Allan on Confucius and Abdication at Harvard (and in NYRB)

Monday, April 11, 4:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.
The Rise of Confucius and Legends of Abdication in Light of Warring States Period Bamboo Manuscripts
Speaker: Sarah Allan, Burlington Northern Foundation Professor of Asian Studies in honor of Richard M. Dressler at Dartmouth College, chair of the Society for the Study of Early China, and editor of Early China
Sponsored by the Harvard University Fairbanks Center for Chinese Studies
S250, 2nd Floor, CGIS South, 1730, Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA

More information here.

Subscribers to the New York Review of Books can also read Ian Johnson’s “A Revolutionary Discovery in China” in the April 21 issue, which is a review essay based on Sarah Allan’s book Buried Ideas: Legends of Abdication and Ideal Government in Early Chinese Bamboo-Slip Manuscripts.

Angle: “How Buddhist is Neo-Confucianism?”

I trust that everyone who is interested has heard about the upcoming Rutgers Workshop on Chinese Philosophy (RWCP), “Conversations with Western Philosophers”; more info is here. The prior afternoon, I will be giving a public lecture in which some may be interested:

“How Buddhist is Neo-Confucianism? The Roots and Branches of Zhu Xi’s Epistemology”

Thursday, April 14, 2016, 4:30-6:00pm.  Pane Room, Alexander Library, College Avenue Campus, Rutgers University.  Free and open to the public.

C&CP on Decolonializing Comparative Methodologies

The current issue of Comparative and Continental Philosophy (issue 7:2) has some excellent, provocative material on the methodology of comparative philosophy. I particularly recommend:

  • Amy K. Donahue & Rohan Kalyan, “Introduction: On the Imperative, Challenges, and Prospects of Decolonizing Comparative Methodologies”

and

  • David Haekwon Kim, “José Mariátegui’s East-South Decolonial Experiment”

 

Is There a Pre-Modern Tradition of Rhetoric in China?

A colleague writes:

I do not believe there existed a “Chinese rhetorical tradition” as it did in ancient Athens and Rome–and would like to hear your opinion on this subject.

Rhetoric as an institution whose purpose and goal was to persuade seemed at odds with pre-modern Chinese concepts of language, politics, and law. (Of course, the skills for persuading an emperor to change his ways was important–but such skills never got transformed into a set of institutional practice which one could learn and on which basis one’s performance was judged as it was in 16th and 17th century European universities.)

The absence of a rhetorical tradition in China did not manifest itself simply linguistically, but also in art and music. Statues in China prior to the 20th century were limited to statues of gods but not to heroicize human beings (Gigantic, monumental, and emotion arousing statues in China century appeared only in the 20th century after Westernization–esp. after China had learned the art of propaganda.)

It would be wonderful to hear whether you think rhetoric as an institution existed in China before the 20th century.

With her permission I share these thoughts here. What think you all?

El Amine and Symposium on Bell in Perspectives on Politics

The new issue of Perspectives on Politics (14:1, March 2016), available here, contains several articles of interest:

  • Loubna El Amine, “Beyond East and West: Reorienting Political Theory through the Prism of Modernity”
  • An extended discussion of Daniel Bell’s The China Model, with articles by Baogang He, Victoria Tin-bor Hui, Leigh Jenco, Andrew Nathan, Lynette Ong, Thomas Pangle, and Joseph Wang.

Lecture on Wen (文)

PHILOSOPHIZING THE CONCEPT OF “WEN (文)”: BEGINNING FROM TAKEDA TAIJUN’S SHIBA SEN

APR 5, 12:00–1:30pm

Harvard Yenching Institute Common Room, 2 Divinity Ave., Cambridge

Ishii Tsuyoshi (Associate Professor, Area Studies, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the University of Tokyo; HYI Visiting Scholar)

Chair/discussant: David Wang (Edward C. Henderson Professor of Chinese Literature, East Asian Languages and Civilizations Department, Harvard University)

For more information, see here.

Call For Papers, Journal of Chinese Humanities

Journal of Chinese Humanities (JOCH) is an English-language extension of Wen Shi Zhe (Journal of Literature, History and Philosophy), one of mainland China’s oldest and most respected humanities journals. JOCH presents scholarly work on various aspects of China’s traditional culture and society. It is our goal to foster international dialogue on important issues in Chinese studies and provide a platform for academic exchange.

We are now accepting submissions for our next issue with a focus on the theme “Ancient Chinese Myth and Legend.” All entries must be original works and will be peer reviewed.

The deadline for submissions is September 15, 2016. Submissions should be in English, use Chicago Style format and be between 6,000 and 12,000 words in length.

Please send submissions and questions to joch@sdu.edu.cn, or submit online at http://www.editorialmanager.com/jochbrill

 

Dr. Ben Hammer

Journal of Chinese Humanities

http://www.journalofchinesehumanities.com/

Shandong University