[Dissertation] The Fallible Body in Early Medieval China

Author: 
Li, Xiaoxuan

Degree date: 
2020

School:
Harvard University

Abstract:
This dissertation examines one of the most important assumptions inherited by early medieval China: that the physical body functions as a valid and readable source of knowledge about individuals and the world they inhabit. It considers the continuity and evolution of this assumption during the period of the Six Dynasties (3rd - 6th centuries CE), and argues that it is contested across various genres of textual representation. I identify the emergence of a “fallible” body in three clusters of texts. First, I discuss how the late third century idea of “knowing others” (zhiren 知人) diverges from an earlier physiognomic tradition, and I interpret several rhapsodies (fu 賦) in the context of this zhiren paradigm. I explain their choice of rhetorical strategies, most centrally the conceit of a ventriloquized body part, as rooted in a challenge against the regime of interpreting one’s physical appearance for ability and status. Second, I examine the relationship between representations of the female body and knowledge of interior subjectivity in the rhapsody tradition from the Han (206 BCE-220 CE) through the Liang (502-557 CE), and locate in the shi (詩) poetry of the fifth and sixth centuries a new interest in the disjunction between the inherited literary discourse of this relationship and its basis in economic and social realities. Lastly, I discuss the motif of the anomalous body in zhiguai (志怪) collections, and through a comparison between Buddhist apologetic sources with more heterogenous compilations, show how certain tales question the status of bodily markings as evidence for both narrative and moral resolution.

A Pure Mind in a Clean Body: Bodily Care in the Buddhist Monasteries of Ancient India and China

Authors:
Ann Heirman & Mathieu Torck

Publication Year:
2013

Publisher:
Gent: Academia Press

Abstract:

Buddhist monasteries, in both Ancient India and China, rightfully attract the attention of many scholars, discussing historical backgrounds, institutional networks or influential masters. Still, some aspects of monastic life have not yet received the attention they deserve. This book therefore aims to study some of the most essential, but often overlooked, issues of Buddhist life, namely, practices and objects of bodily care. For monastic authors, bodily care primarily involves bathing, washing, cleaning, shaving and trimming the nails, activities of everyday life that are performed by lay people and monastics alike. In this sense, they provide a potential bridge between two worlds that are constantly interacting with each other: monastic people and their lay followers.