Constituting Communities: Theravada Buddhism and the Religious Cultures of South and Southeast Asia

Explores how community is defined and how it functions among Theravada Buddhists in South and Southeast Asia.

Constituting Communities explores how community functions within Theravāda Buddhist culture. Although the dominant focus of Buddhist studies for the past century has been on doctrinal and philosophical issues, this volume concentrates on discourses that produced them, and why and how these discourses and practices shaped Theravāda communities in South and Southeast Asia. From a varie...