The Gods of Traffic: A Brief Look at the Hindu Intersection in Buddhist Bangkok

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Published: Jul 3, 2009
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Buddhist Bangkok Hindu Intersection A Brief Look The Gods of Traffic

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Justin McDaniel
University of Pennsylvania

Abstract


Any visitor to Thailand will undoubtedly pass dozens of shrines on street corners, at bus stations, and on monastic grounds to supposedly “non-Buddhist” deities.


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How to Cite
McDaniel, J. (2009). The Gods of Traffic: A Brief Look at the Hindu Intersection in Buddhist Bangkok. The Journal of International Association of Buddhist Universities (JIABU), 2(1), 49–57. Retrieved from https://so06.tci-thaijo.org/index.php/Jiabu/article/view/204854
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Vol. 2 No. 1 (2009): The Journal of International Association of Buddhist Universities (JIABU)
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Article

Views and opinions expressed in the articles published by The Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Universities (JIABU), are of responsibility by such authors but not the editors and do not necessarily reflect those of the editors.

Author Biography

Justin McDaniel, University of Pennsylvania

Associate Professor Dr. Justin Thomas McDaniel received his Ph.D. from Harvard University’s
Department of Sanskrit and Indian Studies in 2003. He is now Undergraduate Chair in the Department
of Religious Studies at University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA. Courses include: Buddhism,
Religious Reading Cultures, Monasticism, Buddhism and Film, Buddhism, Ritual, and Magic.
His research foci include Lao, Thai, Pali and Sanskrit linguistics and literature, Southeast Asian
Buddhism, Thai and Lao art, ritual studies, manuscript studies, and Southeast Asian history. He is
the chair of the Thailand, Laos, Cambodia Studies Association and the founder of the NEH funded
Thai Digital Monastery Project. He has taught courses on Hinduism, Southeast Asia Literature,
Buddhism, Myth and Symbolism, Southeast Asian History, and the Study of Religion after living and
researching in South and Southeast Asia for many years as a Social Science Research Council and
Fulbright Fellow, translator, volunteer teacher, and Buddhist monk. His book, Gathering Leaves and
Lifting Words: Histories of Monastic Education in Laos and Thailand, is published by the University
of Washington Press (2008).
2 Starting in 2004 and reaching its pinnacle in the summer of 2007, newspapers, television programs,
film stars, and politicians in Thailand had regular commentaries on the popularity and economic
impact of this new class of amulets from Nakhon Sri Thammarat in Southern Thailand called the
Jatukham Ramathep. The flurry (what Thais came to call “khai” (fever)) of people who traveled to
the South to purchase these amulets reached into the tens of thousands. When one group of these
amulets went on sale two people were trampled to death as crowds rushed to the monastery cash in