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1
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Discourse on Daoism’s Xiao-yao Aesthetics: Dialogue
with Roland Barthes’ Philosophy of Laziness
Modern people lead a life of anxiety, with each and
every move measured in terms of practicability and
effectiveness. However, there also emerges a contrasting
attitude that promotes lifestyles such as LOHAS
(Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability) and Slow
Movement. On the one hand, people are extremely busy. On
the other hand, they crave leisure time. Such is the
divided vision of modern people. This article, in light
of the two contradictory attitudes, reflects on the
significance of Daoist xiaoyao aesthetics and Roland
Barthes’ philosophy of laziness. By way of dialogues, I
analyze Barthes’ criticism and therapy to modern Western
life and his aspiration for the Eastern aesthetics of
life. In addition, by interpreting the xiaoyao
aesthetics of Daoism, I intensify Barthes’ philosophy of
laziness and reveal the possible therapeutic merits of
Daoist aesthetics towards modern civilization. Finally,
I conclude that Daoism’s profound agreement with nature
is a tripartition that is capable of mental therapy,
language therapy, and cultural therapy. I also attempt
to disclose the ethics dimension contained in xiaoyao
aesthetics.
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Lai, Hsi-san
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2
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Ming名 and Yan言: The Development of and Insight from
Chinese and Japanese Linguistic Philosophy
In his work Na to haji no bunka: chùgokujin to
nihonjin (A Culture of Name and Honor), the Japanese
scholar Mori Mikisaburo closely examines ming名 (name),
a concept shared by Chinese and Japanese. By comparing
the different implications of ming in Chinese and
Japanese, he further analyzes their differences from the
perspective of ethical thought, drawing a conclusion
that ming is the core value in Chinese ethics and chi恥
(shame) is the core value in Japanese ethics. This
approach of investigating the concept of ming in Chinese
ethics has provided an innovative perspective for the
study of Chinese cultural features. Inspired by Mori
Mikisaburo’s comparison of Chinese and Japanese ethics,
I further find that ming, as a shared concept between
China and Japan, has developed into two utterly
different patterns in their respective linguistic
philosophy and cultural history, which have exerted
direct influence on their attitude towards foreign
cultures. In addition, another shared concept yan
言(word, language) is also a cause leading to the
different evolution of ming in Chinese and Japanese.
With a focus on linguistic philosophy, this paper
compares and analyzes the divergence between ming and
yan in the Chinese and Japanese languages, and further
explores the influence of the different philosophical
ideas developed from the two concepts on China and
Japan’s modernization.
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Wang, Xiao-lin
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3
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On Guan-jian (關楗), Guan-yue (管籥) and Suo-chi
(鎖匙): From the Perspective of Lexical History
This paper argues from the perspective of lexical
history that guan-jian (關楗), guan-yue (管籥) and
suo-chi (鎖匙) are related in terms of their lexical
development. In early texts, guan (管) might signify a
locking-bar, both the lock and the locking-bar, or the
key that opens the lock. This phenomenon of multiple
referents shows a special kind of lexical derivation in
a set of words or word family that is closely related in
form or usage. Given the relationship between them, it
is quite understandable why one form’s name could be
used to denote the other or vice versa. This usage leads
to duplication. Many philologists define guan and jian
or guan and yue, by using suo and chi. This is because
as the objects that the terms guan and jian refer to
were improved overtime, their appearance increasingly
resembled suo and chi. Through lexical replacement, we
can see how suo and chi came to connote the implements
used for securing a door. This is a clear example of how
words are replaced in the history.
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Yang, Hsiu-fang
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4
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Xunzi’s Politicized and Moralized Philosophy of
Language: A Systematic Interpretation, Reconstruction,
Comparison and Comments
Xunzi offers a classification of names, in which he
discusses the membership or inclusion relations among
the things to which names refer. In this regard Xunzi’s
thought is at least six centuries ahead of Porphyry’s.
He suggests the principle and process of “the
establishment of names by social conventions and
customs,” highlights the sociality, conventionality, and
coerciveness of names, and refers to the division of
linguistic labor. He discusses the cognitive and
communicative functions of names, but places more
emphasis on their social, political, and moral
functions. He states that the similarities and
differences among cognitive objects provide the
ontological basis for regulating names; the sensation
and cognition of such similarities and differences
provide the epistemological basis. He expounds some
essential requirements for regulating names, and
analyzes three categories of errors about names and the
refutations of them. He also investigates the position
and functions of names in the system of argumentation.
In short, Xunzi develops a rather systematic theory of
names, in which there are some outstanding and
illuminating insights. These insights are still alive in
contemporary philosophy of language, and could be used
to broaden and deepen our understanding of names, and of
language more generally. His theory of names obviously
acknowledges social conventionalism, its most prominent
characteristic is politicization and moralization, and
its distinct internal limitation is that it does not pay
much attention to the epistemological and logical
aspects for regulating names, resulting in limited
contribution to the study of names in these
aspects.
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Chen, Bo
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5
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Predicament and Escape: On the Images of Spring in
Du Fu’s Poems “Tonggu Qige” and “Qiuxing Bashou”
“Tonggu qige” and “Qiuxing bashou” are famous poems
by Du Fu. Written seven years apart, both were
completed in the autumn or winter, and mention spring
in the final stanza. At that time, Du Fu was advancing
in years, and he was exhausted and in hard times.
Where did these thoughts of transcending reality come
from This article will discuss this issue by using the
text of the poems and the imagery contained therein.
The focus of discussion will be on the contrast
between natural scenery and art. Particular attention
will be given to the structure, management, and
timeline of these qilu poem series. It will be shown
how Du Fu summoned spring through his structuring of
the poems, resulting in an ability to break out of
life’s predicaments.
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Fang, Yu
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6
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Violation, Dislocation, Pollution: Excrement Writing
in Contemporary Taiwanese Poetry
Excrement is normally regarded as the most disgusting
among the things issued from one’s body. This essay aims
at discussing how the imagery of excrement came to be a
topic discussed in contemporary Taiwanese poetry, its
novelty as a trend and its wonderful transfiguration.
After a sizable corpus of works were inspected and
analyzed, three main patterns of poetic production were
apparent: First, the blocked-up excrement type, stemming
from a gloomy outlook, uses excrement as a metaphor for
the devil or evil. The desire to rid oneself of the
foulness is unrealized, resulting in pent-up emotion and
thoughts. Second, the splashing excrement type
challenges the notion of “curbing desires and avoiding
filth.” It uses excrement as a weapon for antisocial
action, as a way to rethink what it means to be human.
Third, the amusing excrement type advocates freedom and
liberation, by viewing excrement as a magical and
whimsical game. This is used to deconstruct things noble
and to destroy the grand narrative. Finally, the
possibility of establishing an “excrement poetics” is
discussed.
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Liu, Cheng-chung
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7
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The Stranger’s Friendship on the Battlefield: The
Performance of Xenia in the Iliad
This paper aims to study the meeting of Diomedes and
Glaucus in Book 6 of the Iliad in relation to the
practice of the religious and cultural code of xenia
(guest-friendship), which the ancient Greeks
formulated as the major institution for consolidating
the inter-household and intercity relationships. In
the literary world of the Iliad, xenia is vividly
represented in several places as the Greek warriors’
respect for the cultural institution and for the
philosophy of ethics and morality that lies behind it.
The episode of Diomedes and Glaucus’ confrontation
with each other on the battlefield in the Trojan War
from Book 6, the Iliad, is examined as an example to
demonstrate the importance of this ethical code. The
description of the two great warriors’ refusal to
fight with each other on the battlefield provides a
social and cultural space to elucidate the
significance of this religious and cultural custom.
Through this, the epic narrative transforms the
battlefield into a social space of production where
ethics and the religious and cultural code reinforce
each other’s necessity and importance in a society
that obeys not just the edicts of the kings but also
the law of Olympus.
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8
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Nosos [ν?σο?]: Plague, Disorder, Disease, and
Sophocles’ Oedipus Tyrannus
The statement that the plague at Thebes depicted in
Oedipus Tyrannus alludes to the plague at Athens is
highly speculative, since the date of this play is
uncertain. Admittedly, Oedipus Tyrannus, like most
classical Greek tragedies, grafts the fifth-century
scenario unto its heroic background; however, the plague
scene in this play does not necessarily refer to any
specific event. Based on the observation that the entire
intellectual, cultural, and social situation of the
fifth century B.C. may well be reflected in the tragedy,
this paper attempts to explore the multiple senses of
Sophocles’ inventive portrayal of the plague, of the
quest for the cause of disease and human suffering, and
of the conflicting attitudes towards the religious
medical treatment. In this light, the term anachronism
revealed in Oedipus Tyrannus may integrate the following
concepts: to impose the past onto the present, to
reverse the order of time, to conduct a retrospective
investigation, and to re-map a chronological etiological
trajectory.
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9
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Textual Vision and Visual Text: Envisioning the
Vernacular Text in The House of Fame
While many critics of Chaucer’s early poem The House of
Fame have put a premium on problems of language and
textuality and others have called attention to a
predominance of images and sight, they have generally
failed to address the crucial convergence of the textual
and the visual. This paper investigates three
interrelated issues critical to an appropriate
understanding of the poem: first, the blurring of the
visual and the textual; second, the role of sound or
speech in this conflation; and finally, the problems of
vision and seeing that help empower the project of
vernacular writing. The multiple configurations of
visuality in the dream world provide crucial insight
into the complicated relationships between Chaucer’s
vernacular writing and his culture’s canon, which haunts
the dream vision and text with imposing yet ambivalent
visibility and textuality. The poem explores to the
fullest the vernacular poet’s position, the sources of
his knowledge and cultural memory, and the limits and
strengths of his vision. As Chaucer exploits the tension
and intersection of word and image in the dream vision,
his visual text dramatizes vernacular writing’s
confrontation with canonicity and envisions promises of
negotiating and achieving fame through seeing, reading
and writing in the vernacular text.
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10
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Dialectics of Conscience: A Comparative Study of the
Theories of Kant, Fichte and Mou Zongsan
The central theme of this paper is the problem of
conscience in a context of comparative study of Eastern
and Western moral philosophy. I argue that the absolute
rightness of conscience cannot be justified if one does
not limit the sphere of its validity. Conscience can be
understood in two different ways: it can either contain
a subjective reference (Subjektbezug) or an objective
reference (Objektbezug). Subjective reference means
self-examination based on practical reason, while
objective reference signifies reference to a concrete
content of duty. Kant holds that conscience can only
have a subjective reference, because an objective
reference is not the task of conscience, but of moral
judgment. Both Fichte and Mou Zongsan hold that
conscience cannot just have the empty form of subjective
reference, but should also contain some concrete
substance without losing its absolute rightness. My
conclusion is that Kant’s interpretation of conscience
is right. The reason is quite simple: the objective
reference of conscience cannot avoid the difficulty of
dialectics.
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