and societies through flows is seen as a natural historical process, which globalization and digitalization exacerbate rather than induce (Welsch, 1999). The identity shaped in this process manifests not only through nominal avowal and being a member of a group, but also on the level of physical representation, behavior, ethics, belief and purpose. These levels of manifestation are presented as expressions of cultural flows, traversing space and time, urged by the human needs for meaning and belonging.
Bibliography
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Mullen, E. 2001. The American occupation of Tibetan Buddhism. Jugend Religion Unterricht ed. Waxmann.
Seager, R. H. (2012). Buddhism in America. Columbia University Press.
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Author’s Bibliography
Sharapan, M. & Swann N. (2019). Negotiating tradition in a postmodern society: Tibetan Buddhism online. In Eds. Atay A. & D’Silva M. Mediated Intercultural Communication in a Digital Age. Routledge.
Sharapan, M. (2018). Social Constructionism and religious experience: Case of Tibetan Buddhist converts in Finland. At Vajrayana Summit conference in Thimphu, Bhutan, conference proceedings, p. 255-288 Available online.
Sharapan, M. (2018). Discovering Buddhism Online: a translocative analysis of Tibetan Buddhist forum discussions, Heidelberg Journal of Religions on the Internet, a research article. Available online in October 2018.
Sharapan, M. & Härkönen M. (2017). Teacher-student relations in two Tibetan Buddhist groups in Helsinki. Contemporary Buddhism 18 (2), 437-454, a research article