A Buddhist Crossroads: Pioneer European Buddhists and Globalizing Asian Networks 1860–1960

This chapter introduces the special issue of Contemporary Buddhism entitled A Buddhist crossroads: pioneer European Buddhists and globalizing Asian networks 1860-1960'. Single-country approaches to the study of Buddhism miss the crucial significance of international networks in the making of modern Buddhism, in a period when the material basis for such networks had been transformed. A key element of this process was the encounter between Asian Buddhist networks and western would-be Buddhists. The research described in this issue often raises other methodological questions of representatively and significance, while posing important challenges around collaborative research and the use of new technologies. The new twenty first century digital technologies which enables, working collaboratively yet thousands of miles apart, to piece together from hundreds of fragmentary and formerly lost' pieces of information a fairly comprehensive account of Dhammaloka's public career as a monk between 1900-1913.