Chinese religions are often presented as a unity with each tradition possessing features typical of a Chinese religious system. From the 17th century there has been debate in Europe as to whether religion in China exists at all or whether what appear as Chinese religions are atheistic, purely functional, superstitious, cults and rituals.
This publication takes the approach to reflect from within the perspective of Western cultural studies upon the following inherent problems. First, Western cultural studies claim to be universal but nevertheless have developed their theories exclusively with Western source material and concerns. Second, a multiplicity of strands have emerged within the discipline and the significant divergence between national cultural studies therefore shows no unified body of cultural studies. Third, with its enormous impact on Western academia cultural studies are now being adapted to non-Western academic traditions, generating an even greater diversity of cultural studies approaches. While acknowledging that multiplicity is inherent to the nature of cultural studies, it is our contention that Chinese cultural studies cannot easily be subsumed under the umbrella of Western cultural studies. The Keywords Re-Oriented course critically reflects upon Western theoretical approaches towards culture through an examination of the application of Western theories to the non-Western culture of China, testing theories of culture generated in the West in their application to the Chinese field. This book is part of the series „interKULTUR European-Chinese Intercultural Studies“ which consists of teaching material for intercultural studies in higher education and research results of such studies.