Abteilung für Sprache und Kultur Chinas
Asien-Afrika-InstitutSprache und Kultur Chinas
HSG-Vortrag von Halvor Eifring: Notions of Emotion in the conceptual history of pre-imperial China
24. April 2025, von AAI Webmaster
Foto: H. Eifring
Die Abteilung für Sprache und Kultur Chinas sowie die Hamburger Sinologische Gesellschaft laden zu einem Vortrag von Herrn Prof. Dr. Halvor Eifring (Oslo) am Donnerstag, 24.4.25 um 18 Uhr in Raum 123 am AAI ein.
Notions of Emotion in the conceptual history of pre-imperial China
It has been argued that the late 4th century BCE saw a shift of attention inwards in Chinese philosophy, and that emotions now became a focus of major philosophical interest. It has also been argued, however, that emotions were a central concern in Confucius’s philosophy more than a century earlier, and in the poems of the Book of Songs several centuries before that. In this talk, I will argue that the changes taking place in the late 4th century BCE involved a step from an interest in individual emotions to the formation of concepts about ‘emotion’ as a general, overarching category. These new concepts formed the basis for a number of philosophies about this aspect of the human mind. Most modern Chinese concepts of ‘emotion’ can be traced back to this period.
