Buddhism: Critical Concepts in Religious Studies, Volume VII

Volume VII of Buddhism: Critical Concepts in Religious Studies provides a focused examination of Buddhism in Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia through selected studies representing major directions in modern Theravāda scholarship. Edited by Paul Williams, the collection places canonical and institutional Buddhism alongside lived religious practice. Its contributors investigate how Vinaya, Dhamma, merit, ethical narratives, law, gender, political organization, and local traditions interact within particular historical and social settings. Especially significant is the volume’s sustained attention to Buddhist law: rather than treating Vinaya exclusively as monastic discipline, several studies reveal it as a complex legal and interpretive tradition that has interacted with wider political and social orders. The essays on Sri Lankan female renunciants, Sinhalese Buddhism, Mandalay, Thailand, and the Mon kingdom further demonstrate the diversity of Theravāda traditions across South and Southeast Asia. The volume therefore provides an important scholarly bridge between textual Buddhist Studies and the anthropological, historical, legal, and sociological study of lived Buddhism.