4th Meeting, 16th June: "Eurocentrism in the Study of Non-Western Philosophy"

Organizer: Department of Philosophy (Zhuhai)，Sun Yat-sen University

Topic: Eurocentrism in the study of Non-Western Philosophy

Speaker: Shyam Ranganathan (Assistant Professor, York University)

Moderator: Jun-Hyeok Kwak, Professor, Department of Philosophy (Zhuhai)

Discussant: Zheng Wang, Research Associate, Department of Philosophy (Zhuhai)

Time: June 16th, 11:00 am

Venue: Room 106, No.13 Administrative Building of Department of Philosophy (Zhuhai), SYSU

Abstract:

Eurocentrism is a basic fact of the study of Non-Western philosophy. One of the dominant expressions of this prioritization of Europe is the marginalization of anything non-European as religion, even when the non-European sources coincidentally defend theories defended by European "nonreligious" intellectuals. Another is the orthodox view in Indology that Indian thinkers did not have a robust tradition of moral theorizing, for anything that deviates from European ethics is not considered as ethics by orthodoxy.  In this paper, I contrast two differing models of understanding: explication (the explanation of a perspective in terms of its entailed theories that account for its controversial claims) and interpretation (explanation of a perspective in terms of the beliefs or commitments of the interpreter). Interpretation mystifies and religifies anything that is not a derivation from the interpreter's bias, and interpretation with a Eurocentric bias can be shown to be a straightforward derivation from the basic philosophical commitment of the Western tradition, which is traceable to the Greek idea of logos. This is the linguistic account of thought: thought is the meaning of what you say in your language. I argue that this entails interpretation and given its historical origins, keeps Europe as an ultimate interpretive frame as it spreads. It creates religion out of nonwestern philosophy and maintains a historical hostility to philosophy expressed in Europe's history.   These errors can be ameliorated by adopting explication, which has historical roots in meditational philosophies of Asia.