essay

The revival of monastic life in Deprung Monastery

Buddhism in contemporary Tibet : religious revival and cultural identityBerkeleyPublished In 1998 • Pages: 15-52

By: Goldstein, Melvyn C..

AbstractBrief abstract written by HRAF anthropologists who have done the subject indexing for the document
The article outlines four periods of Tibet Buddhism under in Communist era, focusing on Drepung Monastery, Tibet's largest. The four periods are 1951-1959, a gradualist period of accommodation albeit ending with the abortive Tibetan uprising; 1959-1966, when Beijing dismantled monastery supports. 1966 marked the beginning of the Cultural Revolution and an all out attempt to destroy religion. By the end of these last two periods, the population of monks at the monastery had shrunk to 306 from a 1959 high of 10,000. The final period began in 1978, the year of the liberalizing reforms of the Eleventh Party Plenum, which restored of religious practices. The authors document the work of the Democratic Management Committee (DMC), a committee of poorer and progressive monks, and its efforts to gradually restore the monastic way of life.
SubjectsDocument-level OCM identifiers given by the anthropology subject indexers at HRAF
External relations
Miscellaneous government activities
Political movements
Theological systems
Prophets and ascetics
cultureCulture name from the Outline of World Cultures (OWC)
Tibetans
HRAF PubDateThe date HRAF published the document
2010
RegionThe area the document pertains to
Asia
Sub RegionThe more specific area the document pertains to, which is located within the Region
Central Asia
Document TypeMay include journal articles, essays, collections of essays, monographs, or chapters/parts of monographs
essay
Evaluation
Creator TypeThe type of person writing the document, e.g. Ethnographer, Missionary, Archaeologist, Folklorist, Linguist, Indigenous Person, and so on.
Ethnologist
Document Rating A ranking done by HRAF anthropologists based on the strength of the source material on a scale of 1 to 5, as follows: 1 - poor; 2 - fair; 3 - good, useful data, but not uniformly excellent; 4 - excellent secondary data; 5 - excellent primary data.
4: Excellent Secondary Data
5: Excellent Primary Data
AnalystThe HRAF anthropologist who subject indexed the document and prepared other materials for the eHRAF culture/tradition collection
Ian Skoggard; 2009
Field DateThe date the researcher conducted the fieldwork or archival research that produced the document
no date
Coverage DateThe date or dates that the information in the document pertains to
1978-1996
Coverage PlaceLocation of the research culture or tradition (often a smaller unit such as a band, community, or archaeological site)
Lhasa, Tibet
NotesAdditional notes
Melvyn c. Goldstein
For bibliographical references see document 30: Goldstein and Kapstein
LCCNLibrary of Congress Control Number
97026851
LCSHLibrary of Congress Subject Headings
Tibet (China)--Ethnology