Dear friends and members of the International Society for Chinese Philosophy (ISCP),

It is with a heavy heart and grave sadness that I write to formally inform you that Professor Cheng, the founding director of ISCP and the founding editor and editor-in-chief of the Journal of Chinese Philosophy, has passed away on July 2 (US time) at the Kaiser Moanalua Hospital, Honolulu, Hawaii, at the age of 89.

As many of you know, Professor Cheng has been a tireless mover in promoting Chinese philosophy on the world stage for over 50 years. Moreover, he has been a true inspiration as a senior prominent scholar who never missed a session in the conferences that he attended, always listening intently, asking questions, and engaging in conversation with the presenters. He has made major contributions to the study of the Philosophy of Yijing and pioneered onto-hermeneutics with numerous publications.

In the upcoming World Congress of Philosophy in Rome in early August, we will hold an invited session in honor and in memory of him, a round table on the contributions of Chinese philosophy to the world philosophy organized initially by him, as well as three ISCP society sessions. If you are attending the WCP, please come to these sessions to honor him and in memory of him.

In consultation with Dr. Linyu Gu (the surviving spouse Dr. Chung-Ying Cheng), the best and the most meaningful way that we can remember him is to carry on the work of the ISCP and JCP that Professor Cheng had been so passionate about and devoted lifelong energy to. A call-for-paper for a festschrift in memory of him will be distributed under a separate cover with the subject title, “Call for Festschrift: Celebrating Chung-ying Cheng’s Contributions and Life (1935-2024).”

In addition, the Philosophy Department at the University of Hawaii at Mānoa, where Dr. Cheng has taught since 1963, has posted an article written by Professor Tamara Albertini, chair of the department and created a webpage in memory of him. The article includes a link to a poster featuring the last lecture delivered by Professor Chung-Ying Cheng on April 19 and a second link to photos from the time when he was a young scholar to his recent retirement celebration. Readers can leave comments in the comment field as a tribute to him. The Cheng family will be able to read these messages. Here is the article and webpage: https://hawaii.edu/phil/chung-ying-cheng-1935-2024-a-life-dedicated-to-east-west-scholarship/

Sincerely,
Ann A. Pang-White
Executive Director of ISCP

This Is the Way is a podcast series on Chinese philosophy, hosted by Richard Kim and Justin Tiwald (me). So far, we have five episodes published, five more episodes “in the can” (the discussions have been recorded, but the recordings await sound editing), and many more episodes in the works.

Richard and I have found the response to our podcast series enormously gratifying. I can’t quite bring myself to boast about the specific numbers of downloads, etc. But I’ll just say that there is a larger listenership than we anticipated, and pretty large group of “loyal listeners” (people who appear to listen to each new episode within a month of its appearance). I hope that you who are listening are finding at lest some of the episodes informative or useful for teaching purposes.

Many thanks to those of you who have written us with suggestions, posted responses on the blog, and continued discussions on Facebook, YouTube, or X (Twitter). We still very much see the series as a work in progress and have been discussing all of the feedback that we’ve received, even if we haven’t been able to answer all of the comments and emails in detail.

Speaking of feedback, one adjustment that we’ve decided to make is to add a kind of Index Locorum for the show, which we’ll call an “Index of Historical Passages.” The idea (suggested to us by friends and colleagues) is to make it easy for instructors to find an episode on a particular passage that has come up in their teaching, or to make as the basis of a class assignment. So, for example, you won’t have to scroll through the entire back catalogue of episodes to find the one on Analects 2.4 or the one on Cook Ding — just go to the Index and it will link you directly. Since teaching is increasingly a mixed-media undertaking, we are hoping that this might be useful to teachers.

Many thanks for your support, friends, colleagues, and listeners!