Teaching Asian Religions from Within Asian American Community

Article Excerpt: Our 87 year-old Elder, a third-generation descendent of a Chinese American fishing village in Northern California, gives us a timid smile from behind the bar of the small diner that he and his family have operated since the 1940s. My students and I have just set up a laptop and microphone for recording a first-person account of his life story. The Elder looks over our shoulders, where a man stands with a stern face and his arms crossed—this is a member of the non-profit organization that now operates the village as a park. The twinkles in the eyes of the Elder’s eyes dims, but ever a shrewd businessman, he composes himself immediately. With his usual charm mixed with a fragility that comes with his age, the Elder gives us a narrative that is consistent with the official story of the location, a story that evolves around ecological explanations of the decline of the local fishing industry. Having interacted with the Elder for months before the formal recording, we have started to hear bits and pieces of another version of the history—one that is not going to be caught on tape

Review of Daoist Modern: Innovation, Lay Practice, and the Community of Inner Alchemy in Republican Shanghai by Xun Liu

Article Excerpt: Situated in Republican-era Shanghai, already a great metropolitan city, Daoist Modern leads the readers through a Daoist inner-alchemy revivalist (no pun intended) movement that actively participated in China’s transformation from its imperial past toward modernization. Xun Liu’s book traces the way in which Chen Yingning (1880–1969) and his followers infused both intellectual discourse and the cultivation of immortality with issues pertinent to their own identity as Chinese urban elites: Nationalism and the roles of elite Daoist practitioners in a time of crisis; gender equality and women’s rights; and changing modes of information dissemination

Model Minority on the Modernization Project: Images of Chinese Religiosity in America

As the stereotypical model minority in the United States, Chinese Americans are rarely considered as religiously threatening. Those Chinese Americans who already were or became converted to mainstream Christianity are seen as cases of successful Americanization. Buddhism, another popular religious affiliation among the Chinese ethnics, is understood as a benign and respectable source of wisdom. Few Chinese ethnics identify themselves strictly as Daoist or Confucian, but there is a wide range of religious and spiritual practices that are diffused into their daily lives. Without specific religious affiliations or congregational headcount, eclectic practices such as ancestral worship, temple visits, home rituals, and healing methods are interpreted (both by observers and insiders) to be merely preserving ethnic heritage and revisiting cultural tradition. In this paper, I will explore how the American mainstream and Chinese religious communities construct the image of Chinese Americans as socially participating and culturally inclusive, and therefore modernized, citizens. The two examples will demonstrate two models—one internally defined model by the Chinese American community, and another externally defined model by the mainstream American community

Heat waves, droughts, and preferences for environmental policy

Using data from a new household survey on environmental attitudes, behaviors, and policy preferences, we find that current weather conditions affect preferences for environmental regulation. Individuals who have recently experienced extreme weather (heat waves or droughts) are more likely to support laws to protect the environment even if it means restricting individual freedoms. We find evidence that the channel through which weather conditions affect policy preference is via perceptions of the importance of the issue of global warming. Furthermore, individuals who may be more sophisticated consumers of news are less likely to have their attitudes towards global warming changed by current weather conditions.environmental regulation; global warming; environmental attitudes

Seeking Serious Tourists – Balancing Culture Conservation and Economic Gains from Aboriginal Tourism

Ethnic culture, often complemented by attractive relatively natural environments, is the core tourism attraction for indigenous areas. With the rise of aboriginal tourism, many regions with indigenous people intend to reform their economies by introducing tourism development. However, some places where this has occurred have exhibited adverse consequences, such as the breaking up of conventional social/cultural norms and distortion of unique ethnic cultures. Thus, it is critical to establish an approach to development that can satisfy both cultural and economic concerns to achieve sustainable development in aboriginal regions. Based on serious leisure theory, it is proposed that serious travelers can contribute offer enhanced prospects of contributing to aboriginal communities in terms of both economic gains and cultural conservations. The idea is assessed in the context of aboriginal community in Taiwan and the empirical findings mostly verify the above claims. Serious aboriginal tourists express their support for ethnic culture with real spending on culture-related products and services. Likewise, serious aboriginal travelers reveal their passions for ethnic culture by demanding more cultural experiences and, more willingly donate for aboriginal cultural conservation. Thus, it is suggested that, aboriginal destinations should cater more to the serious traveler market to make sustainable development possible

Associations between Dietary Acid Load and Biomarkers of Inflammation and Hyperglycemia in Breast Cancer Survivors.

Metabolic acidosis can lead to inflammation, tissue damage, and cancer metastasis. Dietary acid load contributes to metabolic acidosis if endogenous acid-base balance is not properly regulated. Breast cancer survivors have reduced capacities to adjust their acid-base balance; yet, the associations between dietary acid load and inflammation and hyperglycemia have not been examined among them. We analyzed data collected from 3042 breast cancer survivors enrolled in the Women's Healthy Eating and Living (WHEL) Study who had provided detailed dietary intakes and measurements of plasma C-reactive protein (CRP) and hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c). Using a cross-sectional design, we found positive associations between dietary acid load and plasma CRP and HbA1c. In the multivariable-adjusted models, compared to women with the lowest quartile, the intakes of dietary acid load among women with the highest quartile showed 30-33% increases of CRP and 6-9% increases of HbA1c. Our study is the first to demonstrate positive associations between dietary acid load and CRP and HbA1c in breast cancer survivors. Our study identifies a novel dietary factor that may lead to inflammation and hyperglycemia, both of which are strong risk factors for breast cancer recurrence and comorbidities

Ultrasound- and microwave-assisted preparation of lead-free palladium catalysts: effects on the kinetics of diphenylacetylene semi-hydrogenation

The effect of environmentally benign enabling technologies such as ultrasound and microwaves on the preparation of the lead-free Pd catalyst has been studied. A one-pot method of the catalyst preparation using ultrasound-assisted dispersion of palladium acetate in the presence of the surfactant/capping agent and boehmite support produced the catalyst containing Pd nanoparticles and reduced the number of pores larger than 4 nm in the boehmite support. This catalyst demonstrated higher activity and selectivity. The comparison of kinetic parameters for diphenylacetylene hydrogenation showed that the catalyst obtained by using the one-pot method was seven times as active as a commercial Lindlar catalyst and selectivity towards Z-stilbene was high. Our work also illustrated that highly selective Pd/boehmite catalysts can be prepared through ultrasound-assisted dispersion and microwave-assisted reduction in water under hydrogen pressure without any surfactant