Jack Meng-Tat Chia

Jack Meng-Tat Chia serves as Associate Professor of History and Foo Hai Fellow in Buddhist Studies at the National University of Singapore's Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. A historian of religion, he specializes in transnational Buddhist networks and Chinese religious traditions across Southeast Asia, with emphasis on Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore.

Chia received his PhD in History from Cornell University (awarded the Lauriston Sharp Prize), BA (Hons) and MA in History from the National University of Singapore, and MA in East Asian Studies from Harvard University as a Harvard-Yenching Fellow. Prior to his current position, he was a Postdoctoral Fellow at UC Berkeley's Center for Buddhist Studies.

His research examines Buddhism in Maritime Southeast Asia, Buddhist diaspora formations, religious diplomacy, Chinese popular religion, and South China Sea dynamics. Chia's work integrates historical and ethnographic methods to analyze how Buddhist communities negotiate modernity, globalization, and state policies while maintaining transnational connections.

His scholarly output reveals an evolution from localized studies of temples and deities toward broader analyses of Buddhist movements and international relations. Recent publications increasingly focus on Buddhist diplomacy, cultural exhibitions, and the role of religion in Southeast Asian geopolitics, demonstrating interdisciplinary engagement across history, religious studies, and political science.

Chia's contributions have earned significant recognition:

• 2021 EuroSEAS Humanities Book Prize for Monks in Motion: Buddhism and Modernity Across the South China Sea
• Shortlisted for the 2023 Friedrich Weller Prize
• Lauriston Sharp Prize for doctoral dissertation at Cornell University
• Fellow of the Royal Historical Society

He actively supervises graduate students in Buddhism across China and Southeast Asia, supporting candidates through the FASS Scholarship in Buddhist Studies and Foo Hai Ch’an Monastery Scholarship. His current research on Diplomatic Dharma: Buddhist Diplomacy in Modern Asia is funded by the Social Science Research Council Singapore's 2020 Social Science and Humanities Research Fellowship.

Chia leads multiple academic initiatives including the Buddhist Studies Group and GL Louis Religious Pluralism Research Cluster at NUS, co-chairs the Association for Asian Studies' Theravada Studies Group, and serves on editorial boards for Asian Culture, Journal of Global Buddhism, and six other major journals in religious and Asian studies.