Category Archives: Xunzi

Episode 2 of “This Is the Way”: Confucians on Shame

The second episode of This Is the Way is on shame as a moral emotion, as understood by classical Confucian philosophers (especially Confucius and Mencius, but also Xunzi). Our special guest is Jing Iris Hu (HU Jing 胡婧), author of “Shame, Vulnerability, and Change.” Key questions include the following: What are the Confucian arguments for having a sense of shame? To what extent can shame be autonomous or independent of social attitudes, and what mechanisms do the Confucian recommend for making it so independent? Do fully virtuous people need a sense of shame?
Below you will find a more detailed accounting of topics, some specific passages and books or articles mentioned in the episode, and an opportunity to “weigh in” and share your views about the topic (or about the hosts’ wild claims about the text). Continue reading →

Connolly Reviews Kim, Theorizing Confucian Virtue Politics

NDPR Sungmoon Kim Theorizing Confucian Virtue Politics: The Political Philosophy of Mencius and Xunzi (Reviewed by Tim Connolly, East Stroudsburg University)

“Confucian political theory offers a normative vision for contemporary societies that draws on concepts from thinkers in the Chinese philosophical tradition initiated by Confucius (551-479 BCE). Much of the recent work in this area is motivated by dialogue with mainstream Western political theory, focusing on questions of Confucianism’s compatibility with liberal democracy. Yet as Sungmoon Kim writes in the opening pages of the book, these attempts to establish dialogue have tended to look at general characteristics of the classical Confucian tradition, giving less attention to internal debates and disagreements within this tradition. Kim’s book is devoted to a reconstruction of…”

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New book: Mastery, Dependence, and the Ethics of Authority, by Aaron Stalnaker

Oxford University Press has just published my new book on early Confucian social thought, and what contemporary people might learn from it: Mastery, Dependence, and the Ethics of Authority.  The publisher’s page is here.  At present the cheapest way to purchase it is directly from Oxford, with a discount code for 30% off (AAFLYG6).

This comes with hearty thanks to Steve Angle and Bryan Van Norden, who were belatedly revealed as the press’s referees.

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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 entry on Xunzi in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

I just noticed that the SEP has a new entry on the Xunzi, penned by Paul Goldin (published earlier this month). (Look forward to reading it, Paul!) The older entry, penned by Dan Robins, is linked to at the top of the current one. I don’t know what goes behind the editorial decisions to replace existing entries with newer ones by different authors, but I think it’s great that readers will have more than one perspective to look at when turning to the SEP, which has been a go-to site for me when I want to read up on an area of philosophy foreign to me.

 

Perkins Reviews Harris, The Shenzi Fragments

Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews

2017.03.05 View this Review Online   View Other NDPR Reviews

Eirik Lang Harris, The Shenzi Fragments: A Philosophical Analysis and Translation, Columbia University Press, 2016, 173pp., $55.00 (hbk), ISBN 9780231177665.

Reviewed by Franklin Perkins, University of Hawai’i at Manoa

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New Book: Dao Companion to the Philosophy of Xunzi

xunzi_dao-companion

 

I am pleased to share the news that Eric Hutton’s much-anticipated Dao Companion to the Philosophy of Xunzi has been published. Click here for more information and to download the back matter and front matter for free (this includes the introduction).

A list of chapters and contributors is below the fold.

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Columbia Neo-Confucian Seminar: Hagop Sarkissian “Experimental Philosophy and the Confucian Philosophical Tradition: A Brief History and Comparison.” Friday, September 30 @ 3:30pm

The next session of the Columbia University Seminar on Neo-Confucian Studies (University Seminar #567) will convene Friday, September 30, 2016 from 3:30 to 5:30pm in the Heyman Center for the Humanities at Columbia University.

Hagop Sarkissian (City University of New York, Baruch College | Graduate Center) will present his paper

“Experimental Philosophy and the Confucian Philosophical Tradition: A Brief History and Comparison.”

ABSTRACT: Continue reading →