Looking to the future, we propose to formally generalize the HB Visualizer into one web application–the NTI Visualizer–which will allow the academic community to build, collaborate on and publish their personal research bibliographies, controlled vocabulary and visualizations. 

This idea was initially developed after a pioneering bibliography of English-language academic publications related to Humanistic Buddhism was published in July 2019. In order to assist users in fully and quickly apprehending the great breadth of Humanistic Buddhist topics, a new method of presenting the material was necessary and timely. The strategy taken was to build lists of controlled vocabulary, or keywords, and locate them within the titles and abstracts of the publications of the HB Bibliography. A bimodal network visualization between titles and keywords was then generated and published online. 

In collaboration with Venerable Miao Guang and FGSIHB, this method was then applied to the Complete Works of Venerable Master Hsing Yun, crossing the chasms of language from English to Chinese and of content from academic to general, and have shown to be a useful way of peeking into the mind of a great master. The Institute of Humanistic Buddhism has also expressed interest in integrating such a visual method of accessing all of Fo Guang Shan’s material in their upcoming portal. 

We believe the NTI Visualizer will provide scholars an innovative lens towards Humanistic Buddhism, encouraging many more to contribute to this great endeavour.