Category Archives: Academia

Chinese philosophy in the 2021-2022 Philosophical Gourmet Report

Once every few years, the Philosophical Gourmet Report publishes rankings of PhD programs in philosophy in the English-speaking world. It ranks programs “overall” and by areas of specialization. As one would hope for a report that aspires to be comprehensive and describe the current state of the field, one of those areas of specialization is Chinese philosophy.

You can find a general description of the methodology of the report here. As the member of the advisory board who took the lead in managing the Chinese philosophy area, and who wrote to the other assessors of Chinese philosophy to convene some joint deliberations about the process, I wanted to say a bit more about how we handled the Chinese philosophy section. Continue reading →

Call for applications: “Text and Image in the Ancient World” Renmin University, Beijing, June 8-12

Sixth Biannual Ph.D. Student and Young Scholar Workshop

“Text and Image in the Ancient World”

Venue: International Center for the Study of Ancient Text Cultures Renmin University of China Beijing,

Time: June 8–12, 2020

The International Center for the Study of Ancient Text Cultures (ICSATC), hosted at Renmin University of China, holds its sixth Ph.D. Student and Young Scholar Workshop on June 8-12, 2020. Four renowned scholars from the fields of Ancient Chinese, Japanese, Egyptian, and Mesopotamian Civilization will present lectures and seminars on specific topics. There also will be student research activities to complement the lectures and seminars. The principal language of instruction and interaction will be English.

Continue reading →

Job in Chinese Philology and Chinese Thought

The Department of Chinese Literature, National Cheng-Chi University, announces the following vacancy:

National Chengchi University

Department of Chinese Literature 2019 Academic Year First Semester

Recruitment of Full-time Teacher Announcement

Assistant Professor

Academic Expertise: (1) Chinese Philology (priority), (2) Chinese Thought, (3) Chinese Literature

Continue reading →

Conference in Taipei: “Phenomenology and Chinese Philosophy” (March 18-20)

Dear colleagues,

this is to inform you about the international conference “Selfhood, Otherness, and Cultivation. Phenomenology and Chinese Philosophy” (March 18-20, at National Chengchi University in Taipei). You can still register on our website which also contains many helpful information (list of speakers, abstracts, etc.). The conference is co-hosted by the philosophy department and the interdisciplinary “Research Center on Chinese Cultural Subjectivity in Taiwan” at National Chengchi University. Our guest of honor is Dan Zahavi (Kopenhagen/Oxford) who, besides participating in our conference, will also give a series of lectures next week (see here).

Cordially,
Kai Marchal

 

 

 

New episodes of The Issue is Not The Issue

The Issue is Not the Issue: A Podcast with Hans-Georg Moeller and Dan Sarafinas

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfs0MY7rs8J6jWlCdneoPVQ

 

Hans-Georg Moeller and Dan Sarafinas discuss contemporary debates on “political correctness” and related moral and social issues. They point to concepts such as virtue speech (“virtue signalling”), civil religion, “profilicity,” and the role of critique to better understand their nature.

 

Episode 3—Critique:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3W1m0Bez8vU

Philosophy today runs the risk of once more becoming the “handmaiden of theology” by being put in the service of civil religion. The Kantian concept of critique is revived to reflect on contemporary dogmatism and associated power structures that lead to phenomena such as “competitive wokeness” in entertainment (Taylor Swift) or the need to write “diversity statements” in academia. The idea of a therapeutic rather than a normative philosophy is suggested and it is explained how society, along with critique, evolves rather than progresses.

 

Episode 4—Profilicity: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Yz1C0-mtWI

Why do we need to produce “virtue speech”? We need it to be competitive in society and to bolster our public profiles. A new profile-based identity paradigm, called “profilicity,” is on the rise. It is replacing other identity paradigms such as sincerity and authenticity and provides not only individuals but also institutions (political parties, companies, universities, etc.) with identity value.