Welcome

Anthropologist, researcher

Award-winning author and public speaker

MEET DAVID

I’m an anthropologist whose research expertise is on religion and spirituality, and on transformations of Chinese society and culture in the context of globalization.

My training is in the anthropology and sociology of Daoism and Chinese religion, areas in which I have published several award-winning books including Qigong Fever: Body, Science and Utopia in China; The Religious Question in Modern China (co-authored with Vincent Goossaert); and Dream Trippers: Global Daoism and the Predicament of Modern Spirituality (co-authored with Elijah Siegler).

My research has also touched on aspects of Buddhism, Confucianism and new religious and spiritual movements in the Chinese world, and has extended to cover other parts of Asia, transnational religious circulations, and the Baháʼí Faith. I am currently writing about fundamental philosophical and theoretical issues in the relationship between science, religion and society.

Much of this research has taken place within a broader investigation of the transformations of traditional society and culture in contemporary China, and has led me to conduct studies on civil society, volunteering and governance. In the past decade, my research on those themes has extended beyond China, to examine cultural, religious and social relations between China and the Global South, notably through some major projects on the Belt and Road Initiative. I have recently conducted field research in Laos, Nepal and Pakistan, among other countries.

I hope to translate my research into applications that are of benefit to the broader society. These efforts are focused in three main areas:

Growth: Helping students and others to grow spiritually, by developing approaches to spiritual knowledge and practice informed by social scientific insights; and to develop approaches to social science informed by spiritual insights.

Dialogue: Contributing to interdisciplinary, inter-cultural, inter-faith, and inter-civilizational discourses revolving around the principle of the oneness of humanity, in the context of an emerging global civilization.

Engagement: Helping institutional and business actors to sustainably engage with local communities through consultative practices and understanding of local values and social realities.