PHOTO EXHIBITION: Buddhism and the Global Bazaar at the Seat of Enlightenment

How is the memory associated with places made, imagined, contested and enforced? How are particular pasts renewed and activated through international conventions and transnational agendas? How do religious, economic and social aspirations intermingle and connect people across national boundaries? In a state that is often described as the most “backward” and impoverished part of India, what are the consequences of UNESCO World Heritage designation among local stakeholders who rely on the economic benefits derived from tourism and pilgrimage?These are some of the questions I want to highlight in this photographic exhibition showing how the central place of Buddhism intersects with the sacral-economic dimensions of the global bazaar in North India today. These photographs were taken at Bodh Gaya between 2005 and 2007 as part of my doctoral research in Anthropology here at the University of British Columbia.

- DAVID GEARY, PhD