Buddhism beyond gender : liberation from attachment to identity

Description: At the heart of Buddhism is the notion of egolessness—“forgetting the self”—as the path to awakening. In fact, attachment to views of any kind only leads to more suffering for ourselves and others. And what has a greater hold on people’s imaginations or limits them more, asks Rita Gross, than ideas about biological sex and what she calls “the prison of gender roles”? Yet if clinging to gender identity does, indeed, create obstacles for us, why does the prison of gender roles remain so inescapable? Gross uses the lenses of Buddhist philosophy to deconstruct the powerful concept of gender and its impact on our lives. In revealing the inadequacies involved in clinging to gender identity, she illuminates the suffering that results from clinging to any kind of identity at all.

Table of Contents: Publisher's Note p. vii
Introduction Judith Simmer-Brown p. ix
1 Buddhism as Studying the Self and Forgetting the Self p. 1
2 Identity, Egolessness, and Enlightenment p. 11
3 The Prison of Gender Roles p. 21
4 Freedom from the Prison of Gender Roles p. 71
5 Indigenous Buddhist Feminism p. 107
6 My Audience and Purpose p. 131
Notes p. 147
Bibliography p. 157
Index p. 161

FY2018 /