Events

Jointly organized by Asia Research Institute, and Wan Boo Sow Research Centre for Chinese Culture at the Department of Chinese Studies, National University of Singapore.

CHAIRPERSON

Prof Kenneth Dean, Asia Research Institute, and Department of Chinese Studies, National University of Singapore

ABSTRACT

Though long seen uniquely from the perspective of the Chinese literary canon, Tao Qian’s 陶潛(365?-427) famous “Record of the Peach Blossom Spring” (“Taohuayuan ji” 桃花源記) may find an even more fruitful disciplinary home in religious studies. The story refers itself to a grotto at Wuling 武陵 (nowadays northern Hunan province, PRC), a site that has been associated with Daoist “divine transcendents” (shenxian 神仙) at least since the middle of the sixth century. An older Daoist monastery on that same site, the Peach Spring Abbey (Taoyuan guan 桃源觀) or Peach Blossom Abbey (Taohua guan 桃花觀), became officially recognized in 748 and received imperial support not long after. This talk discusses the long history of Peach Spring as a sacred site, or, as Tao Qian referred to it in his poem, a “divine realm” (shenjie 神界), and relates it to the living ritual tradition in Hunan that revolves around the female transcendents (“Immortal Mothers,” xianniang 仙娘) dwelling in the grotto.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Mark Meulenbeld received his training at the Sinological Institute of Leiden University, the Netherlands, where he was steeped in philological and anthropological approaches to traditional China, with special training in Daoism. From 2000 to 2007, he studied at Princeton University, where he obtained a PhD in East Asian Studies. He is currently Associate Professor at the School of Chinese, The University of Hong Kong, and has previously taught at Bryn Mawr College, University of Wisconsin-Madison, National University of Singapore, and Hong Kong Polytechnic University. He is the author of Demonic Warfare: Daoism, Territorial Networks, and the History of a Ming Novel (U Hawaii Press, 2015) and many articles on Daoism and literature.

REGISTRATION

Admission is free. Please register at https://forms.office.com/r/xfVbYwp9Cb, and we will confirm your mode of attendance and email you the webinar link prior to the event.