draft of final project
A Sound from Thousand Years Ago…
Can you imagine a sound coming from thousand years ago “looks” like?
Try it, [insert a clip of chanting audio, on the way]
After listening to this audio, can you believe it comes from a long time ago, back to the pre-modern and pre-digital era? Let’s take on the journey to trace its history.
The segment of chanting audio was created by a Tibetan Buddhism believer, who worked in Nepal now and grew up in Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, China. She practiced chanting sutras (Buddhism religious canons, like Bible in Christianity), nearly every day since her childhood. She consented that I can observe her chanting through WeChat video function, and I made jottings (see the Double-entry notes in the following part) while observing her chanting without interruption for the whole process, about 20 minutes. After she finished, I interviewed her by Chinese to clarify some ritual details and other interesting topics, such as the sutra book and the meaning of chanting ritual to her. Then I transcribed all to the digital version and translated it into English.
Double-entry Notes
| Direct Observations (Bold for jottings made during observations; underline for expansion and explanation in the interview) | Personal Reactions (wonders, surprises and follow up questions) |
| clean up and wear properly1
She usually takes a shower before chanting, if it is not convenient or she doesn’t have enough time, she will at least wash face and hands. Then she wears comfortably as usual. This is necessary to show respect and piety.
sit down upright2 She said the posture is like doing meditation, sitting down upright, and closing eyes mildly and softly, not tightly because it needs to be relaxed rather than strained.
have a mala (a string of beads) in hand3 She touched the mala and made it like a circle, holding in both hands to start with, then she put it around the right-hand wrist. She said it does not have special meanings of the mala, these procedures are only her personal habits.
chanting and murmuring4 She is chanting classic Tibetan Buddhism sutra in Tibetan. Most of the time she is reciting and murmuring very fast with a low voice, which is hard to hear clearly for others. There are no facial expressions and variations. She learned these classic Tibetan Buddhism sutra from her uncle, who is a Tibetan Buddhism monk. The uncle taught her when she was in primary school, by listening, repeating a segment of sutra every day. After reciting the segment, she will continue to the next one until she can chant the whole sutra by herself. The content of the sutra is usually the praise of the buddhas and masters, and the descriptions of their appearances and their merits. So, when she was chanting these contents, she will imagine these images and landscapes in the mind*. She has her own pace when chanting, if she has enough time she will not do it so fast or urgently, but sometime she will omit some episodes.
close eyes for most of the time, sometimes open eyes, open a sutra and read5 She sometimes read a sutra that is long or she is unfamiliar with, so she will open the sutra and read, after she is familiar with the content, she will just recite it. clapping several times, different gestures of hands6 During a part of chanting, she is clapping her hands with a certain tempo, and changed to a different hand gesture after that. She said she was just doing what her uncle taught her, she doesn’t know what the meanings or functions of clapping. When she learned the whole ritual, she was very young and could not remember all the meanings and explanations. She did it routinely because it is a family tradition and she followed it without too much thinking. It is a ritual practice to make her more self-disciplined and doing things habitually. Now she is learning the meanings of the sutra by watching videos on YouTube, she felt more confident and motivated to do it after knowing and understanding more about it. Every time finishing this ritual, she felt calm and relaxed. She will pray for and think more for all creatures, including human beings and all other living things, become more selfless rather than self-centered. It is a way to cultivate compassion she viewed as the essence of this ritual.
|
1. wonder how to prepare for this ritual, what’re special features? wonder how to prepare for this ritual, what’s special features?
2. she sits down more seriously than usual, I wonder could she keep this posture for the whole ritual process? what’s the requirement of the posture? 3. what’s the function of the mala? And the meaning of the gesture? 4. what’s the content of chanting? Is it required to recite? Why someplace is fast and some slowly? *she used a special word here in Chinese （观想）, I didn’t find a corresponding word in English, which means “see thought process”. 5. surprised when she opened eyes, why?
6. what the symbolic meanings of different hand gestures? |
Hand features interviewee performed in the ritual, download from https://lovepeaceboho.com/blogs/mudras-hand-gesture/m-u-d-r-a-s-hand-gesture
Continued Interview…
Interviewer: Hi, thank you for the time to continue talking about the chanting ritual. So, if you choose one artifact in the ritual that represents its significance to you, what it would be?
Interviewee: Hey, no problem. I think it would be the cannon book of the sutra. I carried it with me everywhere since my elementary school. When I do the chanting practice, I would like to have it aside from me as a reminder.
Interviewer: a reminder of what?
Interviewee: reminding me not to killing. For example, I am living in an environment that has so many mosquitoes, and they bite me and sometimes I will become so annoyed and have to kill them. But I felt so regret of my killing behavior when I saw my sutra book and did the chanting ritual. However, I am also ambivalent and self-contradictory.
Interviewer: how did that happen? Why did you feel regret? Because of the teaching of the sutra?
Interviewee: yeah, the content of sutra is about teaching us how to accumulate merits by not killing, showing respect to masters, friends to neutralizing our bad karma, not to be the cause of the bad karma. While not killing is a very important principle in Tibetan Buddhism, so I felt so bad when I violated this principle. Actually, sometimes the little insects did not harm us or occupy our space, we can co-exist with them harmoniously, but I just felt like they are so annoying and dirty, so I am repentant when I am chanting the sutra.
Interviewer: I see. You said you carried with it since the elementary school, so where did you get it?
Interviewee: I bought it from a bookstore in my town. Before elementary school, I used my uncle’s sutra book, which is the traditional one, large and landscape, writing by ink and brush. So, I cannot carry it to my boarding school, I think I could have my own one. I found this one in the bookstore using my pocket money.
Interviewer: could you remember how much is it?
Interviewee: No idea, let’s check. [she fetched the book but the back cover has been lost]
Interviewer: no problem, do you remember how the back cover got lost?
Interviewee: not really. Actually, I protected this book with extra care and attention, more important than any other books, I always put it on the top of the pile of books. When I am settled down in a new place, I will put on the bed near my head.
Interviewer: why you cherish it so much with extra protection?
Interviewee: because Tibetans are taught to revere books and knowledge, for example, we never use books to be placed under other stuff, not to mention books with sutra scripts.
Interviewer: good to know. what’s the special significance of this sutra book to you?
Interviewee: since I have carried with it for a long time, it is like a companion that reminds me of doing good, the symbol of morality, and also helps me to make sense of belonging, belonging to my Tibetan ethnicity.
Interviewer: wow, that makes a lot of sense. I am glad to know your sutra book and your story. Hope to learn more.
Interviewee: my pleasure.
Example of Tibetan Traditional Sutra
[https://www.google.com/search?q=sutra&rlz=1C5CHFA_enUS709US713&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwicvPT08OTqAhXDXM0KHbfLBCwQ_AUoA3oECBcQBQ#imgrc=ywxoiS5DYjbu8M]
Observing personal chanting ritual and knowing about the origin of the sutra book, I can imagine how the chanting practice is passed on from one Tibetan generation to another through orally teaching and learning. Considering there is a small elite population is literate in Tibet pre-modern history, so, I believe this face-to-face learning practice made the chanting ceremony tainted with the sound of history. Would like to try chanting to embodied link with history, and are you chanting enough?
[YouTube: How Do You know When You’re Chanting Enough? Uploaded by: Arup Dey, Mar 30, 2017]
8 Comments Already
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
Xue, I love how much of the “raw data” you include in this piece – I think it does the work of showing the methods and results at the same time. Perhaps a bit more unpacking of this in the final, maybe pulling out the notes and interview transcript as figures to reference would help the people engaging with it? Curious to hear more about your choices around organization!
This sounds like an incredibly interesting project. I think that one part which struck me as particularly engaging was this reverence of books. I wonder if this feeling of reverence extends to all written word (like digital) or if physical books are viewed as unique. Either way, I think that this sort of feeling could be incorporated in a really interesting way inside of your project. I wonder if you could somehow organize your project in a way that this feeling of reverence comes through in the words themselves.
This is such a wonderful project, and I feel as though it has the foundation for a great narrative piece. Especially with the dramatization in your opening, I could imagine you cutting down on some of the rawness to present the research as a story, blending together your different resources and notes. I’m not sure what final form you want this to take, but there might be ways to keep the raw data as part of the project, maybe something that is linked to or optionally expanded in a website. Either way, excited for the final project!
This seems like a fantastic project. I like the images you found of hand gestures–I wonder if those could be spread more throughout? I think having a central narrative with the images and raw data interspersed might be an interesting approach.
I loved reading this interview and your field notes! Two moments that I’m still curious about are 1.) when she explains the mala beads are a personal habit and 2.) how she used a youtube video to supplement her chanting practice. With the mala beads, I’m curious what additional presence it adds to the routine. Since it’s a personal choice, does physically holding onto something amplify the experience for her? And for the youtube video, I’m curious about her thoughts on modern practices and the role of technology in further spreading the knowledge. How does she view this internet knowledge compared to physical books (and how she gives it extra care and protection).
Xue, I think your project is so cool! I like that you have given a wealth of information on the importance of sutra for your informant, and I also like that you give contextualizing information at the end so as to allow the viewer to really take in the depth of the sutra ritual. As far as multimedia goes, do you plan on including audio of your informant’s chanting? I think doing that could lend itself to making the experience immersive for the listener.
This is all really cool! I really appreciate the context at the beginning, and how much raw data you used. I think the audio will add a lot too, once you have it! I agree with Theo that a bit more of a central narrative with images interspliced could also be a cool idea
This project is great for incorporating sound and text together! The way chanting is foregrounded in the interview makes it extremely open to an auditory incorporation of media. The images of the meditation poses too are fantastic.