His area of speciality isFalun Gong as well as the interpretation of Chinese religions bywesterners and the history of the religions ofChinese Australians.[2]The Times Literary Supplement states that inThe Religion of Falun Gong Penny "makes a good case for defining Falun Gong as a modern Chinese religion. . . . [He] provides an admirable guide to the short history of Falun Gong and the eclectic complexities of its doctrine, which he sets within the framework of indigenous religious belief over the centuries."[3]
After university study, Penny was a post-doctoral fellow at the ANU. From 1999 until 2005, he was the first Executive Officer of the Herbert and Valmae Freilich Foundation. During the years 2003 and 2004 he was a research fellow at the Centre for Cross-Cultural Research. Penny was appointed to the Division of Pacific and Asian History in October 2005. Since January 2010 he has been Deputy Director, and a Research Fellow, at theSchool of Culture, History & Language ANU College of Asia and the Pacific.[5]
'On the Acquisition of Moral Character', inGeremie R. Barmé and Jeremy Goldkorn (eds.), China Story Yearbook 2014: Shared Destiny, Canberra: Australian Centre on China in the World 2014.
The Religion of the Falun Gong, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2012.[7][8][9]
'Karmic Retribution, Animal Spirits, Falun Gong and the State', inMayfair Yang, Chinese Religiosities: Afflictions of Modernity and State Formation, Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008.
‘Master Li Encounters Jesus: Christianity and the Configurations of Falun Gong’, W. Smith, M. Tomlinson, and L. Manderson (eds.), Beliefs beyond Borders: Faith, Spiritual Practice and Communities in Asia/Pacific, New York: Springer, 2012.
