Events  

International Conference about Classical Japanese Philosophy

Conference/workshop "Classical Japanese philosophy: context, interpretation, development" takes place at Tallinn University, 20-23 May, 2010.

The rapid modernisation of Japan after the Meiji period brought along a wave of cultural import comparable only to the Chinese-mediated continental influence on the emerging Japanese state during the Asuka and Nara periods. Whole new disciplines and areas of knowledge were established, previous cultural practices restructured and Western models tried out in almost all spheres of life. But soon enough the tendency to import turned into a need for synthesis: the cultural practices of modern Japan came largely to be based on creative reinterpretations of received practices, and the mutual influence of Western and traditional ways of thinking about things.

This is also true of Japanese philosophy, which made the effort to combine the domestic heritage and Western thought and to synthesize on this basis a new conceptual language for describing reality. But the influence on the contemporary Japanese cultural system of classical thought, notably the philosophical views of Dōgen and Shinran, goes even deeper and is reflected not only in philosophical arguments, but also in the social and cultural practices of Japan, past and present

Programme
Thursday, May 20
Conference site: Tallinn University, Uus-Sadama Str 5 (Mare building), M-225
16.00 - Gereon Kopf (Luther College) – “Neither Good Nor Evil: A Non dualistic Ethics for Today”
17.00 - John C. Maraldo (University of North Florida) – “Negotiating the Divide of Death in Japanese Buddhism: Dōgen’s Difference”
19.00 Opening sauna (Reval Hotel Olympia, Liivalaia 33)

Friday, May 21
Conference site: Tallinn University, Uus-Sadama Str 5 (Mare building), Riho Pätsi saal (M-213)
9.45 - Graham Parkes (University College Cork) – “Body-Mind and Buddha-Nature: Dōgen’s Deeper Ecology“
10.30 - Rein Raud (Tallinna Ülikool) – “Inside the Concept: Rethinking Dōgen’s language”
11.15-11.30 -  coffee break
11.30 - Aleksi Järvelä (University of Helsinki) – “Aconceptual Language, Atemporal Time - An Alternative View of Time in Dōgen”
12.15 - Margus Ott, Alari Allik (Tallinna Ülikool) – “Time of Practice Is Practicing” Time”
13.00-15.00 - lunch break
15.00 - Ralf Müller (Humboldt University) – “The Religion and Philosophy of Dōgen
15.45 - Laurentiu Andrei (Blaise Pascal University) – “Self and other. A parallel between Dōgen and Nishida”
16.30 - Martin Doesch (Erlangen University) – „Escaping existence vs. ordering the world: Dōgen and Shao Yong – conceptions of time in Buddhism and Neo-Confucianism”

Saturday, May 22
Conference site: Tallinn University, Uus-Sadama Str 5 (Mare building), Riho Pätsi saal (M-213)
9.45 - Thomas P. Kasulis (Ohio State University) – “The Ground of Translation: Issues in Translating Premodern Japanese Philosophy”
10.30 - Uehara Mayuko (Meisei University) – “The Concept of Translation in Edo period”
11.15-11.30 - coffee break
11.30 - Dennis Hirota (Ryukoku University) – “The Phenomenology of Religious Life in Shinran and Heidegger2
12.15 - Takako Saito (Centre d’Études Japonaises / Institut des Langues et Civilisations Orientales, Paris, Université du Havre) – “Searching for an encounter with the Absolute being: Kuki Shūzō and the ideas of Shinran”
13.00-15.00 - lunch break
15.00 - Laeticia Söderman (University of Helsinki) – “The Logic of the Enlightenment Paths: Tanabe, Shinran and the Ideal State”
15.45 - Miika Pölkki (University of Helsinki) – “Tanabe’s Shu no ronri as Dynamic Atemporal Savage Logic: Re-Thinking Logical Underpinnings of Classical Japanese Philosophy”
16.30 - Matteo Cestari (University of Turin) – “Between Empitiness and Absolute Nothingness. Reflections about Negation in Buddhism and the Kyōto School”

Sunday, May 23
Conference site: Tallinn University, Uus-Sadama Str 5 (Mare building), Riho Pätsi saal (M-213)
9.45 - Steffen Doell (Munich University) – “No heart, no illusions. A conceptual history of mushin”
10.30 - Yoko Takau-Drobin (The Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm) – “Establishing the academic subject history in Meiji-Japan”
11.15 - James W. Heisig (Nanzan Institute, Nagoya) – “Nishida’s Deodorized Basho and the Scent of Zeami’s Flower”
12.00 - Conlusions and closing reception

Further information: Lauri Kitsnik, lauri.kitsnik@tlu.ee, 56664377