Cui, Xiaojia, assistant professor at the school of philosophy, Beijing Normal Univeristy, will give a lecture entitled “ ‘Thinghood’ in Daoist Thought: A Possible Route for Breaking Through ‘Anthropocentrism’ ” at 16:00-21:00 on March 5^th.

The lecture is the third one of the English Lecture Series: Classical Interpretations and the Philosophy of Daoism, co-hosted by the School of Philosophy, the Confucius Research Institute, and the Research Center for Development of Contemporary Chinese Philosophy, RUC. The lecture will be held in Room 2106 in the Second Public Teaching  Building.

Abstract: Both Confucianism and Daoism have talked about “thinghood” or “things”. Confucianism “looks at things from the perspective of man” while Taoism “understands man from the perspective of things”. In Confucianism, one should first “respect the ghosts and gods and keep a distance from them” and secondly, one should distinguish them from things. Regarding “things”, Confucianism mainly considers the essential difference between human beings and thinghood, in order to highlight the uniqueness and the value of human beings. Daoism, on the other hand, brings “thinghood” into a holistic philosophical context. The Laozi introduces the concept of “myriad things” (wanwu 万物), and the Zhuangzi not only does not worry about the confusion between human beings and things, but even proposes to abolish the boundary between human beings and things. Daoism's understanding of “thinghood” and “things” provides us with a new perspective of looking at the world that is different from Confucianism and offers new ideas for breaking down anthropocentrism.

Introduction: Cui Xiaojiao works as an assistant professor at the school of philosophy, Beijing Normal University. She is interested in Daoism and the manuscript culture of early China, focusing primarily on the political philosophy of the Laozi and the Huang-Lao Daoist. She received her B.A. from Sun Yat-sen University, and her Ph.D. from Peking University. During conducting her Ph.D., she spent one year at Dartmouth College as a joint Ph.D. student and 6 months at Cornell University as a visiting scholar. Her current research utilizes the newly excavated texts to explore the ideological connections between early Daoism, legalism, and the school of the military. Other fields of interest include: early Confucianism, Neo-Daoism in the Wei-Jin period.