Curie Virag

Humanities Initiative Fellow
Discipline: 
Philosophy
Institution: 
University of Toronto, Canada
Project Title: 
Emotions in Medieval China
Project Abstract: 

My main project is to write up my book manuscript, "Emotions in Medieval China." In this book I examine the evolving history of conceptions of emotions from 3rd – 12th centuries CE, focusing on the triangular relationship among the discourse of emotions, values, and conceptions of the self. I trace the intense debates within which discussions of emotions are enmeshed, and the process by which the "mainstream" ethical ideal in traditional China – namely, that emotions are patterned, intelligent expressions of the "moral nature" and could thus serve as the grounds of individual moral agency – came to be formulated in the 11th and 12th centuries. My concern is to explain how, why, and with what implications, such a norm came to be established, and to work out how the trajectory of development in China can illuminate our understanding of how the "self" comes to be configured more generally.

File Attachments