The Mystery as a Symbolic Idiom — A Buddhist Temple in South China

• This essay explores a southern Chinese Buddhist temple as an assembly of symbolic spaces and of objects distributed over these spaces. The symbolic construction is regulated by explicit rules as to distinctions and directions. The objects fill the spaces with a Buddhist story line by clustering elements of Buddhist creeds that are largely unknown to worshippers. These objects have been provided with an artistic form. Taken together, beautiful things and the design of the halls form an aesthetic iconic vision which carries a nebulous moral message. In the temple, exclusive discourse is converted into inclusive iconic displays, theological speculations into demotic transcendental experiences.

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Sociologi -- Socialantropologi (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Sociology -- Social Anthropology (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

South China

Buddhism

Temples

Symbology

Cultural grammars

Publikations- och innehållstyp

ref (ämneskategori)

art (ämneskategori)