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Buddhism, Digital Technology and New Media in Korea: Ŭisang’s Ocean Seal Diagram

Editor: Hyangsoon Yi, Dal Yong Jin
Author: , , , , , , , , , ,
Publisher: , 2024
Link to online store *

Buddhism, Digital Technology and New Media in Korea introduces Ŭisang (625-702), a seminal figure in East Asian religion who founded the Korean Hwaŏm school of Buddhism from various angles and placing his thought in the interdisciplinary and transcultural context of the twenty-first century.

The book presents and analyses the scope of Ŭisang’s teachings in Korean Buddhism through a study of the Ocean Seal Diagram in the context of digital technology and poetics. It studies diverse intersections between Ŭisang’s thought and Western ideas, elucidating the diagram’s potential as a meta-theory applicable to various academic fields in view of unprecedented changes in human life brought forth by the digital revolution. Contributors to the book present comprehensive and in-depth analyses of the strikingly dynamic applicability as well as persistent traits of the Ocean Seal Diagram. Inspired by the creative potential of the diagram, the chapters unravel the points of agreement and disagreement between Huayan Buddhism and contemporary Western ideas, promising to take a transregional and transcultural dialogue to the new level suitable to the ever-changing digitalized global environment.

This book will be of interest to researchers in a variety of fields, such as Religious Studies, Cultural Studies, Media Studies, Korean Studies, Sociology, Anthropology, and Globalization Studies.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Ŭisang’s Life and Legacies | Hyangsoon Yi and Dal Yong Jin

PART I: The Ocean Seal Diagram in Theory and Praxis

  1. Ŭisang’s Understanding of the Avatamsaka-Sǔtra as Seen Through the Seal-Diagram Symbolizing the Dharma Realm of the One Vehicle | Yeonshik Choe and Richard D. McBride II;
  2. The Heart-Smile Training: The Compassion-Based Intervention Program of Korean Sŏn in the Al Digital Era | Misan W.D. Kim and Hee Jung Min;
  3. From Daily Devotions to Ceremonial Paths and Talismans: The Functions of Ŭisang’s Seal Diagram in Contemporary Korean Buddhism | Richard D. McBride II

PART II: Transcultural Dialogue with Ŭisang

  1. Chapter 4: A Whiteheadian Process Critique of Huayan Buddhism: Creative Synthesis and Emergent Novelty | Steve Odin;
  2. Chapter 5: The One, the Many, and Time in Deleuze and Huayan Buddhism | Ronald Bogue;
  3. Chapter 6: Technics and the Ocean Seal | Ronald Bogue

PART III: Ŭisang and Digitality

  1. Chapter 7: The Internet as a Technological Manifestation of Indra’s Net: Ŭisang’s Ocean Seal as a Unifying Model for Art, Religion, Metaphysics and Technology | Steve Odin;
  2. Chapter 8: The Mediatization of Buddhism in Digital Media: The Contemporary Reflection of Ŭisang’s Hwaŏm Thought in Video Games | Dal Yong Jin;
  3. Chapter 9: The Apparition of an Appearance: Artist Notes on the Performance of Wisdom | Mark Amerika, Laura Hyunjhee Kim, GPT-J-6B Model EleutherAI, and GPT-2 Model OpenAI

PART IV: Time and Salvation in the Ocean Seal

  1. Chapter 10: The Journey as Mediation: A Buddhist Reading of O Chŏng-hŭi’s “Words of Farewell” | Hyangsoon Yi;
  2. Chapter 11: The Hwaŏm Allegory of Time in Marcel Aymé’s “La Carte” | Hyangsoon Yi, Misan W.D. Kim and Myeongbeop S.O. Chu;

Postscript | Hyangsoon Yi and Dal Yong Jin

Source: publisher’s website

Entry on Goodreads.com here.

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