TY - JOUR

T1 - Network Paradigm in Buddhist Studies

AU - Alekseev-Apraksin, Anatolly

AU - Erokhin, Boris

N1 - Alekseev-Apraksin A., Erokhin B. Network Paradigm in Buddhist Studies. / Reliģiski-filozofiski raksti (Religious-Philosophical Articles). Riga: Latvijas Universitates Filozofijas un sociologijas instituta. 2019. pp. 305-319

PY - 2019

Y1 - 2019

N2 - Expansion of Buddhism in modern societies tends to take forms the researchersoften define as global transnational networks. It opens the way to studyingBuddhism from the standpoint of network analytics. The novelty of the networkparadigm is shifting the focus from studying objects to analyzing their connections and relationships using the ‘graph theory’ as the mode of description. The network approach successfully develops in many modern fields of science (mathematics, physics, biology, sociology, psychology) and even pretends to be a new inter disciplinary paradigm. Many parallels between the network theory and Buddhist ideas call for the investigation of the respective fields. Buddhism regards the phenomenal world in terms of coherence and interdependence. In the Buddhist texts and exegetical literature, the network narrative is found pervading the whole teaching by concepts of dependent origination, karma patterns, logical methods and constructions along with enumerating manner of presentation, the concepts of illusory character of the so-called reality, mandala, personalized way of transmission, and nonlinear dynamics. Contemporary research of social networks allows to studythe topology of religious organizations, to identify their structure, interconnection,and scope, to conduct comparative studies of various communities, to ascertain the density of connections and the level of clustering, to estimate the life cycle of a network, its dynamics and specifics that induces its quality changes. Such anapproach that may alter many established ideas opens up new perspectives forreligious studies and beyond.

AB - Expansion of Buddhism in modern societies tends to take forms the researchersoften define as global transnational networks. It opens the way to studyingBuddhism from the standpoint of network analytics. The novelty of the networkparadigm is shifting the focus from studying objects to analyzing their connections and relationships using the ‘graph theory’ as the mode of description. The network approach successfully develops in many modern fields of science (mathematics, physics, biology, sociology, psychology) and even pretends to be a new inter disciplinary paradigm. Many parallels between the network theory and Buddhist ideas call for the investigation of the respective fields. Buddhism regards the phenomenal world in terms of coherence and interdependence. In the Buddhist texts and exegetical literature, the network narrative is found pervading the whole teaching by concepts of dependent origination, karma patterns, logical methods and constructions along with enumerating manner of presentation, the concepts of illusory character of the so-called reality, mandala, personalized way of transmission, and nonlinear dynamics. Contemporary research of social networks allows to studythe topology of religious organizations, to identify their structure, interconnection,and scope, to conduct comparative studies of various communities, to ascertain the density of connections and the level of clustering, to estimate the life cycle of a network, its dynamics and specifics that induces its quality changes. Such anapproach that may alter many established ideas opens up new perspectives forreligious studies and beyond.

KW - global transnational networks, connectivity, cluster, nods, graph, rhizome, interdisciplinary paradigm, nets, Buddhism, Vajrayana, Diamond Way, emptiness, illusion, dependent origination, tantra, mandala.

KW - global transnational networks, connectivity, cluster, nods, graph, rhizome, interdisciplinary paradigm, nets, Buddhism, Vajrayana, Diamond Way, emptiness, illusion, dependent origination, tantra, mandala.

M3 - Article

SP - 305

EP - 319

JO - Religiski-Filozofiski Raksti

JF - Religiski-Filozofiski Raksti

SN - 1407-1908

IS - XXV

ER -