Advanced Topics: Specialization Tracks in Chinese Philosophy

Specialization tracks designed for self-directed learners who have completed the core undergraduate curriculum and wish to pursue technical subfields, advanced textual methodologies, and contemporary applications in Chinese philosophy.

Specialization Index

Early Medieval Philosophy, Xuanxue, and Daoist Metaphysics

Investigates the intellectual transformation of the Wei-Jin period (220–420 CE), where thinkers shifted focus from Han cosmological teleology to fundamental ontology, hermeneutical commentary, and the nature of non-being.

Xuanxue Ontology and Meontology: The Classic of the Way and Virtue: A New Translation of the Tao-te ching of Laozi as Interpreted by Wang Bi (Richard John Lynn, trans. / Columbia University Press) - Unabridged translation demonstrating how Wang Bi reconstructed early Daoism into a rigorous ontology grounded in primordial non-being (benwu).

Guo Xiang and Immanent Pluralism: The Penumbra Unbound: The Neo-Taoist Philosophy of Guo Xiang (Brook Ziporyn / SUNY Press) - The definitive philosophical study of Guo Xiang's rejection of an ultimate metaphysical root in favor of self-so (ziran), spontaneous emergence (duhua), and complete immanence.

Wei-Jin Aesthetics and Pure Conversation: Shih-shuo Hsin-yü: A New Account of Tales of the World (Richard B. Mather, trans. / University of Michigan Press) - The premier sourcebook documenting the aesthetic rebellion, psychological individuality, and philosophical salons (qingtan) of the Wei-Jin literati.

Internal Alchemy (Neidan) and Somatic Metaphysics: The Seal of the Unity of the Three: A Study and Translation of the Cantong qi (Fabrizio Pregadio / Golden Elixir Press) - Critical edition and study of the foundational text of internal alchemy, analyzing how cosmic cycles and Yijing hexagrams were mapped onto physiological self-cultivation.

Advanced Chinese Buddhist Philosophy and Epistemology

Examines the technical philosophical systems that emerged as Indian Buddhist theories of emptiness, consciousness, and hermeneutics were systematically naturalized in early and medieval China.

Chinese Madhyamaka (Sanlun) and Sengzhao's Paradox of Motion: Three Short Treatises by Vasubandhu, Sengzhao, and Zongmi (Rafal Felbur, trans. / BDK America) - Free open-access translation of Sengzhao's Zhaolun, articulating the earliest mature Chinese synthesis of Madhyamaka emptiness, non-duality, and the stillness of motion.

East Asian Yogācāra (Consciousness-Only Epistemology): Three Texts on Consciousness Only (Francis H. Cook, trans. / BDK America) - Free open-access primary translation of Xuanzang's Cheng Weishi Lun, the encyclopedic treatise on the eight consciousnesses, storehouse seeds, and cognitive transformation.

East Asian Yogācāra (Consciousness-Only Epistemology): Buddhist Phenomenology: A Philosophical Investigation of Yogacara Buddhism and the Ch'eng Wei-shih Lun (Dan Lusthaus / Routledge) - A comprehensive reconstruction of Xuanzang's system as an epistemological phenomenology of lived experience rather than metaphysical idealism.

Tiantai Dialectics and the Threefold Truth: Emptiness and Omnipresence: An Essential Introduction to Tiantai Buddhism (Brook Ziporyn / Indiana University Press) - An advanced philosophical analysis of Zhiyi's Threefold Truth (emptiness, conventionality, and the middle) and the doctrine of mutual inter-inclusion of all phenomena.

Huayan Mereology and Universal Interpenetration: Hua-Yen Buddhism: The Jewel Net of Indra (Francis H. Cook / Pennsylvania State University Press) - The classic monograph analyzing Fazang's mereological system of identity, difference, and the total interpenetration of Principle (li) and phenomena (shi).

Chan Hermeneutics and Language Skepticism: Philosophical Meditations on Zen Buddhism (Dale S. Wright / Cambridge University Press) - An advanced inquiry exploring how Chan encounter dialogues (gong'an) deploy language skepticism and rhetorical irony to dismantle epistemic reification.

Logic, Philosophy of Language, and Epistemology

Analyzes classical and medieval Chinese treatments of semantic reference, disputation (bian), paradoxical reasoning, epistemic skepticism, and cross-linguistic semantics.

The School of Names (Mingjia) and Semantic Paradoxes: Science and Civilisation in China, Volume 7, Part 1: Language and Logic (Christoph Harbsmeier / Cambridge University Press) - An exhaustive linguistic and logical analysis of classical Chinese syntax, semantic definitions, and explicit argumentation structures.

The Later Mohist Canons: Epistemology and Dialectics: Later Mohist Logic, Ethics and Science (A. C. Graham / The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press) - The landmark reconstruction and translation recovering early China's most rigorous classical treatises on formal disputation, semantic criteria (lei), and analogical extension (tui).

Zhuangzian Perspectivism and Epistemic Skepticism: Essays on Skepticism, Relativism, and Ethics in the Zhuangzi (Paul Kjellberg & Philip J. Ivanhoe, eds. / SUNY Press) - A specialized collection of essays examining the epistemological subtleties of the Qiwulun, debating whether Zhuangzi advances radical skepticism, perspectivism, or contextualism.

Comparative Semantics and Classical Philosophy of Language: Language and Logic in Ancient China (Chad Hansen / University of Michigan Press) - A seminal work establishing the mass-noun hypothesis and defending a part-whole mereological model of classical Chinese semantics against sentence-based Western frameworks.

Moral Psychology, Virtue Ethics, and Self-Cultivation

Explores the cognitive, affective, and bodily mechanics of ethical self-transformation, contemporary reconstructions of Confucian virtue theory, relational selfhood, and intersections with feminist care ethics.

Sentimentalism vs. Constructivism in Early Confucianism: Mencius and Early Chinese Thought (Kwong-loi Shun / Stanford University Press) - A definitive analytic investigation into Mencian moral psychology, unpacking affective sprouts (duan), moral volition, and the cultivation of the heart-mind (xin).

Neo-Confucian Moral Psychology and Contemporary Virtue Ethics: Sagehood: The Contemporary Significance of Neo-Confucian Philosophy (Stephen C. Angle / Oxford University Press) - A philosophical reconstruction demonstrating how Song-Ming theories of moral failure, self-deception, and psychological unity inform contemporary virtue ethics.

Relational Selfhood, Role Ethics, and Feminist Care Reconstructions: The Sage and the Second Sex: Confucianism, Ethics, and Gender (Chenyang Li, ed. / Open Court) - The pioneer volume bringing Confucian relational ethics, family harmony, and moral hierarchy into critical dialogue with feminist care ethics.

Relational Selfhood, Role Ethics, and Feminist Care Reconstructions: Confucian Role Ethics: A Vocabulary (Roger T. Ames / University of Hawaii Press) - A systematic defense of Confucian ethics as an irreducible role-based morality rooted in narrative context, interpersonal duty, and performative relation.

Affect, Demeanor, and Moral Exemplarity: Moral Exemplars in the Analects: The Good Person Is That (Amy Olberding / Routledge) - An exploration of how aesthetic comportment, emotional tone, and everyday etiquette construct moral authority and guide interpersonal interaction.

Political Philosophy, Modern New Confucianism, and Contemporary Theory

Investigates early and late imperial political statecraft, institutional critique, the 20th-century New Confucian philosophical renaissance, and contemporary models of governance.

Imperial Statecraft and Ideological Realism: Envisioning Eternal Empire: Chinese Political Thought of the Warring States Era (Yuri Pines / University of Hawaii Press) - A comprehensive analysis of how Warring States political theorists forged the ideological architecture of unified imperial monarchism and bureaucratic management.

Late Imperial Institutional Critique and Constitutionalism: Waiting for the Dawn: A Plan for the Prince (Huang Zongxi / Wm. Theodore de Bary, trans. / Columbia University Press) - The seminal 17th-century treatise mounting a radical critique of dynastic despotism while proposing legal checks on autocratic power and autonomous public academies.

Twentieth-Century Modern New Confucian Metaphysics: Late Works of Mou Zongsan: Selected Essays on Chinese Philosophy (Jason Clower, ed. & trans. / Brill) - Authoritative translation of Mou Zongsan's mature essays, demonstrating his systematic harmonization of Kantian moral philosophy with Confucian intellectual intuition (liangzhi).

Twentieth-Century Modern New Confucian Metaphysics: Modern Confucianism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) - An open-access survey contextualizing the three generations of New Confucian thinkers (including Xiong Shili, Tang Junyi, and Mou Zongsan) responding to Western political and scientific modernity.

Contemporary Political Confucianism: Perfectionism and Meritocracy: Confucian Perfectionism: A Political Philosophy for Modern Times (Joseph Chan / Princeton University Press) - A rigorous formulation of moderate Confucian perfectionism that reconciles traditional virtue promotion with civil liberties and democratic institutions.

Contemporary Political Confucianism: Perfectionism and Meritocracy: The China Model: Political Meritocracy and the Limits of Democracy (Daniel A. Bell / Princeton University Press) - An influential defense of political meritocracy, evaluating institutional frameworks that balance local democratic elections with merit-selected central leadership.