{"product_id":"goddess-on-the-frontier-9780804799546","title":"Goddess on the Frontier","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"No other work has linked gendered religious symbols to the complex process of identity-making in such a long historical span, and with such analytical depth. Meticulously researched and lucidly written, this book makes an important and timely contribution to dialogues about religion, gender, and ethnicity in China.\" -- Xiaofei Kang * George Washington University *\u003cbr\u003e\"A compelling interdisciplinary study of a fascinating religio-cultural phenomenon on the frontiers of China, India, and Southeast Asia. Bryson has skillfully combined historical research with fieldwork to produce a methodologically sophisticated portrait of a regionally important goddess through her many historical and contemporary vicissitudes.\" -- Robert Ford Campany * Vanderbilt University *\u003cbr\u003e\"A tour de force of historical and ethnographic inquiry, \u003ci\u003eGoddess on the Frontier\u003c\/i\u003e sheds invaluable light on the religion and culture of southwest China. Combining meticulous scholarship with sophisticated theory, this book is a must-read for anyone interested in the interplay of gender, ethnicity, and religion.\" -- Meir Shahar * Tel Aviv University *\u003cbr\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eGoddess on the Frontier\u003c\/i\u003e vividly portrays religious life in Dali (Yunnan). Megan Bryson's interdisciplinary research shows how the manifold images of the goddess Baijie resulted from local worshippers adapting to the impact of Buddhism and Han Chinese culture by subverting stereotypes of sexually uninhibited minority women, while still emphasizing indigenous ideals of feminine fertility.\"— Paul R. Katz, Academia Sinica\u003cbr\u003e\"Bryson hits her target well...The scholarship is excellent, the sources well researched, and the ancillary references useful.\" -- John W. Dardess * \u003ci\u003eJournal of Interdisciplinary History\u003c\/i\u003e *\u003cbr\u003e\"Megan Bryson's new book, \u003ci\u003eGoddess on the Frontier: Religion, Ethnicity, and Gender in Southwest China\u003c\/i\u003e, offers not only another example of the growing academic discourse on Dali, one of the most popular tourist destinations nowadays in Southwest China, but also an ingenuous case study of Baijie, an iconic figure in the cultural life of the Bai people in Dali....Clarifying, refreshing, and thought provoking, the book is a very layered analysis of Baijie.\" -- Yuemin He * \u003ci\u003eReligion and the Arts\u003c\/i\u003e *\u003cbr\u003e\"[T]he author has successfully created a fascinating study of a Chinese frontier where histories, borders, cultures, religions, and ethnicities converge. Bryson has deftly combined historiography and art history with ethnography, and is thereby able to present before our eyes a sophisticated picture of a local goddess.\" -- Naran Bilik * \u003ci\u003eNova Religio\u003c\/i\u003e *\u003cbr\u003e\"This is an outstanding work of scholarship on gender and religion in Chinese history. Bryson selected a perfect case study to shed light on how people in frontier zones develop regional identities from a range of possibilities, and the role gender plays in these possibilities.\"––Ping Yao, \u003ci\u003eJournal of Chinese Religions\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"By employing such a thorough methodology, Bryson has compiled a volume of immense use to anyone in the field of Chinese religions, especially those seeking a window into the interaction of religion, ethnicity, and gender.\" -- Joseph Chadwin * \u003ci\u003eReligious Studies Review\u003c\/i\u003e *\u003cbr\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eGoddess on the Frontier\u003c\/i\u003e is an intellectual powerhouse....I wholeheartedly recommend the study for its depth of otherwise unavailable historical and anthropological information on the Dali region, for its potential strength in graduate training, and for its firm insistence that frontier regions of the Chinese heartland need to be studied on their own terms.\" -- Stephanie Balkwell * \u003ci\u003eH-Buddhism\u003c\/i\u003e *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTable of Contents\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eContents and AbstractsIntroduction: Religion, Ethnicity, and Gender in Dali chapter abstract\u003cp\u003eThe introduction gives an overview of the goddess Baijie's four identities and the book's main themes of religion, ethnicity, and gender. It starts by examining the relationship between deities and society, with a focus on gendered deities, local deities, and deities of the Chinese frontier. It also introduces the Dali region, which it locates both in Zomia, the mountainous, stateless region that covers much of Southeast Asia and southwest China, and in relation to the Chinese state. Baijie's different forms illustrate how people in Dali managed the tensions between their local identities and the increasing proximity of the Chinese state. Finally, the introduction addresses historiographical and methodological issues that arise in studying Dali and concludes with an outline of each chapter.\u003c\/p\u003e 1Baijie's Background: Religion and Representation in the Nanzhao and Dali Kingdoms chapter abstract\u003cp\u003eChapter one goes back to the Nanzhao (649-903) and Dali kingdoms (937-1253) to understand the broader context in which the Buddhist Baijie arose. It shows that though Nanzhao and Dali rulers adopted most of their Buddhist texts from Chinese territory, they embraced Indian Buddhist images and claimed Indian origins for their Buddhist tradition. Moreover, it was their worship of distinctive deities with Indian iconography that distinguished their Buddhist tradition from that of Tang and Song China. This emphasis on India did not just stem from India's prestige as Buddhism's birthplace, but also from Dali's position in relation to China. While Nanzhao and Dali rulers could not claim equality with Chinese rulers as Sons of Heaven, their relative proximity to India meant that they could claim superiority as Buddhist monarchs.\u003c\/p\u003e 2Holy Consort White Sister: Baijie Shengfei and Dali Buddhism chapter abstract\u003cp\u003eThe second chapter focuses on the Buddhist Baijie Shengfei, a hybrid figure whose identity combines elements of the Indian goddess Lakmī and local dragon maidens. This chapter demonstrates how her hybridity and gendered characteristics relate to Dali rulers' religious self-representation. It argues that though Baijie Shengfei appears in tantric Buddhist materials as the consort of the wrathful Indian Buddhist protector Mahākāla, she herself does not embody the sexuality or violence seen in images of many Indian and Tibetan tantric goddesses. Dali rulers embraced images of fierce tantric masculinity, as shown in Dali-kingdom depictions of Mahākāla, but this did not extend to female figures like Baijie. This stemmed from Dali rulers' close interactions with China, in which Dali could exploit stereotypes of martial masculine barbarism to their advantage, but not stereotypes of sexually uninhibited barbarian femininity.\u003c\/p\u003e 3Little White Sister: Baijie Amei, Dragons, and Kingship in Ming Dali chapter abstract\u003cp\u003eThis chapter examines Baijie's next form, Baijie Amei, which developed in the fifteenth century after the Dali kingdom had become part of the Ming dynasty. Baijie Amei's legend shows how Dali elites drew on Chinese historiographical conventions in formulating a local Bai ethnic identity. According to her legend, Baijie Amei was born from a giant plum and conceived Duan Siping, founder of the Dali kingdom, after touching a dragon. This story mirrors Chinese tales about great rulers that claim dragon paternity, but diverges from Chinese conventions by giving Baijie Amei her own miraculous birth. Chinese officials accepted that male rulers could have miraculous births, but not that their mothers could, too. Baijie Amei remained a powerful symbol for Bai elites in Dali who claimed direct descent from her and worshiped her as a goddess that linked them to the illustrious Bai lineage of Dali's independent history.\u003c\/p\u003e 4Lady of Cypress Chastity: Baijie Furen in the Ming and Qing chapter abstract\u003cp\u003eAs the Ming dynasty continued and gave way to the Qing, more migrants from the empire's eastern and central regions made their way to Yunnan. Baijie Furen, the third form of Baijie, emerged as a result of this increasing contact between Han outsiders and Dali locals. This chapter argues that Baijie Furen, portrayed in legend as an eighth-century widow martyr, supplanted the earlier forms of Baijie because of her multifaceted identity: for Dali elites, she signified the region's long history of Confucian virtues, which marked it as civilized; for Ming and Qing elites, her exceptional example proved that imperial civilizing projects could succeed. In both cases Baijie Furen served as a proxy for the Bai people because male elites correlated a population's civilization with women's sexual propriety.\u003c\/p\u003e 5Baijie the Benzhu: Village Religion in Contemporary Dali chapter abstract\u003cp\u003eBaijie's significance shifts again in the modern period with the adoption of the terms ethnicity and religion. In the reform era (1978-present) Baijie again represents difference from Chinese identity, but in this period the language of ethnicity demarcates Bai from Han. However, the use of this language differs within the Dali population: male Bai elites present Baijie as a symbol of Bai ethnic culture, while most people who worship Baijie as their village guardian use gendered terms instead of ethnic discourse. Male Bai elites claim a modern, rational identity similar to the image of the Han and displace tradition, religiosity, and ethnic difference onto rural populations and women. This chapter relies in part on ethnographic research that examines how people not involved in textual production represent Baijie, which offers a new perspective on how gender plays a role in demarcating Bai ethno-cultural identities.\u003c\/p\u003e Conclusion: Ethnicity and Gender in the Cult of the Goddess Baijie chapter abstract\u003cp\u003eThe conclusion returns to the book's central question of how people in the frontier zone of Dali develop gendered local identities out of multiple possibilities. Baijie's examples, from the Dali kingdom to the present, show that people Dali locals have combined local and translocal elements in different ways in response to historical changes. Representations of Dali identity strategically use gendered symbols that correlate to local and translocal forces, so that Baijie's roles as dragon maiden, mother, and martyr tie her to Dali while also making her legible within universalizing semiotic systems.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Stanford University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":49405631267159,"sku":"9780804799546","price":49.3,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9780804799546.jpg?v=1730493064","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/goddess-on-the-frontier-9780804799546","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}