The USA is the center for Buddhist studies in western countries at present, and Chinese Buddhist scholars would benefit from the scholarship of American colleagues. In the field of Chinese Buddhism, most of American scholars show great interest in the history of pre-song dynasties, particularly in Chinese Buddhist schools centered by Zen Buddhism, just as their Chinese colleagues. As for the post-song dynasties, i .e. Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties, they introduce various methods from social science, such as social history and anthropology, and new perspectives for further Buddhist studies take place especially in their studies of late Ming and early Qing, and modern history of Chinese Buddhism. This paper still pays attention to their studies on such problems as "Signification of Buddhism" and "Relationship between Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism."
