Tourism is one of the potential segments of economy to promote both direct and indirect employment opportunities and thereby national income. It also plays a significant role in promotion of mutual understanding among people of different lands and cultures. This book attempts to study the prospects of tourism in Andhra Pradesh, with special emphasis on Buddhist Circuits. Taking a lose look at the development of tourism in the state, it traces the history, sites and monuments of Buddhism. It also presents a detailed study of Buddhist Circuits and tourism in the state.

Buddhism, often described as an austere religion that condemns desire, promotes denial, and idealizes the contemplative life, actually has a thriving leisure culture in Asia. Creative religious improvisations designed by Buddhists have been produced both within and outside of monasteries across the region—in Nepal, Japan, Korea, Macau, Hong Kong, Singapore, Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam. Justin McDaniel looks at the growth of Asia’s culture of Buddhist leisure—what he calls “socially disengaged Buddhism”—through a study of architects responsible for monuments, museums, amusement parks, and other sites. In conversation with noted theorists of material and visual culture and anthropologists of art, McDaniel argues that such sites highlight the importance of public, leisure, and spectacle culture from a Buddhist perspective and illustrate how “secular” and “religious,” “public” and “private,” are in many ways false binaries. Moreover, places like Lek Wiriyaphan’s Sanctuary of Truth in Thailand, Suối Tiên Amusement Park in Saigon, and Shi Fa Zhao’s multilevel museum/ritual space/tea house in Singapore reflect a growing Buddhist ecumenism built through repetitive affective encounters instead of didactic sermons and sectarian developments. They present different Buddhist traditions, images, and aesthetic expressions as united but not uniform, collected but not concise: Together they form a gathering, not a movement. Despite the ingenuity of lay and ordained visionaries like Wiriyaphan and Zhao and their colleagues Kenzo Tange, Chan-soo Park, Tadao Ando, and others discussed in this book, creators of Buddhist leisure sites often face problems along the way. Parks and museums are complex adaptive systems that are changed and influenced by budgets, available materials, local and global economic conditions, and visitors. Architects must often compromise and settle at local optima, and no matter what they intend, their buildings will develop lives of their own. Provocative and theoretically innovative, Architects of Buddhist Leisure asks readers to question the very category of “religious” architecture. It challenges current methodological approaches in religious studies and speaks to a broad audience interested in modern art, architecture, religion, anthropology, and material culture.

This is the third volume in my series on Buddhist monuments and temples in South Asia, and the last one dealing with orthodox or Theravada Buddhism. The advent of Theravada Buddhism in Cambodia and Laos came during the 11th century, while Mahayana Buddhism came much earlier to Cambodia. Laos, however, with its constant contact with Thailand (Siam), inherited Theravada or the pure form of Buddhism. The specific origins of the peoples of these countries are uncertain due to the lack of historical documentation. Due to the constant wars and invasions between these and neighbouring countries such as Myanmar (Burma) and Thailand (Siam), many temples, monasteries and stupas suffered destruction, and statues and other religious artefacts were pillaged. Therefore there are far fewer historical temples and monuments than might have been expected. In fact Sri Lanka is the only Theravada country in which there are substantial ancient Buddhist monuments and temples remaining in good order and still in use. Furthermore, the history of these is well documented, the oldest ones dating back to the Buddha. It is impossible to comprehensively deal with such an expansive subject encompassing the two countries in this small volume. Therefore I have confined myself to areas and places which have grown in popularity, are of major importance and those which are easily accessible. During the course of writing the books in this series I have visited all the sites dealt within them and taken most of the photographs. It is sincerely hoped that this small volume will be useful to those who are interested in seeing the monuments described, and also kindle their interest in the study of this subject.

This is a mainly pictorial work, featuring recent color photographs taken by the author of the many different styles and features of Buddhist images, stupas, or pagodas found in two of the most prominent Buddhist countries in Asia. Accompanying the photographs is the text describing the magnificent architectural heritage of Buddhism and also explaining the origin and development of the images and stupas. The photographs attempt to exhibit the physical expression of one of the worlds major religions, which now has many adherents in the West as well as in the East. These Buddhist sites now attract many thousands of visitors, both pilgrims and tourists, all year round. This book showcases the most prominent sites for both the visitor and the armchair traveler. This is the second in the authors series of books on Buddhist architecture and iconography. He is, at present, working on a third volume, Buddhist Monuments and Temples of Cambodia and Laos.

"The volume thoroughly examines the origins and principal types of Buddhist architecture in Asia primarily between the third century BCE-twelfth century CE with an emphasis on India. It aims to construct shared architectural traits and patterns alongwith the derivative relationships between Indian and Asian Buddhist monuments. It also discusses the historical antecedents in the Indus Civilization and the religious and philosophical foundations of the three schools of Buddhism and its founder, Buddha. Previously obscure topics such as Aniconic and Vajrayana (Tantric) architecture and the four holiest sites of Buddhism will also be covered in this comprehensive volume. The author further investigates the influences of Buddhist architecture upon Islamic, Christian, and Hindu architecture that have been overlooked by past scholars."

This book deals with the technical, artistic and architectural aspects of the Hindu and Buddhist monuments from the beginning until today in Southeast Asia.