Douglas M. Gildow, originally from the United States (Ohio), is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). Before coming to CUHK in 2018, he taught at Florida State University (FSU, 2016-18), where he held the Sheng Yen postdoctoral fellowship in the Department of Religion. 

 

Gildow’s research interests center on modern and contemporary Chinese Buddhism and extend into the late imperial period and to Chinese popular religion. He has published and presented on Buddhist intellectual history, monastic education, ritual performance, relic worship, religious mummification, Chan historiography, and vinaya studies. His research has been published in the journals Asia Major, Foxue Yanjiu, Journal of Chinese Buddhist Studies, Journal of Chinese Religions, and Review of Religion and Chinese Society. In addition, he has translated two books on Buddhism from Chinese into English. His current projects include a monograph on contemporary monastic education and articles on early modernist Buddhism.

 

Gildow’s has taught both graduate and undergraduate courses at CUHK, FSU, and the City College of New York (CCNY). His courses have centered on various subjects including Buddhism, Chinese religions, Asian religions, modern Asian societies, and thesis writing. Gildow has also contributed to the field of religious studies through peer reviews for several scholarly journals and for two major academic publishers.

 

Publications and Dissertation (Since 2014)

2020: “Questioning the Revival: Buddhist Monasticism in China Since Mao.” Review of Religion and Chinese Society 7:1, 6-33. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/22143955-00701002

2018: “Cai Yuanpei (1868-1940), Religion, and His Plan to Save China through Buddhism.” Asia Major Third Series 31:2, 107-148. Abstract and pdf: 
https://aims.cuhk.edu.hk/converis/portal/detail/Publication/97710099?auxfun=&lang=en_GB

2017: Review of Figures of Buddhist Modernity in Asia (2016). In the Journal of Global Buddhism 18, 40-44. Available here: http://www.globalbuddhism.org/jgb/index.php/jgb/article/view/217

2016: PhD dissertation: “Buddhist Monastic Education: Seminaries, Academia, and the State in Contemporary China.” (Princeton University, Department of Religion).

2014: “The Chinese Buddhist Ritual Field: Common Public Rituals in PRC Monasteries Today.” Journal of Chinese Buddhist Studies 27, 59-127. Available here: http://chinesebuddhiststudies.org/previous_issues/chbj2703.pdf

2014: “Xifang xueshujie dui chanzong ‘dongshan famai’ de yanjiu” (A review of Anglophone scholarship on the Chan East Mountain Lineage). Foxue Yanjiu (Buddhist Studies) 22, 350-58 (in Chinese).

 

Grants and Awards (Since 2019)

2020:  Coming to the Terms of Modern Chinese Buddhism, 1870-1950 (for 2021-23). General Research Fund (GRF) (external grant; project no. 14621220)

2020: Liang Qichao and Early Chinese Buddhist Modernism (for 2020-21). CUHK Direct Grant (internal grant)

2019: CUHK Faculty of Arts Outstanding Teaching Award

 

More publications and presentations can be found here: https://cuhk.academia.edu/DouglasGildow

 

Clips from a documentary film about Taiwanese folk Buddhist funerals, which he helped produce years ago and which are related to older research projects, are available here: Taiwanese Buddhist Funeral YouTube Playlist