Table of contents : Cover Title Copyright Contents List of figures List of contributors Acknowledgements PART I Theravāda as a historical construct 1 Theravāda Buddhist civilizations and their modern formations 2 Periodizing Theravāda history: where to start? 3 The impact of the science–religion bifurcation on the landscape of modern Theravāda meditation PART II Local cultures and Buddhist vernaculars in colonial modernity 4 Buddhist religious culture and processes of modernization in Sri Lanka 5 Buddhist communities of belonging in early-twentieth-century Cambodia 6 What Theravāda does: thoughts on a term from the perspective of the study of post-colonial Nepal PART III Theravāda Buddhist practices in the contemporary world 7 The rhetoric of authenticity: modernity and “true Buddhism” in Sri Lanka 8 Portrait of the artist as a Buddhist man 9 “Conscripts” of Chinese modernity? Transformations of Theravāda Buddhism in southwest China in the reform era Bibliography Index