"In this revised edition of her work, June Campbell extends and clarifies many of the key issues concerning gender, identity and Tibetan Buddhism in order to promote a better understanding of the historical importance of gender symbolization in the construction of religious belief and philosophy.

With its cross-cultural stance, the book creates links between the symbolic representations of gender in the philosophy of Tibetan Buddhism and contemporary western thinking about identity politics and intersubjectivity. In the light of Tibetan Buddhism's popularity in the West, Campbell raises questions about gender and the potential uses and abuses of power and secrecy in Tibetan Tantra, with its unique emphasis on guru-devotion and sexual ritual.

Throughout this new edition, she elucidates, through a psychoanalytical perspective, something of the dynamic interrelationships between the inner lives of individuals, their gender identities in society and the belief systems which they create to provide cohesion, continuity and meaning, whether it be in the East or the West."--BOOK JACKET.