The Asia Pacific Journal | Japan Focus

Volume 22 | Issue 2 | Number 4 | Article ID 5826 | Feb. 29, 2024

Introduction to the Special Issue: Food Charity,
Religion, and Care in Vietnam
Dr. Le Hoang Anh Thu and Dr. Sara A. Swenson
Abstract: This introduction to the special issue on foodcharity, religion, and care in Vietnam compares grassroots philanthropy in Vietnam with broader trends toward
religious humanitarianism happening across Asia. The
co-editors of the special issue examine why food charity
has become popular in urban areas like Ho Chi Minh
City by exploring how food holds spiritual, moral significance for both donors and recipients. This survey
illuminates how grassroots philanthropy in Vietnam canoffer a comparative study for spirituality, ethics, and foodpractices across Asia, as well as religious humanitarianism globally.
Keywords: Vietnam, Buddhism, Religion, Charity, Humanitarianism, Philanthropy, Gender, Affect, Emotion,
Care

The Charity Kitchen: Vignette from Co-Editor
Le Hoang Anh Thu
I was walking down a busy street in the center of
Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam (hereafter, HCMC) in
March 2022 when a red banner caught my eyes. It
stood out from an array of boards advertising grocery stores, motorbike wash shops, street vendors,
and an elementary school, with big block lettersthat read “Charity Kitchen—Cook and deliver
meals to hospitals and neighborhoods affected by
COVID-19.”

Figure 1: Boxes of dried goods are stacked around awhite marble statue of the Buddha. A charity group
has dedicated these pre-packaged foods and hygienic products to a monastery that provides care toelderly people near Ho Chi Minh City. Photo credit:
Sara A. Swenson

Following the instructions of the shop owner, I
walked into a narrow alley to the Buddhist temple
that operated this charity kitchen. I would not haverecognized that it was a temple if there had not beena tall brown statue of the Bodhisattva of Compassion, Quan Âm Bồ Tát (Sanskrit: Avalokitesvara)
standing in one corner and a monk sitting at thedoor. The temple looked more like a fruit barn, as
its space was fully occupied by huge piles of dragon
fruit. Several middle-aged and older women in theirfloral pajamas1 were hastily putting dragon fruits
1
Women in HCMC, especially those from working class backgrounds, usually wear home clothes to run their errands outside of their house,such as to do grocery shopping or to visit neighbors and relatives.

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into small nylon bags. Before I could introduce myself, the monk approached me and invited me to jointhem in dividing 18 tons of dragon fruits into nylon
bags that would later be distributed to hospitals in
the city. He was in urgent need of volunteers and,
therefore, quickly recruited me as an assistant to
the temple’s charity kitchen. He dragged over a tiny
plastic chair and pointed for me to sit down. A woman sitting nearby immediately enrolled me in the“assembly.” My task was simple: put three dragon
fruits into one nylon bag and put the bag into a big
basket that would be taken to a van when it was full.

love,” “charity kitchen,” “0-VND meals,” and “0VND supermarket.”2

I later learned that, even though it was located in a
nameless alley, this temple oversaw a very broadtransnational network of philanthropists, volunteers,and donors. Their network included Buddhists inthe neighborhood who came regularly to help prepare charity meals, farmers from whom the temple
bought vegetables and fruits for the charity kitchen,and overseas Vietnamese people who were among
the donors for its food charity program. It was wellconnected with many hospitals, orphanages, schools,
communities, and neighborhoods inside and outside
the city, to which it distributed charity meals every
week. During the COVID-19 outbreak in HCMC,
even when the city was in strict social lockdown
from June to September 2021, the temple’s charity
kitchen never ceased its activity of distributing freemeals to many neighborhoods and hospitals affected by COVID-19. The temple also donated medicine, surgical masks, hand sanitizer, and money to
COVID-19 patients in the city.

Figure 2: Volunteers divide 18 tons of dragon fruits
into nylon bags for charity distribution in a Buddhist
temple in Ho Chi Minh City. Photo credit: Le Hoang
Anh Thu
Although there have been several studies exploring
the mushrooming of voluntary and charitable organizations since the state policy renovation (Đổi Mới)in 1986 that transformed Vietnam from a centrally
planned socialist system to a mixed-market economy (e.g., Luong 2005; Sidel 1997), few studies
have focused on religious charity groups. Even
rarer are studies on faith-based charitable distributions of food, despite this practice becoming prevalent in Vietnam and especially visible during the
COVID-19 pandemic. Food is central to religious
practices and charitable movements in Vietnam.
Buddhist believers, for example, give away foodduring certain times in the year, such as during theseventh lunar month or the new lunar year. Many
temples and Buddhist groups cook hot meals and deliver them to hospital patients. Donors provide foodin all forms, from dried goods and raw ingredients
to hot meals. In addition to donations, food charity
programs require the participation of many volunteers who help prepare and distribute food. Thus,
countless charitable activities occur around theThis temple is only one example of many Buddhist
temples, groups, and individuals that distribute charity meals to people in need across HCMC. During
the COVID-19 outbreak in HCMC—in addition to
the limited support offered by the state that provided
financial assistance and food to affected neighborhoods—Buddhism-based charity teams were prominent providers of food and other necessities to thecity residents. These charity teams operated under
several names, such as “kitchen of love,” “meals of2

2

VND is shorthand for the national currency, Việt Nam Đồng.

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preparation, distribution, and consumption of foodby donors and recipients.

Along with this retrenchment, the state has offered
growth incentives to private social service sectors,
such as voluntary cooperatives and organizations,while retaining its management and control to ensurethat these social organizations do not pose any political challenges to the state (Luong 2005, 125; Sidel1997).

The three articles in this special issue focus particularly on the charitable preparation and distributionof food from Buddhist temples, grassroots groups,
and individuals in HCMC and adjacent provinces.
Food has rich social and religious significance as a
medium of care and nurturance. The authors of thisspecial issue examine how food conveys care andmorality while facilitating community relationships
among grassroots charities in Vietnam. This special
issue aims to contribute to the understanding of therole of religion in the waves of popular volunteerism
that have swept the country since the 1990s. The
articles explore the question of how sharing food
through charity should be considered in relation tosocial responsibilities, agency, religion, and moral
obligations to fellow citizens in Vietnam’s contemporary society. The authors seek to understand how
food charity connects people across social strata andmanifests citizens’ moral agency by analyzing theexperiences of both donors and recipients.

Amid the proliferation of voluntary and charitableassociations, religious-based groups stand out for
their social contributions while being “loosely, if atall, connected to the national associations” (Luong
2005, 124). Studying village-based associations innorthern Vietnam, Luong (2005, 126) shows that
Buddhist communities are the most resilient voluntary groups. Meanwhile, in southern Vietnam, donating to charity has been a longstanding tradition. This
practice dates back to the pre-1975 period (whenNorth and South Vietnam were reunified) and continues to benefit from a steady flow of remittancesfrom overseas, as well as a highly developed private
sector (Luong 2005, 129).
Among religious-based associations, Buddhist
groups have made several significant contributions
and are considered “the most common alternativesocial services in the community” in Vietnam (Tu2017, cited in Hoang et al. 2018, 1076). In a context
of public distrust toward both public and private secular humanitarian organizations and limited options
for charity donations, faith-based charities and voluntary groups have received much higher donations
for their social activities than organizations run by
the government (TAF & VAPEC 2011, cited in Hoang et al. 2018, 1076). Moreover, Buddhist groups
have strong community connections and fundraising
capacities. Their services are accessible to vulnerable groups, which in turn renders them an important
player as the most available social services for many
communities in Vietnam’s society.

Context: Faith-Based Charity in Vietnam
The transition to a market economy since the Renovation in 1986 has led to several significant changes in Vietnam’s socioeconomic situation. Whiletransition has brought greater economic freedom
and expanded the market (London 2014, 90), it has
also witnessed the state’s declining involvement in
the financing of welfare programs. Since the early
1990s, the Vietnamese state has retreated from its
dominant roles in welfare institutions and shifted the
responsibilities of payment for welfare services tohouseholds, the private sector, and faith-based associations (Hoang et al. 2018, 1077; London 2014, 98;
Salemink 2006, 105). The state undertook a massive
retrenchment of welfare provisioning, especially inhealthcare and education (London 2014, 98; Luong
2005, 127). Meanwhile, the private sector mostly
caters to the stable-income and middle-class groups,
which leaves lower-income populations with a greater burden in affording several basic welfare services.

Several studies have highlighted the activities ofreligious groups in welfare provisioning, especially in health and education (e.g. Hoang et al. 2018;
Luong 2005). However, most of these studies fo3

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Food and Moral Concerns in Vietnam and Beyond

cus on organization-based activities, such as those
conducted by Vietnam’s state-managed National
Buddhist Sangha or prestigious temples, rather thanthose conducted by grassroots faith-based groups
or individuals (Le 2020, 6). A close-up analysis ofthese religious charity groups—including an examination of how they combine religious beliefs with
their volunteer and donation practices—has beenrather absent in the literature. Some rare exceptions
are studies on mental health care and elder careprovided by Buddhist temples (e.g. H. Nguyen 2016;
D.M. Nguyen 2020). Although grassroots activities
have not received sufficient attention from scholars, they have often been featured and recognized
for their work and contributions on national media
platforms in Vietnam (Le 2020, 6). Several television programs and YouTube channels feature charitable groups that distribute free meals to the poorand those in need. Some examples are “Kitchen ofLove” (Bếp Yêu Thương) and “The Miracle” (ĐiềuKỳ Diệu), programs featuring food charity groups
in various provinces in Vietnam, broadcasted by Ho
Chi Minh City Television (HTV).

Marshall Sahlins (1972, 220; cited in Leung and
Caldwell 2019, 9), contends that the exchange offood always has a “moral purpose,” as food is central to social relations. Food thus constructs personaland collective ties, through which moral meanings
and connections are made. Expansive studies in theanthropology of food and power further examine
how practices of cooking, eating, and sharing foodboth construct and challenge social hierarchies
around gender, class, and ethnicity (see Mintz and
Du Bois 2002). As Nir Avieli notes, the culinary
sphere serves as “an arena in which cultural production [takes] place” (Avieli 2012, 13). As illustrated inthis special issue, not only does food given in charity
define the ties between donors and recipients—andthus, between social groups and classes—it also
reveals the interactions between people involved incharitable practices with a wide array of moral discourses at play in contemporary Vietnam.
Previous studies have shown that these moral concerns revolve around Buddhist concepts of meritand karma as well as secular concerns such as social
hierarchies, connections between social groups,
and citizens’ expectations toward the state’s duties
of care (see, for example, Le 2020; Nguyen 2020;
Swenson 2020). As explored in this special issue,
the interweaving of charitable food and morality
involves a wide variety of secular concerns aboutfood and materialism such as issues of food poverty and safety, materialism, and over-consumerismin post-socialist Vietnam. The authors illustrate themoral meanings of food through the gendered andreligious dispositions of Buddhist charity donors andrecipients, which in turn shapes their exchange ofcare.

The articles collected here contribute to this existing
literature by exploring the Buddhist charitable distribution of food from an ethnographic perspective.
As Leung and Caldwell explain, food is “central
to most occasions for learning and making social
relationships” (2019, 4). Food indeed can foster“ethnographic encounters” between researchers andtheir local interlocutors through its exchanges during
fieldwork. These articles feature several ethnographic encounters between the authors, Buddhist charity
donors, and recipients. Following a range of foodcharity programs in HCMC and nearby provinces, the authors in this volume provide an in-depth
examination of the motives behind these activities;
how they reveal HCMC dwellers’ socioeconomic
and religious perceptions of food; as well as various
food issues faced by vulnerable populations, ranging
from food deprivation and food safety to food andmaterial abundance.

Embedded in Vietnam’s food system, it is not surprising that concerns about food safety found in
the country’s foodscape manifest in the activity of
cooking for charity. Having experienced food scarcity and hunger during the war and post-war periods
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(Ehlert and Faltmann 2019, 7; Le 2018, 60), contemporary Vietnam is facing a new set of challenges
that come with emerging food abundance and mass
agricultural production, such as widespread concerns
about food safety due to overuse of chemicals during
food production, lack of traceability of food origins, social stratification through food consumption(Ehlert and Faltmann 2019, 11), and the questionable
quality of imported food (Figuié et al. 2020, 152–3;
Swenson 2020, 45).

national identities. Promoting a specific food is often
part of the nation-building process. Essays in Leungand Caldwell’s (2019) edited volume contend thatthe consumption of milk, rice, soybean products,
and so on is not merely a dietary practice but iseven promoted as a moral duty that citizens should
perform to respond to their nation-state’s agenda.
For example, in “Rice as Self” (2019, 23), Francesca Bray maintains that domestic rice is protectedagainst imported rice in Japan and Malaysia because
this staple food is believed to be the embodiment of
the nations’ spiritual and moral essences. By eating
domestic rice, citizens construct themselves “socially, physically, spiritually, and morally.” Likewise, the consumption of milk and meat as part ofdaily diets in China and Vietnam is paralleled by
the pursuit of modernity, wealth, and power (Ehlert
2019, 117; Fu 2019, 47; Leung 2019, 230). By thesame token, soybean milk and vegetarian diets havebeen promoted in China as “a moral food choice fora modernizing Asian nation” rather than depending
intensively on meat-based diets as in the West. On
the other hand, soybean-based diets have also beenencouraged to maintain China’s agricultural anddietary traditions (Fu 2019, 51; Leung 2019, 234).

Meanwhile, past concerns about food security(Ehlert and Faltman 2019, 2) persist in society, especially among vulnerable social groups, thus sprinkling modern-day materialism and food abundancewith moral ambiguities. As shown in Le Hoang
Ngoc Yen’s ethnographic study of a Buddhist temple
that treats patients with chronic and terminal diseases using a macrobiotic diet, problems with the foodproduction system and materialistic ways of life areperceived by many as revealing a moral crisis in society. These issues are condemned as the root causesof several severe illnesses and health problems experienced by Vietnamese people such as obesity, diabetes, depression, organ failure, and cancer. Le Hoang
Ngoc Yen’s paper highlights the interconnection between seemingly scientific questions about nutrition
and food hygiene and a number of questions about
the morality of Vietnamese society. Food, its safety,
and its nutritional values in the eyes of consumers—
especially those with chronic and fatal diseases—
become the embodiment of moral values in society.
Dirty food is conceptualized as a symptom of moral
deficiencies caused by rapid economic development
and industrialization that have led to a human obsession with wealth, greed, and gluttony. Practitioners
therefore follow a macrobiotic diet not merely as analternative source of nutrients, but also as a “moral
project” to cultivate themselves amid the allegedly
moral downturn of Vietnam’s society.

The articles in this special issue contribute to thediscussion by exploring the religious-based moral meanings that Buddhist charity donors bestow
on their benevolent works and food. The authors
highlight the spiritual and emotional aspects of theprocess of preparing charitable food for Buddhist
charity donors. Moral concerns revolving aroundfood are densely connected to religious values, suchas Buddhist teachings of compassion, Buddhist
cosmologies about trans-temporal and trans-species
kinship, and karmic and merit transmission between
lifetimes. Most focused on how Buddhist moral
values are infused in food charity practice is Sara
Swenson’s paper, which features charitable groups
and temples that distribute food to vulnerable groups
in HCMC. She compares the moral terms that they
use to differentiate their projects from one another,and then analyzes how descriptions of charity thatemphasize selflessness and empathic giving correlate

Placing these studies in a broader regional context—academic work on food and morality in Asian
countries has similarly discussed the connections
between food, the construction of citizenship, and5

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with broader nationalist discourses on morality. The
author contends that Buddhist charity groups act inaccordance with the state’s encouragement toward
the socialization of care. Socialization emphasizes
individuals’ responsibility to not only care for theirfamilies but also to have compassion for disadvantaged groups in society (see M.T.N. Nguyen 2018).

send positive energy into the food that will be passed
on to the recipients. Thus, charity cooks’ virtues
contribute to the development of healthy and safe
food despite the widespread issue of dirty food in
Vietnamese society. Similarly, Sara Swenson’s paper
highlights Buddhist volunteers’ belief in the effectof the emotional dispositions of charity donors on
the holistic well-being of recipients. By comparing
Buddhist concepts of “karma” among different charity groups in HCMC, she points out how the nuances of this term translate into different motives andmoral meanings that these groups assign to altruism.
Likewise, Le Hoang Ngoc Yen highlights Buddhist
macrobiotic practitioners’ beliefs in merit-making
food. They posit that, by consuming certain foods
while steering clear of others, patients can avoid
bad karma transmitted through the food production
process and, in turn, accelerate their recovery.

In addition, the articles in this collection contend
that Buddhist volunteers believe that their spiritualand emotional labor bestows their food with moral
purity, which in turn offsets several commonly foundconcerns about food safety and hygiene in Vietnam. Food safety and how Vietnamese consumers
tackle this issue to gain trust and confidence in foodhave attracted substantial academic attention (e.g.,
Ehlert & Faltmann 2019; Faltmann 2019, Figuié etal. 2019; Kurfurst 2019). A recurrent theme in thisresearch is the issue of trust, be it trust in the foodindustry or the state. Concerns about food safety
centers mostly on the use of artificial chemicals
and their residues in ingredients (Figuié et al. 2020,
155). Previous studies have explored the tactics that
Vietnamese buyers—most of whom are women, as
they are primarily responsible for preparing household meals—employ to overcome their distrust of
the food system. For example, Vietnamese womenpurchase food from the early morning “wet” market
to obtain the freshest products, from supermarkets orfrom their usual retailers, as familiarity with a vendor is sometimes the hallmark of good food quality(Figuié et al. 2020, 156–8). Meanwhile, middle- andhigher-income groups opt for organic products (Faltmann 2020).

Situating food charity in the wider moral context ofnation- and citizen-building, Le Hoang Anh Thu explores the analogy that female donors make between
cooking for recipients and cooking for their own
families and how this cross-contextual comparison
situates the act of cooking within Vietnam’s moral
discourse. Perceiving their charity work as taking
care, not only of their families, but of everyone insociety, female donors see the significance of theireveryday work—which is cooking—extended far
beyond the domestic space and reaching out to amuch wider social context. Their works are praisedby the country’s media as acts of sustaining “thefire” both of their homes and of the country. Not
only does charity food alleviate the suffering of thepoor and the needy, but it also sustains the strengthand solidarity of the nation in times of hardship. In
Le Hoang Ngoc Yen’s paper, patients undertaking
macrobiotic treatment see a macrobiotic diet as a“return to the root,” to the pre-industrial past when
Vietnamese people were allegedly healthier and did
not suffer from so many chronic and terminal diseases as they currently do. Opting for macrobiotic
food, rather than industrially produced food, thesepractitioners cultivate an alternative subjectivity, as
opposed to the one made by greedy and consump-

These special-issue articles highlight the spiritual dimensions that Buddhist followers attribute towidespread concerns about food safety and morality. Dirty food and the overuse of chemicals in
production processes do not merely indicate ethicalviolations in the agricultural and food industries, butthey also conceal potential karmic consequences forboth producers and consumers. Nevertheless, charity
donors in Le Hoang Anh Thu’s paper believe that
their wholehearted labor and purity of thought will6

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Vietnamese people have become.

volunteers, women, and people with terminal illness.
The articles gathered here offer new analyses of
how marginalized communities respond to economic transformations in Vietnam by engaging in foodcharity. These articles also show how the religious
values and practices of grassroots food charities
may affect the very realization of national trends—
like the privatization of social services, deepening
income disparity, and rapid development—as they
unfold on the ground.

The Need for Ethnography in Studies of Humanitarianism
In addition to engaging with issues of religion, morality, food security, and nation building, the arguments and findings presented in this special issue are
significant for studies of religious humanitarianism
transnationally. By offering close ethnographic
studies of grassroots movements, the authors demonstrate how philanthropy operates on a spectrum frominformal to formal—spanning spontaneous acts ofcare and bureaucratically organized movements.
Local cultures—including religions—have conceptsof subjectivity, care, and ethics that fundamentally
shape altruism. Ethnographic research traces thesesubtle connections, illuminating how dominantreligious traditions in any given region affect theorganization, function, and reception of humanitarian projects, even when these projects are seemingly
secular. Non-religious or state-run facilities likehospitals, orphanages, and assisted-living centers
receive support from donors and volunteers motivated by religious values that may go undocumented instudies that lack a qualitative research component.
Similarly, informal groups bolster and intersect withformal organizations in ways that are largely invisible through top-down research on humanitarianism
at the national or international level. The articles inthis special issue offer a model for examining theintersections between religious and non-religious
social services, proving the need to include ethnography among standard research methods for exploring the large-scale transformations accompanying
development and globalization. As Philip Fountainand Levi McLaughlin write, “Ethnographic accounts
are more than just thick descriptions: they produce
new interpretive and critical possibilities” (2016, 2).
The new critical possibilities produced through thiscollection reveal how grassroots food charities may
particularly appeal to those of previously underrepresented demographics—such as working-class

Grassroots Charity and Industrialized Philanthropy
By centering on grassroots charity, these studies
complicate and expand existing narratives aroundthe popularization of philanthropy in Asia. As pre7

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thropy is applicable to many contemporary contexts
in comparison with the Chinese societies featured intheir study. Fountain and McLaughlin trace a similarrise in professionalized, institutionalized forms of religious philanthropy to provide disaster-relief in Asia
(2016). They describe how local, faith-based charities have become increasingly modernized and professionalized as they move to address the aftermathof natural disasters. These changes include increasing levels of bureaucratization as governments begin
to regulate and audit faith-based efforts at organizingaid (Ibid., 14). The increasing rationalization of religious charity identified by Fountain and McLaughlin
parallels the transformations described by Weller
et al. Hiroko Kawanami likewise identifies a shift
in how charity is given among Buddhist communities in Burmese Myanmar. Kawanami notes that
Buddhist groups have adopted more programmatic
forms of giving following the model of international
humanitarian aid organizations that arrived after the2008 Cyclone Nargis (2020, 140). Finally, Nattaka
Chaisinthop’s research on Buddhist humanitarianism
in Thailand examines how a boom in volunteer programs is tied to changing concepts of moral citizenship and nationalism (2014). In each of these cases,
the development of formalized charity is tied to thesame themes of globalization and modernization
described by Weller et al., on a range of scales.

viously noted, many studies have surveyed the riseand spread of modern, institutionalized humanitarianorganizations across East and Southeast Asia. For
example, Robert P. Weller, C. Julia Huang, Keping
Wu, and Lizhu Fan’s book, Religion and Charity:
The Social Life of Goodness in Chinese Societies
argues that communities in mainland China and theChinese diaspora support a general shift toward what
they call “industrialized philanthropy” (2017, 2).
They define industrialized philanthropy by the threecommon features of (1) large-scale programming,(2) rationalized, bureaucratic systems of operationand leadership, and (3) an emphasis on the self as
an autonomous moral subject (Ibid., 2). This third
aspect of industrialized philanthropy accompanies
a move away from community-based care toward
more anonymized giving. For example, rather thanproviding mutual aid through a village temple orfamily network, industrialized philanthropy may
mobilize cosmopolitan volunteers to serve communities of virtual strangers.3 By distancing donors
from recipients, industrialized philanthropy promotes a universalistic sense of doing good by beinga good person, distinct from moral systems definedamong long-term community and family relationships (Ibid., 122).
The individualistic moral selfhood promoted byindustrialized philanthropy resonates with international trends toward globalization, hyper-mobility,
and urbanization. As upwardly mobile workers findthemselves far from home, pursuing business andeducation opportunities, volunteering becomes one
way to meet others with shared interests and values.
Large-scale humanitarian organizations thus introduce and reifying this new sense of individual moral
selfhood, as volunteers model it together, for one another. Weller et al. explore this phenomenon throughthe case of Taiwan’s international Buddhist Compassion Relief Tzu Chi organization (Ibid., 105–106),
which has gained branches and grown in popularity
among the Taiwanese diaspora population.

Implicitly present in many studies of industrialized
philanthropy is the theme of class: upward mobility, travel, and education facilitate the international
connections that fuel large-scale humanitarianism.
Increased leisure time and financial resources haveenabled such programs to develop with support fromwealthy donors and volunteers—particularly, in thecase of Tzu Chi, among middle-class women (Huang
and Weller 1998, 392). At the same time, experiences of urban alienation, “moral breakdown” (Zigon
2007), exposure to political struggles (Chaisinthop2014), and a perceived decline in traditional formsof care4—drive volunteers to seek new forms of
moral identity. While charity provides a way to gainsocial capital and assert status—as Jeffrey Samuels

Weller et al.’s theorization of industrialized philan-

3
Weller et al. trace these shifting histories of religious philanthropy
in Malaysia, Taiwan, and China (2017, 20–53).

4
Di Febo 2020 analyzes how a perceived breakdown in traditional
forms of care drives new Buddhist charity practices in Japan.

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notes in his study of Sri Lankan Buddhist relief workin Malaysia (2016, 69)—it is also a way of building
community and seeking belonging amid rapid cultural, political, and economic change.

with religions to both explain and determine these
dynamics, especially as religions provide cosmological frameworks for understanding the nature ofnourishment, embodiment, and care.

The articles in this special issue expand studies ofphilanthropy through and beyond the industrial byshifting the focus toward the margins of society.
These studies foreground groups who have not yet
accessed upward mobility, higher education, or
whose demographic positions make it much harder
to improve social status due to factors like gender,
sexual orientation, or physical ability. Women, working-class lay people, low-ranking nuns, and people
with terminal illnesses become leading voices inthese articulations of non-industrialized philanthropy. These voices offer an alternative perspective on
how the same trends toward urbanization, modernization, and globalization manifest differently among
diverse demographic groups. Rather than reinforcing
concepts of autonomous moral selfhood or rationalized universal goodness, these articles show how thepositionality of volunteers profoundly affects theirunderstandings and experiences of morality. Positionality thus powerfully impacts the way charity isinterpreted, organized, and performed at the grassroots level, through the lens of “lived religion” (Orsi
2010).

Food appears as a key component of lived religion
in Le Hoang Ngoc Yen’s article, “Eat, Pray, Heal?
– Prescribing Macrobiotic Foods in a Vietnamese
Temple.” The selection of ingredients, as well as
their sourcing and preparation, is a means of healing
through the macrobiotic diets prescribed by Brown
Rice Temple’s leading monk. Her work offers aclose ethnographic study of how Buddhist theories
of emotion, embodiment, and materiality all manifest through the foods delivered to cancer patientsseeking care. The patients and monastics she met
during fieldwork historically attribute macrobiotics to Zen Buddhism, noting that the diet requires
balancing yin and yang elements typically associated with Daoism. The perfect confluence of thesecosmological systems further shows how religions,on the ground, may draw from multiple historical,
philosophical, and practical sources simultaneously.
Rather than parsing these sources, scholars can gaina deeper understanding of religion and social movements like food charity by considering why labelingsomething “Buddhist” is important to local groups inany given context.

Grassroots Food Charity and Lived Religion

Le Hoang Anh Thu’s article, “Keeping Alight the
Kitchen Fire: Food Charity and Communal Solidarity in Ho Chi Minh City (Vietnam),” takes analternative approach to lived religion by proposingthat women gain social capital and agency throughparticipating in Buddhism-based food charities. Her
research highlights how women’s socialization todomestic care both inspires their interests in charity and shapes their programming styles. Le Hoang
Anh Thu’s work neatly complements research by C.
Julia Huang on middle-class women’s involvementwith Tzu Chi and industrialized philanthropy more
broadly. While Huang analyzes the class dynamics
of leisure time and femininity on women’s volunteering in international Buddhist organizations, Le
Hoang Anh Thu’s article foregrounds working class

The concept of “lived religion” is vital to broadening
research on religious humanitarianism because itemphasizes how beliefs and practices shape wholeexperiences of the world, from the mundane to theextraordinary. Rather than limiting religion to therealms of systematic philosophy or institutionalized
traditions, this approach encourages an analysis ofreligion in minute daily interactions. Approachingfood charity as lived religion further emphasizes
how food is fundamentally social. Food mediates
relationships and power dynamics by illuminating
who gives and who receives, who makes and who
consumes. Because food is vital to life, access tofood is inherently an ethical issue. People engage
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women involved with local, informal groups. She
argues that women’s volunteerism blurs distinctions
between domestic and public labor as women apply
their cooking skills and perceived nurturing instincts
to caretaking beyond the home. State media portrays
this labor as a source of civic pride and solidarity,elevating gendered domestic work to the level of anation-building project. As women prepare food forcharitable distribution, they draw on Buddhist concepts of the mind and emotion to imbue their meals
with moralized affects of pure compassion. These
affects are also determined by feminized ethics of
how to care for one’s family. Altogether, Le Hoang
Anh Thu’s work demonstrates how the socializationof women in Vietnam influences their interpretations
and application of Buddhist ethics through foodcharity. In turn, Buddhist ethics of food charity takeon a distinctly feminine quality as they are enacted
through domestic models of care. Through this article, scholars may surmise that Buddhism also affects
Vietnamese nation-building projects, at large, bysubtly shaping women’s philanthropy.

and gratitude on recipients, for whom reciprocity is
structurally impossible. Conversely, Sara Swenson
argues that this analysis occludes the possibility foralternative understandings of giving and reciprocity
based on non-Christian religious cosmologies. In thecontext of her own research, Buddhist teachings suggest different dynamics between nature, subjectivity,and ethics that affect how reciprocity functions.
Scholars must attend to ways religious cosmologies
influence seemingly universal acts like sharing foodin order to perceive how diverse worldviews leadto different concrete, material outcomes over time.
Even seemingly small programming distinctions,such as whether to serve meat with free meals or not,can begin to affect broader social phenomena likemarket trends.
Overall, this special issue offers research on Buddhism and food charity in Vietnam as a blueprint
for future research on religious humanitarianism
internationally. Each of these articles models how
to analyze “lived religion” in scholarship on food,development, and philanthropy. The specific articles offer additional insights on how gender, health,class, and spirituality affect experiences of socialchange as globalization and urbanization transformdaily life across Asia. These studies compel more
serious treatment of grassroots charity movements asessential to contemporary humanitarianism at both
local and global levels.

Sara Swenson’s article, “The Merit of Meat: Karma
as Social Fact among Food Charities in Vietnam,”
explores the theme of lived religion by comparing
how different understandings of karma motivate avariety of charity programs among volunteers. Her
work traces how leaders and participants in eachgroup hold distinct interpretations of karma that correspond to conflicting choices to serve meat or not
when providing free meals to homeless people andcancer patients. These tensions show how the social
positions and life experiences of volunteers leadthem to a variety of experiences with Buddhist ethics, further emphasizing the importance of resistingmeta-narratives when describing regional trends toward religious humanitarianism. She extends this argument beyond scholarly treatments of Buddhism to
advocate for more nuanced approaches to religious
humanitarianism at large. The article critiques Didier
Fassin’s argument that international humanitarianism
is generally rooted in Christian concepts of compassion and sacrifice. Fassin proposes that humanitarianism thereby imposes an unfair burden of debt

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About the Authors

Nguyen, Huong. 2016. “Mental Health Care forElderly People at Formal Mental Health Systems
and Buddhist Temples in Vietnam: Making a Casefor Mindful Elder Care in Vietnam.” Ageing International 41: 394–413. doi: 10.1007/s12126-016-92635

Dr. Le Hoang Anh Thu is an associate professorof Asia Pacific Studies at Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific
University (Oita, Japan). Le holds a PhD of Anthropology from the Australian National University.
Le’s current research focuses on aging, lay Buddhist
practice, and faith-based charitable practice inVietnam.

Nguyen. Minh T. N. 2018. “Vietnam’s ‘Socialization’ Policy and the Moral Subject in a Privatizing
Economy.” Economy and Society 47(4): 627–647.

Dr. Sara A. Swenson is an Assistant Professor in
Religion at Dartmouth College (Hanover, NH, USA).
Her research focuses on religious humanitarianism
and contemporary Buddhism in Vietnam. Swenson
holds a Ph.D. and M.Phil. in Religion from Syracuse
University, an M.A. in Comparative Religion from
Iliff School of Theology, and a B.A. in English fromthe University of Minnesota Duluth.

Orsi, Robert. 2010. Madonna of 115th Street: Faith
and Community in Italian Harlem, 1880-1950. New
Haven: Yale University Press.
Salemink, Oscar. 2006. “Translating, Interpreting
and Practicing Civil Society in Vietnam.” In David
Lewis & David Mosse, eds., Development Brokers
and Translators: The Ethnography of Aid and Agencies: 101–126. Bloomfield, CT: Kumarian Press.
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