Feasting with Buddhist Women : Food Literacy in Religious Belonging
(2021) In Numen 68(5-6). p.567-592- Abstract
- This ethnographic study shows that women’s knowledge and practices involving food in Japanese Buddhist contexts circulate as gendered currency. It emphasizes how what we term “food literacy” cultivates aesthetic and affective senses of belonging among Buddhist practitioners. We argue that this embodied knowledge helps women negotiate their experiences of Buddhism and show how these experiences articulate the complexities of their bounded and self-disciplining Buddhist selves. Women use food literacy to teach, learn, and practice the way Buddhism feels and etch it into their own and others’ emotional, social, and material bodies. By recognizing women as stewards of religion, particularly through food literacy, we also elucidate how women’s... (More)
- This ethnographic study shows that women’s knowledge and practices involving food in Japanese Buddhist contexts circulate as gendered currency. It emphasizes how what we term “food literacy” cultivates aesthetic and affective senses of belonging among Buddhist practitioners. We argue that this embodied knowledge helps women negotiate their experiences of Buddhism and show how these experiences articulate the complexities of their bounded and self-disciplining Buddhist selves. Women use food literacy to teach, learn, and practice the way Buddhism feels and etch it into their own and others’ emotional, social, and material bodies. By recognizing women as stewards of religion, particularly through food literacy, we also elucidate how women’s uses of mundane practices illuminate food literacy as a value carrier that generates belonging through food. Such practices can equally become sites of failure to connect if the intended recipients do not share understandings or appreciations of the aesthetic and affective dimensions of it. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/102889f0-ceef-43c2-8888-62bbdc614c11
- author
- Kolata, Paulina LU and Gillson, Gwendolyn
- organization
- publishing date
- 2021
- type
- Contribution to journal
- publication status
- published
- subject
- keywords
- Buddhism, Buddhist women, Japanese Buddhism, Japan, food literacy, religious belonging, affect, gendered currency, gender
- in
- Numen
- volume
- 68
- issue
- 5-6
- pages
- 26 pages
- publisher
- Brill
- external identifiers
-
- scopus:85116544152
- ISSN
- 1568-5276
- DOI
- 10.1163/15685276-12341640
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- 102889f0-ceef-43c2-8888-62bbdc614c11
- date added to LUP
- 2021-08-02 17:51:25
- date last changed
- 2022-04-27 02:58:27
@article{102889f0-ceef-43c2-8888-62bbdc614c11,
abstract = {{This ethnographic study shows that women’s knowledge and practices involving food in Japanese Buddhist contexts circulate as gendered currency. It emphasizes how what we term “food literacy” cultivates aesthetic and affective senses of belonging among Buddhist practitioners. We argue that this embodied knowledge helps women negotiate their experiences of Buddhism and show how these experiences articulate the complexities of their bounded and self-disciplining Buddhist selves. Women use food literacy to teach, learn, and practice the way Buddhism feels and etch it into their own and others’ emotional, social, and material bodies. By recognizing women as stewards of religion, particularly through food literacy, we also elucidate how women’s uses of mundane practices illuminate food literacy as a value carrier that generates belonging through food. Such practices can equally become sites of failure to connect if the intended recipients do not share understandings or appreciations of the aesthetic and affective dimensions of it.}},
author = {{Kolata, Paulina and Gillson, Gwendolyn}},
issn = {{1568-5276}},
keywords = {{Buddhism; Buddhist women; Japanese Buddhism; Japan; food literacy; religious belonging; affect; gendered currency; gender}},
language = {{eng}},
number = {{5-6}},
pages = {{567--592}},
publisher = {{Brill}},
series = {{Numen}},
title = {{Feasting with Buddhist Women : Food Literacy in Religious Belonging}},
url = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/15685276-12341640}},
doi = {{10.1163/15685276-12341640}},
volume = {{68}},
year = {{2021}},
}