Comparative Philosophy

Academic Organizer: International Society for Comparative Studies of Chinese and Western Philosophy (ISCWP)

Co-sponsor & Host: Institute of Foreign Philosophy, Peking Beijing, China

Co-sponsor: Center for Comparative Philosophy, San Jose State University, USA

Time:               6^th August 2010, Friday, 1:30-6:00 pm
Location:        Conference Room 227, Old Chemistry Building, Peking University, Beijing, China

Discussion language: Chinese and/or English

The theme of the 2010 Term of the ISCWP’s “Beijing Roundtable on Contemporary Philosophy” workshop series is the constructive engagement of analytic and Continental approaches in philosophy in the setting of comparative philosophy and from the point of view of Chinese philosophy.  

The exploration of the relation between the two is not new. What is especially philosophically interesting is to explore the issue from the vantage point of comparative philosophy in the two related connections: (1) both ‘analytic’ and ‘Continental’ approaches are understood broadly as two general styles/orientations of doing philosophy in treating many issues and topics, instead of being viewed  merely as two local movements within the Western tradition, whose strands and elements may manifest themselves in other philosophical traditions via distinctive resources and in philosophically interesting ways; (2) in the setting of (1), the exploration of their relation are made for the sake of the constructive-engagement goal: how they can learn from each other and jointly contribute to the common philosophical enterprise and a series of issues and topics of philosophical significance. The recent symposium conference on the above theme was successfully held  (10^th April 2010, SJSU) with fruitful results. Now the 2010 “Beijing Roundtable” as a sister workshop on the same theme is planned to go further on two fronts: (1) further critically examine some approaches taken in some of the best papers that are selected from the foregoing SJSU symposium and brought to this roundtable workshop—this also serves one of the purposes of the Beijing roundtable, i.e., bringing some relevant excellent scholarship to our colleagues in China; (2) further look at the issue specifically from the point of view of Chinese philosophy (<1> how some resources in classical Chinese philosophy and its contemporary studies can constructively contribute; <2> how the constructive-engagement discussion at the SJSU symposium can enhand studies of some relevant issues in Chinese philosophy and Chinese-Western comparative philosophy). The workshop emphasizes critical discussion on scene and makes efforts to help prospective participants be well-prepared for it.

The speakers and discussants include (but not limited to) those:

Han, Linhe (Peking University, China)
Liu, Yuedi (Institute of Philosophy, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, China);
Mou, Bo (San Jose State University, USA)
Sun, Wei (Beijing Academy of Social Sciences, China);
Willman, Marshall (New York Institute of Technology, Nanjing-China Campus);
Yao, Dazhi (Peking University, China)
Zhang, Xianglong (Peking University, China).

Any interested colleagues are welcome to participate.

If you are interested in participation and/or plan to make submissions for critical discussion at the workshop, contact Bo Mou, coordinator for 2010 Beijing Roundtable, at bo.mou@sjsu.edu; you can also contact Xianglong Zhang, at xlzhang@phil.pku.edu.cn, for relevant details.