Immanent Frames: Meiji New Buddhism And The 'Religious Secular',
2017
Bucknell University
Immanent Frames: Meiji New Buddhism And The 'Religious Secular', James Mark Shields
Faculty Journal Articles
The secularization thesis, rooted in the idea that “modernity” brings with it the destruction—or, at least, the ruthless privatization—of religion, is clearly grounded in specific, often oversimplified, interpretations of Western historical developments since the eighteenth century. In this article, I use the case of the New Buddhist Fellowship (Shin Bukkyō Dōshikai 新仏教同志会) of the Meiji period (1868–1911) to query the category of the secular in the context of Japanese modernity. I argue that the New Buddhists, drawing on elements of classical and East Asian Buddhism as well as modern Western thought, promoted a resolutely social and this-worldly Buddhism that …
The Invention Of "Japanese" Literature In Colonial Korea, Or How Shameless Literary Engagement Could Be Under Colonial Conditions,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
The Invention Of "Japanese" Literature In Colonial Korea, Or How Shameless Literary Engagement Could Be Under Colonial Conditions, Mihara Yoshiaki
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
This is the full-paper version of the 338th Si-Mian Lecture delivered at ECNU on March 17, 2017, which focuses on the "shameless" act of intellectual collaboration committed by Ch'oe Chaes ô (崔載瑞), an eminent scholar of English literature and criticism as well as a prominent "pro-Japanese" intellectual in Colonial Korea, who encouraged Korean writers to contribute to Japanese "kokumin bungaku" [national literature] by writing in the Japanese language. Rather than simply denouncing him as a "shameless" traitor, however, the author of this article tries to salvage the potentially postcolonial problematics he has posed in his theoretical struggle as regards possible …
The Literary Concepts Through Novel Titles Of The Ming And Qing Dynasties,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
The Literary Concepts Through Novel Titles Of The Ming And Qing Dynasties, Guofu Cheng
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Titles are special insight into the Ming and Qing novel writing. Through an examination of the texts, prefaces and epilogues, the records of book production, guidelines for book use, book reviews, notes etc. the paper explores the literary concepts reflected by the Ming and Qing novels. Specifically, novel titles can be interpreted in four respects, namely, the novel as a supplement to history, the novel as admonishment, the novel as entertainment, and the novel as true feelings. Through these concepts we may have a better understanding of the significance and the evolution of the literary concepts of the Ming and …
The Origin Of The Title "The Four Dreams Of Linchuan" And The Deep Significance Of The Peony Pavilion,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
The Origin Of The Title "The Four Dreams Of Linchuan" And The Deep Significance Of The Peony Pavilion, Baocheng Kang, Yanfang Chen
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
The title "the Four Dream of Linchuan" is not in accordance with the facts of the four Chuanqi plays written by Tang Xianzu, for "The Purple Hairpin", one of the "four dreams" has little to do with "dream" of any kind. Inspired by "the Four Dreams" written by Che Renyuan and the folk song "4 dreams 8 voids" in The Plum in the Golden Vase, Tang Xianzu himself began to use the title of "the Four Dreams of Linchuan". The title was rarely recognized till the late Ming Dynasty, but it became popular during the reign of Emperor Kangxi of …
The Origination Of "Zhong Zhuo Da" From Calligraphy Critique: The Cultural And Literary Historical Background Of The Turn Of Ci-Poetry Criticism In The Late Qing Dynasty,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
The Origination Of "Zhong Zhuo Da" From Calligraphy Critique: The Cultural And Literary Historical Background Of The Turn Of Ci-Poetry Criticism In The Late Qing Dynasty, Ronggang Jiang
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
"Zhong Zhuo Da" (Strength, Refined Antiquity, and Grandiosity) is an important theory of ci-poetry in the late Qing Dynasty, since its theoretical origin remains unknown, there are so various interpretations of the theory that there is still no consensus on its origin. Through a comprehensive study of the related cultural changes in the late Qing Dynasty, the paper argues that it is almost certain that the aesthetic paradigm should originate from the theory of tablet calligraphy critique. Given the shared problem with the development of ci-poetry and calligraphy in the late Qing Dynasty, critics introduced tablet calligraphy critique into ci-poetry …
The Naming Of Bronze Bells In The Shang Dynasty;The Concept System Of Yuexuan; Bronze Bells' Definition:Three Issues About The Bronze Bell,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
The Naming Of Bronze Bells In The Shang Dynasty;The Concept System Of Yuexuan; Bronze Bells' Definition:Three Issues About The Bronze Bell, Fa Zhang
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
The bronze bell in the Shang Dynasty had no name, which was why it has been called Rao (铙) by many scholars and Rong (庸) by others. From the viewpoint of the evolution of bronze bells, Rao was related more to Ling (铃) in the Xia Dynasty, and later Rao became Rong in the Shang Dynasty and finally Bianzhong (编钟) in the Western Zhou Dynasty. Thus seen, Rong was more akin to the nature of bronze bells. The concept system of Yuexuan (乐悬) consisted of three aspects: sunju (簨虡), sidu (肆堵) and gong-xuan-pante (宫-轩-判-特). The three groups of concepts were …
Thinking Is Folding: Deleuze's Problematique Of The Baroque,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Thinking Is Folding: Deleuze's Problematique Of The Baroque, Kailin Yang
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
According to Deleuze, the importance of the Baroque is not the history of art, but what counts is to force us to think about "the possibility of the fold to infinity". The fold, as "point of view", is the distinct expression of the universe, while each fold is inseparable from becoming. The Baroque has no essence. It is just a mannerism pushed to infinity. Through the Monad of Leibniz, Deleuze creates the concept of the fold. Between the Monad and the universe, there is a non-relative who built the "milieu" or "common Limit". Through the conception of the fold, Deleuze …
Pen Names In The "Seventeen Years Period" And The Ecology Of Contemporary Chinese Literary Criticism,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Pen Names In The "Seventeen Years Period" And The Ecology Of Contemporary Chinese Literary Criticism, Pengcheng Kou
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
It is a common phenomenon to use a pen name when a writer publishes his critical works in China's "seventeen years period". There are several causes: 1. the author worries that his work is not mature; 2. the author is not confident of his reputation; 3. the author intends to express particular ideas. Underneath these apparent causes are deeper psychological motivations: 1. to express opposite ideas to someone else’s; 2. to criticize a friend or a teacher; 3. to publish politically alternative works; 4. to reinforce the validity of criticism with another name; 5. to express special aims. Because of …
Tactile Culture Or Auditory Culture: A Different Future Of The Post-Visual Culture,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Tactile Culture Or Auditory Culture: A Different Future Of The Post-Visual Culture, Lianjie Liu
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
With the continuous expansion of the hegemonic visual culture, post-visual culture has become an academic topic. Represented by Martin Heidegger and Hans-Georg Gadamer, phenomenology and hermeneutics turn to listening and advocate the auditory culture, but some postmodernists like Marshall Mcluhan and Jacques Derrida turn to touching and advocate tactile culture. The replacement of visual culture with auditory culture is still confined by traditional Western mindset, which is in fact a move from one extreme (despotic culture) to another extreme (submissive culture). Compared with visual culture and auditory culture, tactile culture is more self-reflexive, and less likely to become despotic, which …
The Aesthetic Regime Of Art And The Construction Of Its Politics: On Jacques Rancière's Aesthetic Thoughts,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
The Aesthetic Regime Of Art And The Construction Of Its Politics: On Jacques Rancière's Aesthetic Thoughts, Haiting Zheng
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Jacques Rancière is not satisfied with the two modes of modernism, namely turning art into mere life or into pure art. He endeavors to reveal the hidden tension between this binary opposition, maintaining that art should play freely within this binary tension space and make the tension space a dissensus theatre of the part of no part. The essential of aesthetic revolution of modernism lies in recognizing and receiving the previous excluded parts of literature, such as details drifted away from the integrated story, characters detached from the writer's arrangement, which challenge the given distribution of the sensible with its …
The Construction And Review Of The Wujiang School And Linchuan School: A Study Of The History Research Books Of Traditional Chinese Drama In The Republic Of China,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
The Construction And Review Of The Wujiang School And Linchuan School: A Study Of The History Research Books Of Traditional Chinese Drama In The Republic Of China, Huaping Cheng
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
The naming of Wujiang Group and Linchuan School in the history of drama was established by drama historians of the Republic of China. Because these drama historians had neither defined the concept of School, nor had they reached a consensus and guidelines that should be followed in the division of the School. These drama history research books differed in the classification and number of dramatists. In interpreting the theory of the two factions, there is also a tendency to exaggerate the opposition between the two groups. Since the Republic of China, some drama historians had denied the existence of Linchuan …
Transcending The "Word-Image" Debate: The Writing Experiment Of T. J. Clark's The Sight Of Death,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Transcending The "Word-Image" Debate: The Writing Experiment Of T. J. Clark's The Sight Of Death, Yi Zhuge
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
The "word-image" relationship is an important subject of modern Western aesthetics. It represents the division between the writing of art history and that of art criticism. The bone of contention between the two writing camps is whether the art work can be reducible to words. Art writings vibrate between this dualism, and some try to transcend the "word-image" division in theory. In his The Sight of Death: An Experiment in Art Writing, T. J. Clark, by adopting the diary style without a strong style of language, recorded his daily viewing of Poussin's paintings and his deep contemplations. He stresses the …
The Perfect Trinity Of Poetry, Calligraphy And Painting As A Neo-Classicist Paradigm In Zhao Mengfu: The Three Aspects Of Zhao Meng-Fu's Thought On Literature And Art,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
The Perfect Trinity Of Poetry, Calligraphy And Painting As A Neo-Classicist Paradigm In Zhao Mengfu: The Three Aspects Of Zhao Meng-Fu's Thought On Literature And Art, Yi Zhang
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
In the formation of the neoclassicism integrating the Yuan's and Southern and Northern Dynasties' retro ethos, Zhao Mengfu, known for his literary and artistic talents, played a pivotal role because of his opportunities to travel between South China and Dadu, the then capital, and to mix with his contemporary literati and artists, thus becoming an archetype of an artist featuring the trinity of poetry, calligraphy and painting. His "conception of antiquity", his understanding of the "Tang approach and Jin rhyme" and his high-brow, superbly skilled painting contains his valuation of classicality, naturalness, tradition, and innovativeness, informing the trend of the …
"What Are Poets For" And Ecological Ethics,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
"What Are Poets For" And Ecological Ethics, Kuiying Zhao
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Martin Heidegger's essential question of "what are poets for" is used to explore the relationship between the poet and nature, being, beings as a whole, the thing, and language in the "world's night" of "destitute time". In Heidegger's view, human beings' venture that follows their manufactural willing has led to the vanishing of the thing, the shrink of beings as a whole, destruction of the foundation of all beings, and deprived things and human beings of their homes of being. Then poet's mission is to reflect on the control of technology, to participate in the rescue of the thing, to …
A Critique Of Studies Of The Cultural Identity Of Hong Kong Literature Since The 1990s: The Case Of Inherent Contradiction Between Nativeness And Chineseness,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
A Critique Of Studies Of The Cultural Identity Of Hong Kong Literature Since The 1990s: The Case Of Inherent Contradiction Between Nativeness And Chineseness, Shiying Xu
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Since the 1990s, Hong Kong and overseas scholars have borrowed the idea of the "third space" to investigate the issue of cultural identity in Hong Kong literature, which has brought about three typical views: "the margin theory", "the crevice theory" and "the theory of imagining Hong Kong moving North", all based on the inherent contradiction between the Hong Kong nativeness and Chineseness. In order to transcend the framework of "Hong Kong and China", Zhu Yaowei shifts his vision to the framework of "East and West, local and global, orientalism/postcoloniality and global capitalism". The above discussion shows that political factors play …
A Probe Into The Theory Of Event Literature: Reflections On The Reconstruction Of Literary Studies "After Theory",
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
A Probe Into The Theory Of Event Literature: Reflections On The Reconstruction Of Literary Studies "After Theory", Jing Yin
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Terry Eagleton criticized different kinds of post theories which were once in fashion in his After Theory, and proposed that literary theory should return to literature itself and reflect on such grand issues as morality and ethics in a constructive way. Based on the "literary ethics" put forward by Terry Eagleton and the concept of "event" highlighted by his theoretical reflection, this paper tries to combine Gilles Deleuze's and Alain Badiou's concepts of "event" in order to carry forward Eagleton's reflection on theory and develop an effective theory of event literature, which focuses on writers who, as the faithful subjects …
Bai Xianyong's New Aesthetics Of Kunqu Opera,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Bai Xianyong's New Aesthetics Of Kunqu Opera, Sheng Ding
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Bai Xianyong proposed the concept of New Aesthetics of Kunqu Opera after the youth version of The Peony Pavilion and the new version of The Story of Jade Hairpin. The goal of the New Aesthetics of Kunqu is to integrate the classical aesthetics of Kunqu and modern theatrical aesthetics, and the integration is characterized by the centrality of classicality aided by modernity. The works which come as a result of the New Aesthetics of Kunqu Opera have received praises scholars and some criticism from senior fans at the same time. This paper expounds on Bai Xianyong's theory and practice, and …
Becoming, Intensity And Transversal Communication: The Cross-Cultural Dialogue Between Deleuze's Thoughts And Taoist Thoughts,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Becoming, Intensity And Transversal Communication: The Cross-Cultural Dialogue Between Deleuze's Thoughts And Taoist Thoughts, Dandan Jiang
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
This paper explores the paradoxical thought in the works of the French philosopher Gilles Deleuze (1925-1995), including his writings in collaboration with Félix Guattari, around the question of "becoming". It examines the connotation of certain notions and their internal connection in Deleuze’s works, and, by drawing on the reinterpretations of Deleuzian philosophy by the contemporary Italian philosopher Agamben, discusses becoming and intensity, immanence and Transcendental empiricism, body without organs and transversal, etc. It also explores some possibilities of cross-cultural dialogue between Deleuze's thoughts on becoming and the works of the Taoist thinker Zhuangzi in ancient China.
Empiricism, Sense And Modernity Of Aesthetics: Edmund Burke's The Sublime And Beautiful From The Viewpoint Of Medieval Aesthetics,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Empiricism, Sense And Modernity Of Aesthetics: Edmund Burke's The Sublime And Beautiful From The Viewpoint Of Medieval Aesthetics, Chen Chen
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
Edmund Burke's The Sublime and Beautiful is familiar to Chinese scholars, the studies of which nevertheless are inadequate, as many studies confine themselves to Burke's exposition of the sublime. But in fact Burke implies a critique of the tradition of the medieval doctrine of beauty, which is particularly evident in the first section of the third part of this book. As central concepts in the Scholastic doctrine of beauty in the Middle Ages, proportion, fitness, and perfection are transmitted to Burke's times. Burke, employing John Locke's empiricism, criticizes traditional qualities of the beautiful on the side of the object, and …
From "Poetry Critique" To "Drama Critique": Lü Tiancheng And Qi Biaojia's Critique Of Drama,
2017
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
From "Poetry Critique" To "Drama Critique": Lü Tiancheng And Qi Biaojia's Critique Of Drama, Chao Wang
Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art
"Drama critique", an important form of critical studies of drama in the Ming dynasty, benefits more or less from the critical paradigms of poetry and prose in terms of the consciousness of different schools, the awareness of comparison and the image- and analogy-based aesthetical mindset. Meanwhile, Lü Tiancheng and Qi Biaojia, starting from the "nature and naturalness" theory in poetry criticism, pursue an aesthetical taste characterized by "ideo-mood-imagery" and "feel". By modifying the various indexes of "calligraphic critique" and "painting critique", including the "spirit, exquisiteness, potential and embodiment", they successfully refresh the essence of "drama critique", which reflects the evolution …
