John Holt and his book, "Spirits of the Place: Buddhism and Lao Religious Culture," featured in The Washington Post.
John Holt, Bowdoin’s William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of the Humanities in Religion & Asian Studies, shares insight about how the Lao New Year (likened to a hybrid of a Hindu festival of colors and a college football tailgate party) has changed over the centuries.
In the Washington Post article, Holt says that in previous centuries the New Year was celebrated with “high sacrality and sobriety,” but today it has a “carnival atmosphere of lighthearted and licensed anarchy.”
The article also references Holt’s book Spirits of the Place: Buddhism and Lao Religious Culture (2009).
