Proposing a feminist reading strategy for Medieval Chinese sources: What? Why? How?

This workshop will be equal parts reading Buddhist texts in Literary Chinese and thinking about why we read the things we read. 

Specifically, I’d like us to think about whether or not it is appropriate to bring our own modern ethics to the study of textual records from the distant past. By exploring a cluster of Mahāyāna Buddhist texts that feature narrative episodes of female-to-male bodily transformation, I hope to engage us in a conversation about how we read primary sources as research experts, what we look for, and the types of arguments that can be made from our source materials. 

Ultimately, I will propose that a feminist reading strategy is one that enables us to use feminist-derived methods of humanistic inquiry to think critically about the past while also being responsible historians. 

About the speaker

Stephanie Balkwill is Associate Professor of Chinese Buddhism at the University of California, Los Angeles where she is also the Director of the Center for Buddhist Studies. She conducts research on the intellectual, political, and religious lives of women who lived in China during the 4^th-6^th centuries and she is the author of The Women Who Ruled China: Buddhism, Multiculturalism, and Governance in the 6^th Century (UC Press, 2024). She is also the co-editor of Buddhist Statecraft in East Asia (Brill, 2022).

Attending the event

This event is free and open to all, but registration is required. Please email Haruka Saito (hs77@soas.ac.uk) to register.

• Organiser: Centre of Buddhist Studies
• The Ho Foundation Lecture Series in Chinese Buddhism is kindly sponsored by The Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation