| Summary: | 碩士 === 佛光大學 === 佛教學系 === 106 === Childhood is a human experience, universally represented across time and cultures. In recent times, it has received increasing attention as an important structural form of society, influenced by various parameters and influencing them at the same time. Despite the relevance of it, the research on childhood and Buddhism is still insufficient and still heavily influenced by a western-centered attitude. This thesis seeks to address the study on Buddhism and childhood by engaging in an extensive exploration of childhood discourse and imagery in Premodern South Asian Buddhist texts.
Chapter 1 aims at clearly laying down the research purposes and motivations, as well as methods and approach. In order to delve into a more critical examination of childhood and its vicissitudes, chapter 2 will provide crucial understanding of terminologies and concepts, as well as background on social aspects. To accomplish this, a critical survey the field of Childhood Studies will be conducted, identifying its challenges and prevailing paradigms.
An analysis of various Buddhist texts containing either direct or indirect discourse and imagery of children and childhood will be carried out. These texts are mainly from Mainstream and Mahāyana traditions, but I will occasionally cross this line and draw from Vajrayana sources in order to support some arguments. The contrasting way in which these two chapters are have been arranged serves two main purposes: (a) to represent the spectrum of discourses on children and childhood in Buddhist tradition and (b) to represent the possibility of transcending established paradigms.
Chapter 3 focuses on the ambivalent Buddhist literal and figurative representation of childhood in philosophical texts. The first section deals with the imagery related to the embryo, the mother and child abandonment to demonstrate a non-idealized construction of childhood its related themes in Buddhist literature. The second section concentrates on the displacement of appreciative language related to childhood and family to the realm of Buddhist religious ideals.
Chapter 4 deals with the adult-oriented perspectives on childhood coexisting with the awareness of childhood and its characteristics revealed through childcare and childrearing practices documented in Buddhist texts. The general adult-centered attitude found in some sources might generate misconceptions about Buddhism as a tradition that disregards the physical and psychological needs of small children. However, a deeper investigation evidenced an awareness of childhood that is unprecedented in Ancient India.
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