Building the Buddhist Revival: Reconstructing Monasteries in Modern China

Between 1850 and 1966, tens of thousands of Buddhist sacred sites in China were destroyed, victims of targeted destruction, accidental damage, or simply neglect. During the same period, however, many of these sites were reconstructed, a process that involved both rebuilding material structures and reviving religious communities. Gregory Adam Scott argues that over the course of this period monastery reconstruction in China changed drastically. The power to determine whether and how a monastery would be reconstructed, and the types of activities that would be reinstated or newly introduced, began to shift from religious leaders and communities to state agencies that had a radically different set of motivations and values.
Building the Buddhist Revival explores the history of Chinese Buddhist monastery reconstruction from the end of the Imperial period through the first seventeen years of the People's Republic.

Gregory Adam Scott received his PhD from Columbia University, was previously a research fellow at the University of Edinburgh, and is currently lecturer at the University of Manchester. Originally from Canada, he is a historian of religion in modern China, particularly Buddhism.