Lotus Pond, Bicultural Ripples: The Psychological Orientations of Korean-Canadian Practitioners of Buddhism

Abstract

This dissertation examines whether Buddhist beliefs and practices serve to reinforce and/or promote a Korean and/or Canadian cultural prism for next-generation Korean Buddhist practitioners in Toronto, Canada. I define Korean and Canadian cultural prisms based on the cross-cultural psychological framework of Individualism-Relational Collectivism (I-RC) and Analytical-Holistic (A-H) cognition. The aim of my research is to problematize culture in the construction of religious meaning and behaviour for relatively bicultural individuals. My research question can thus be summarized as follows: How is religious meaning and behaviour culturally constructed by next-generation Korean Buddhist practitioners in Canada? What role do individual cultural orientations and the different Buddhist cultural traditions play in this cultural construction and how does Buddhism compare to the other religions (namely Protestantism) practiced by younger-generation Korean-Canadians in this regard? By answering these questions, I ultimately hope to show whether the meaning system of Korean culture is preserved through religion among the younger generation of Korean Buddhist practitioners. I hypothesize that, due to the relatively non-authoritarian nature of Buddhism, the light of Buddhist beliefs and practices will predominantly be refracted through the a priori cultural prism of the individual in question, and the role of Buddhist doctrine and institutions in promoting a particular orientation (individualistic/relationally collectivistic and analytic/holistic) will be minimal and subordinate to the individual. The particular cultural orientation of this prism will, in turn, be dependent upon individual levels of monoculturalism (Korean or Canadian) or biculturalism (Korean and Canadian). In this way, Buddhism may serve to both preserve and undermine the Korean cultural meaning system. By comparison, I hypothesize that the relatively authoritarian nature of (Protestant) Christianity will likely encourage younger-generation Korean Christians to relate to their religion in a predominantly uniform way, regardless of the individual’s cultural orientation.