The Centrality of the Female Monastic and Female Laypersons in the Fo Guang Shan Buddhist Organization in Malaysia

Project Title:
The Centrality of the Female Monastic and Female Laypersons in the Fo Guang Shan Buddhist Organization in Malaysia

Research Team:
Dr Lai Suat Yan

Introduction & Problem Statement
Various studies have been conducted on the Fo Guang Shan Buddhist Organization globally. In the context of Taiwan, these include focusing on promoting Buddhism through modern sports (Yu 2011), as modern religious tourism (Shih 2016) and on its short-term monastic retreat and ethical pedagogy (Laidlaw and Mair 2019). The transnational spread of the organization as a Buddhist missionary has also been studied (Chandler 2004), specifically in terms of its localization through the Woodenfish, a one-month residency academic program (Verchery 2010) and its spread to South Africa (Reinke, 2020). In the context of Malaysia, a study on the Buddhist revitalization movements in urban areas as represented by four organizations has included the Fo Guang Shan chapter in Malaysia (Tan 2020). There is, however, no study yet that analyse the gendered dimension of Fo Guang Shan while a study that examines the female charisma of the Buddhist Tzu Chi Movement has been conducted (Huang 2008). This is despite the fact that in Fo Guang Shan monastic women comprise over ninety percent and greatly outnumber their male counterpart. Significantly, the organization upholds gender equality with monastic women leading in various roles from prayers, ritual activities, educational, cultural to social welfare work at the local or global level. Specifically, this is also reflected in the Malaysian context.  In addition, Fo Guang Shan also responds to not only the needs of the Malaysian Chinese Buddhist community but the Malaysian community in general as seen during the COVID.