From the Perspective of “Children of the Earth”: a Discourse on Buddhist Children’s Literature that Accords with Dharma Principles and Human

• Main Authors: Man-Chu Chuang, 莊滿祝
• Other Authors: 黃雅淳教授
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2012
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/98772163078967872092

碩士 === 國立臺東大學 === 兒童文學研究所 === 101 === Children’s literature was not considered literary works until about a hundred years ago. After a continuous debate on the status of Taiwan children’s literature in academia, the value of Taiwan children’s literature has finally been approved and children’s literature has been differentiated from adult literature. Buddhist literature has had a great impact on literary works from ancient times to the present. The traces of Buddhism can be found in the characters in the book titled “Journey to the West”, in the religious beliefs in the book titled “Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio”, and in other folk literature. Children’s literature has not been taken seriously and defined until recently and Buddhist children’s literature has been rarely studied. Even if there were, these studies are more education and religion-related and less literature-related. Buddhism has nowadays been modernized and many Buddhist groups have attempted to extend their cultural and educational undertakings to areas related to children. Therefore, how can literary works for children under strong religious ideology be fun and enlightening? There are five chapters in this thesis. Chapter one is the introduction that elucidates research background and motivation, research questions and purposes, research methods and steps, and research scope and limitation. The definitions of dharma principles and human dispositions in human-centered Buddhism are collated in the literature review to be test indicators for further analyses. Chapter two discusses the doctrines of human-centered Buddhism, the modern meaning of human-centered Buddhism and the development of Buddhist children’s literature. Chapter two also gives a general introduction to the text that is under study and discusses the application of dharma principles and human dispositions in the text. Chapter three uses a textual analysis to analyze “children of the earth” and see whether they have the indicators of dharma principles: “everything is constantly changing”, “everything has no permanent self-substance in its own nature”, “practicing the Bodhisattva way”. Chapter four uses a text analysis to analyze the text and see whether there are indicators of human dispositions: “this time”, “this place”, and “this person”. Chapter five is the conclusions in which the findings and conclusions of the study are presented and the evaluations and suggestions for publishing and studying Buddhist children’s literature texts are proposed for future authors and researchers of Buddhist children’s literature texts.