On the Care and Confinement of the Insane in Early Modern and Contemporary East Asian Buddhism
Event date: 21:00 (Taiwan Time) August 1, 2022
Organizer: University of British Columbia
This talk explores the intersections between Buddhism/Buddhist institutions and madness/mental institutions. It begins with a general discussion of the place of madness within the Buddhist tradition by tracking references to madness in a variety of sources (from doctrinal texts to law codes). Following that general discussion, the talk moves to the intriguing history of the institutional connections between Buddhist monasteries and mental institutions in early modern and contemporary Taiwan, China, and Japan.
I introduce some case studies of sites where modern mental hospitals grew up within the precincts or adjacent to Buddhist monasteries. What, I will ask, is the historical relationship between the older Buddhist monasteries and the new mental hospitals? Have there been institutional connections between the monasteries and the hospitals throughout history?
In addressing these questions, we encounter a history of the fundamental role played by Buddhist monasteries in the therapy of those beset with mental illnesses. Due to modern changes in the care for the mentally ill—including a move toward mandatory hospitalization—the earlier history of the connections between the Buddhist monasteries and those afflicted with mental illness became hidden. One of the primary goals of this talk is to recover some of that history and show the role that was played by Buddhist temples in providing therapies, magical cures, and day-to-day care for the mentally ill.
