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Monthly Archives: November 2014

NEW PARTNERSHIP BETWEEN DUKE UNIVERSITY AND CITY UNIVERSITY OF HONG KONG

We are happy to announce an exciting new partnership between Duke’s Center for Comparative Philosophy and the Center for East Asian and Comparative Philosophy (CEACOP) at City University of Hong Kong. These two centers will initiate regular student and faculty exchanges, co-sponsor international conferences and workshops, and jointly teach courses, beginning with a new course this spring that can be taken for credit at either campus, Eastern and Western Conceptions of Human Nature, Ethics, and Politics. Additional cooperative programs will follow in the coming years.

New Course:

Eastern and Western Conceptions of Human Nature, Ethics, and Politics

Instructors: Owen Flanagan (Duke) and Philip J. Ivanhoe and Sungmoon Kim (City University of Hong Kong)

We are citizens of plural, multicultural, cosmopolitan worlds.  Understanding and dealing with differences of value requires understanding a variety of traditions, and understanding such traditions requires understanding the ways different people have conceived of human nature as well as how such conceptions connect with views about the good human life, duties, responsibilities, rights, and the proper forms of political governance.  An international team will lead weekly seminars discussing these issues from a comparative and cross-cultural perspective.  The seminars will interweave critical examination of work from Western sources (Plato, Aristotle, Hobbes, Rousseau) with Chinese and Korean sources (Confucius, Mozi, Mencius, Xunzi, Zhuangzi, Han Feizi), and Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain sources, as well as descriptions and analyses of how these ideas are manifested in and shape both contemporary Western, East Asian, and South Asian culture.  All of this material will be brought into productive conversation with contemporary scientific sources on human nature from psychology, anthropology, and primatology.

(This advanced undergraduate/graduate level course will be conducted via live multi-media feed at both campuses simultaneously and available to students at Duke, City University, and other universities in Hong Kong. Students should contact the appropriate center at Duke or in Hong Kong for further information and to apply for admission to the class. Enrollment is limited. A complete syllabus will soon be available.)