The Way of Water and Sprouts of Virtue

The Way of Water and Sprouts of Virtue PDF Author: Sarah Allan
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 0791494500
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 200

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book maintains that early Chinese philosophers, whatever their philosophical school, assumed common principles informed the natural and human worlds and that one could understand the nature of man by studying the principles which govern nature. Accordingly, the natural world rather than a religious tradition provided the root metaphors of early Chinese thought. Sarah Allan examines the concrete imagery, most importantly water and plant life, which served as a model for the most fundamental concepts in Chinese philosophy including such ideas as dao, the "way," de, "virtue" or "potency," xin, the "mind/heart," xing, "nature," and qi, "vital energy." Water, with its extraordinarily rich capacity for generating imagery, provided the primary model for conceptualizing general cosmic principles while plants provided a model for the continuous sequence of generation, growth, reproduction, and death and were the basis for the Chinese understanding of the nature of man in both religion and philosophy.

The Way of Water and Sprouts of Virtue

The Way of Water and Sprouts of Virtue PDF Author: Sarah Allan
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 0791494500
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 200

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book maintains that early Chinese philosophers, whatever their philosophical school, assumed common principles informed the natural and human worlds and that one could understand the nature of man by studying the principles which govern nature. Accordingly, the natural world rather than a religious tradition provided the root metaphors of early Chinese thought. Sarah Allan examines the concrete imagery, most importantly water and plant life, which served as a model for the most fundamental concepts in Chinese philosophy including such ideas as dao, the "way," de, "virtue" or "potency," xin, the "mind/heart," xing, "nature," and qi, "vital energy." Water, with its extraordinarily rich capacity for generating imagery, provided the primary model for conceptualizing general cosmic principles while plants provided a model for the continuous sequence of generation, growth, reproduction, and death and were the basis for the Chinese understanding of the nature of man in both religion and philosophy.

The Way of Water and Sprouts of Virtue

The Way of Water and Sprouts of Virtue PDF Author: Sarah Allan
Publisher: SUNY Press
ISBN: 9780791433850
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 202

Get Book Here

Book Description
Explicates early Chinese thought and explores the relationship between language and thought. This book maintains that early Chinese philosophers, whatever their philosophical school, assumed common principles informed the natural and human worlds and that one could understand the nature of man by studying the principles which govern nature. Accordingly, the natural world rather than a religious tradition provided the root metaphors of early Chinese thought. Sarah Allan examines the concrete imagery, most importantly water and plant life, which served as a model for the most fundamental concepts in Chinese philosophy including such ideas as dao, the "way", de, "virtue" or "potency", xin, the "mind/heart", xing "nature", and qi, "vital energy". Water, with its extraordinarily rich capacity for generating imagery, provided the primary model for conceptualizing general cosmic principles while plants provided a model for the continuous sequence of generation, growth, reproduction, and death and was the basis for the Chinese understanding of the nature of man in both religion and philosophy. "I find this book unique among recent efforts to identify and explain essential features of early Chinese thought because of its emphasis on imagery and metaphor". -- Christian Jochim, San Jose State University

The Shape of the Turtle

The Shape of the Turtle PDF Author: Sarah Allan
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 0791494497
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 248

Get Book Here

Book Description
Many Chinese philosophic concepts derive from an ancient cosmology. This work is the first reconstructions of the mythic thought of the Shang Dynasty (ca. 1700- 1100 B.C.) which laid the foundation for later Chinese patterns of thought. Allan regards the myth, cosmology, divination, sacrificial ritual, and art of the Shang as different manifestations of a common religious system and each is examined in turn, building up a coherent and consistent picture. Although primarily concerned with the Shang, this work also describes the manner in which Shang thought was transformed in the later textual tradition.

The Wonder of Water

The Wonder of Water PDF Author: Ingrid Leman Stefanovic
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 148752403X
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 278

Get Book Here

Book Description
Judgment calls, values, and perceptions often implicitly affect decisions around water policies and programs. This book explores how embodied, lived experience informs such values and impacts policy and practice around water issues in critical ways.

Wisdom in Early Confucian and Israelite Traditions

Wisdom in Early Confucian and Israelite Traditions PDF Author: Professor Xinzhong Yao
Publisher: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
ISBN: 1409477010
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 268

Get Book Here

Book Description
Wisdom is an integratal part of all philosophical and religious traditions in the world. Focusing on the concept of wisdom, this book examines the difficulties and problems facing comparative studies of the early Confucian and Israelite traditions by exploring the cosmological and ethical implications of wisdom in the older layers of Christian and Confucian texts. Presenting a detailed discussion of how wisdom was understood in philosophical, religious and social contexts by the writers of the so-called early Confucian and Israelite wisdom texts, this book offers an invaluable contribution to our understanding of the significance of wisdom in the East and West, and to our knowledge of different and yet related ways of life as understood in their literature.

Metaphor and Meaning

Metaphor and Meaning PDF Author: Constance A. Cook
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 1438498322
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 322

Get Book Here

Book Description
In Metaphor and Meaning, scholars from China, the United States, and Europe draw on Sarah Allan's groundbreaking application of conceptual metaphor theory to the study of early Chinese philosophy and material culture. Conceptual metaphor theory treats metaphors not just as linguistic expressions but as fundamental structures of thought that define one's conceptual system and perception of reality. To understand another culture's worldview, then, hinges upon identifying the right metaphors, through which it then becomes possible to navigate between shared and unshared experiences. The contributors pursue lines of argument that complement, enhance, or challenge Allan's prior investigations into these root metaphors of early Chinese philosophy, whether by explicitly engaging with conceptual metaphor theory or, more indirectly, by addressing meaning construction in a broader sense. Like Allan's interpretative works, Metaphor and Meaning interrogates both transmitted traditions and newly unearthed archaeological finds to understand how people in early China thought about the cosmos, society, and themselves.

Cutting the Mass Line

Cutting the Mass Line PDF Author: Andrea E. Pia
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 1421448858
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 345

Get Book Here

Book Description
Explores the growing water supply crisis through an ethnographic study of a rural minority community in China threatened by climate change. China is experiencing climate whiplash—extreme fluctuations between drought and flooding—that threatens the health and autonomy of millions of people. Set against mounting anxiety over the future of global water supplies, Cutting the Mass Line explores the enduring political, technical, and ethical project of making water available to human communities and ecosystems in a time of drought, infrastructural disrepair, and environmental breakdown. Anthropologist Andrea E. Pia explores essential questions of how to manage water resources from the vantage point of Huize County, a water-challenged, ecologically damaged, multi-ethnic area in rural Yunnan Province. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, archival materials, and statistical data, Pia brings readers inside the inner workings of China's complex water supply ecosystem by exploring the intricate relationships among Chinese water services agencies; water user associations; dam construction sites; party cadres and rural entrepreneurs, mediators, and farmers; and foreign development planners. The climate crisis and the global politics of sustainability and mitigation offer unanticipated leeway for experimental grassroots intrusions in what has traditionally been the sphere of elite regulatory action: water allocation and distribution. Rural residents' efforts to keep access to local water sources and flourish in their own communities are moving the political possibilities of climate and environmental collective action in exciting and unforeseen directions. As the world grapples with challenges to water quality, supply, and control, the impacts of China's resource management strategies will be a provocative and useful study for the future.

Literary Forms of Argument in Early China

Literary Forms of Argument in Early China PDF Author:
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 900429970X
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 363

Get Book Here

Book Description
Literary Forms of Argument in Early China explores formal approaches to the study of philosophical texts to present new methods for the analysis of pre-modern thought in China. Attempts made by Chinese thinkers to generate literary forms of philosophical reasoning have gone unrecognised within scholarship in China and the West. Drawing together the expertise of leading scholars of early Chinese textuality, this volume addresses this omission by examining the formal characteristics of an argument, the interrelationship between form and content, as well as patterned compositions and non-linear semantic utterances. With these comprehensive new readings, the volume makes a landmark contribution to the study of written thinking in early China. Contributors include: Wim De Reu, Joachim Gentz, Christoph Harbsmeier, Martin Kern, Dirk Meyer, Michael Nylan, Andrew H. Plaks, David Schaberg, Rudolf G. Wagner.

Coping with Global Environmental Change, Disasters and Security

Coping with Global Environmental Change, Disasters and Security PDF Author: Hans Günter Brauch
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 364217776X
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 1816

Get Book Here

Book Description
Coping with Global Environmental Change, Disasters and Security - Threats, Challenges, Vulnerabilities and Risks reviews conceptual debates and case studies focusing on disasters and security threats, challenges, vulnerabilities and risks in Europe, the Mediterranean and other regions. It discusses social science concepts of vulnerability and risks, global, regional and national security challenges, global warming, floods, desertification and drought as environmental security challenges, water and food security challenges and vulnerabilities, vulnerability mapping of environmental security challenges and risks, contributions of remote sensing to the recognition of security risks, mainstreaming early warning of conflicts and hazards and provides conceptual and policy conclusions.

The Spring and Autumn Annals of Master Yan

The Spring and Autumn Annals of Master Yan PDF Author: Olivia Milburn
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004309667
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 515

Get Book Here

Book Description
The Spring and Autumn Annals of Master Yan is the biography of the most important statesmen and political thinkers of the Eastern Zhou dynasty China: Yan Ying (d. 500 BCE). Living through an exceptionally troubled period, he served three rulers and two dictators of the state of Qi, in Shandong Province. His experiences informed his revolutionary theories concerning the relationship between the individual and the state. Long considered to be a forgery, recent archaeological discoveries have proved the Spring and Autumn Annals of Master Yan to be a genuinely ancient text. This book provides not only the first complete translation of the text into any Western language, but a detailed analysis of the context in which it was produced.