Chenxing Han - Be the Refuge: Raising the Voices of Asian American Buddhists

A book destined to be a classic, setting the bar high for future studies on Asian American Buddhism.

Jonathan H. X. Lee, author of Asian American Religious Cultures

In this vivid and nuanced presentation of Asian American voices, Han offers what many of us have been longing for: young voices grappling in deep and caring ways with one of the central issues of our time: how we might build a more inclusive Buddhist communityone big enough to hold our multiple identities, whether of race, ethnicity, and culture, or of gender and tradition. This book is both impressive and necessary.

Jan Willis, author of Dreaming Me

A challenging, poignant, and powerful detailing of the young Asian American Buddhist experience, Be the Refuge beautifully interweaves academic research, personal narrative, and advocacy. A deeply valuable contribution to the discussion of Buddhisms development in the West.

Sumi Loundon Kim, author of Blue Jean Buddha

Be the Refuge connects the dots linking Dharma, ethnic studies, and the politics of erasure and inclusion. At last, we hear the voices of Asian Americans which, for far too long, have been missing from the conversation about American Buddhism. Hans work is refreshing, lyrical, amusing, honest, and immensely personal, all while challenging underrepresentation, misrepresentation, and the standard typologies of who counts as Buddhist and why.

Karma Lekshe Tsomo, author of Women in Buddhist Traditions

Be the Refuge not only raises the voices of Asian American Buddhists, but makes space for many other communities who feel unseen, erased, or forgotten in our tradition.

Lama Rod Owens, author of Love and Rage

Han makes two vital contributions to the study of American Buddhism: her rich, textured ethnography centers and celebrates the depth and diversity of Asian American Buddhist lives, and her incisive theoretical work undoes essentialist typologies of Buddhism in the U.S. and the racial hierarchies too often undergirding them. Timely and compelling, Be the Refuge is essential reading for both religious studies and ethnic studies scholars and Buddhist practitioners and teachers.

Ann Gleig, author of American Dharma

Be the Refuge empowers the emergent generation of Asian American experience to reclaim, restore, and reconnect streams of practice, lineage, and history for all generations of Asian descentwithout the narratives of Western biasthus providing us all paths of healing and growth for all of our futures.

Larry Yang, author of Awakening Together

This groundbreaking book powerfully reveals the voices of Asian American Buddhists. These personal accounts and Chenxing Hans incisive reflections reveal how important the Asian American Buddhist experience is in understanding American Buddhism. Hans book inspires all Buddhists to both be their own refuge and to respect the valuable ways others become their own refuge.

Gil Fronsdal, author of The Buddha before Buddhism

This important, insightful book focuses on the experience of Asian American Buddhists and calls us toward a Western Buddhism that offers refuge in a truly inclusive way.

Tara Brach, author of Radical Acceptance and Radical Compassion

Be the Refuge is a call to rescue the soul of Buddhism in the Western world. Throughout this amazing and comprehensive work, Han disrupts the habitual and hegemonic Buddhist discourse with the question, Whose Buddhism are we talking about?

Zenju Earthlyn Manuel, author of The Way of Tenderness

Copyright 2021 by Chenxing Han. All rights reserved. No portion of this book, except for brief review, may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwisewithout the written permission of the publisher. For information contact North Atlantic Books.

Published by
North Atlantic Books
Berkeley, California
Cover design by Jess Morphew
Book design by Happenstance Type-O-Rama
Dharma wheel image lga A / Alamy Stock Vector

Printed in the United States of America

Be the Refuge: Raising the Voices of Asian American Buddhists is sponsored and published by the Society for the Study of Native Arts and Sciences (dba North Atlantic Books), an educational nonprofit based in Berkeley, California, that collaborates with partners to develop cross-cultural perspectives, nurture holistic views of art, science, the humanities, and healing, and seed personal and global transformation by publishing work on the relationship of body, spirit, and nature.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Han, Chenxing, 1986- author.
Title: Be the refuge : raising the voices of Asian American Buddhists /
Chenxing Han.
Description: Berkeley, California : North Atlantic Books, 2021. | Includes
bibliographical references and index. | Summary: Despite the fact that
two thirds of U.S. Buddhists identify as Asian American, mainstream
perceptions about what it means to be Buddhist in America often
whitewash and invisibilize the diverse, inclusive, and intersectional
communities that lie at the heart of American Buddhism. Be the Refuge is
both critique and celebration, calling out the erasure of Asian American
Buddhists while uplifting the complexity and nuance of their authentic
stories and vital, thriving communities. Drawn from in-depth interviews
with a pan-ethnic, pan-Buddhist group, Be the Refuge is the first book
to center young Asian American Buddhists own voices. With insights from
multi-generational, second-generation, convert, and socially engaged
Asian American Buddhists, Be the Refuge includes the stories of
trailblazers, bridge-builders, integrators, and refuge-makers who hail
from a wide range of cultural and religious backgrounds. Championing
nuanced representation over stale stereotypes, Han and the 89
interviewees in Be the Refuge push back against false narratives like
the Oriental monk, the superstitious immigrant, and the banana
Buddhist--typecasting that collapses the multivocality of Asian American
Buddhists into tired, essentialized tropes. Encouraging frank
conversations about race, representation, and inclusivity among
Buddhists of all backgrounds, Be the Refuge embodies the spirit of
interconnection that glows at the heart of American Buddhism Provided
by publisher.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020016462 (print) | LCCN 2020016463 (ebook) | ISBN
9781623175238 (paperback) | ISBN 9781623175245 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: BuddhismUnited States. | Asian AmericansReligion.
Classification: LCC BQ732 .H36 2021 (print) | LCC BQ732 (ebook) | DDC
294.3089/95073dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020016462
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020016463

This book includes recycled material and material from well-managed forests. North Atlantic Books is committed to the protection of our environment. We print on recycled paper whenever possible and partner with printers who strive to use environmentally responsible practices.

for tt and the bears

I have always marveled that every books acknowledgments is not a tome unto itself, a symphony whose every note is someone that has graced the authors life with kindness. The debts of gratitude I have accumulated in the making of this book are deep, and I wont come close to accounting them fully here. Forgive me for offering only the barest sketch of a melody in these pages.