Dr Manhua Li has organised an exciting international conference and exhibition at Royal Holloway, University of London on the 22nd and 23rd of June.
The conference poster and programme are below. To register for free participation, fill in the form here and send it to manhua.li@rhul.ac.uk
Conference Programme
A pdf of the programme can be found here.
Philosophy of Self-Cultivation
June 22nd – 23rd 2023, Royal Holloway College University of London
Room 1, Senate House, Malet Street, London WC1E 7HU
Thursday June 22nd
9:00 – 9:30 Registration and Breakfast
9:30 – 10:30 Keynote Lecture
Karyn Lai: Two Kinds of Cultivation in the Zhuangzi
10:30 – 10:50 Coffee Break
10:50 – 11:55 Panel 1. Philosophy as a Way of Life: Beyond Spiritual Exercise c
John Sellars: Why ‘Spiritual Exercises’ are not Spiritual
John Marenbon: Medieval Philosophy and Philosophy as a Way of Life
11:55 – 12:55 Lunch
12:55 – 14:00 Panel 2. Religiosity of Self-Cultivation: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives
Nicholas Sihlé: Self-Cultivation and Lived Religion: Anthropological Notes on the Case of the Tibetan Buddhist Tantrists
Feixuan Xu: Cultivating for Self-Cultivation?: Comparing Ancient Agrarian and Contemporary Artistic Practices on Raising Silkworms
14:00 – 14:20 Coffee Break
14:20 – 15:25 Panel 3. Cultivation as a Practice of the Self and Others
Andrea Rehberg: Schopenhauer and Nietzsche on Self and Other
Jozef Majerník: Ascetic Practices in Book IV of Nietzsche’s Gay Science 15:25 – 15:45 Coffee Break
15:45 – 17:15 Panel 4. Nourishing Life: Reconnecting Humans and Nature
David Chai: Ji Kang on Nourishing Life
Julia Ng: Completion as Self-Cultivation: Benjamin, Bloch, Zhuangzi
Manhua Li: Nietzsche and Ji Kang on Self-Cultivation
17:15 – 19:00 Art Exhibition & Drinks Reception
19:00 Dinner
Friday June 23rd
9:00 – 9:30 Breakfast
9:30 – 10:30 Keynote Lecture
Michaela Ott: Dividuation – a New Mode of Thinking the Human Condition
10:30 – 10:50 Coffee Break
10:50 – 11:55 Panel 5. The Politics of Self-Cultivation
Mario Wenning: Cultivating Soft Resistance: Vattimo and Daoism on Weakening Strategies
Gauri Wagle: Worldmaking and the Borders of the Self: Cultivation and Nationhood in Fanon
11:55 – 12:55 Lunch
12:55 – 14:25 Panel 6. Reconsidering Sagehood: Cultivating the Moral Persons
Tzuli Chang: On Moral Error: The Debate and Mencian Comment
Jingyi Zhao: Learning from the Cradle: Children and Moral Self-cultivation in Ancient Greece and Early China
Guillaume Dutournier: Inferring the Intention of the Saints. Canon, Self-Cultivation and Controversy in Neo-Confucian Thought
14:25 – 14:45 Coffee Break
14:45 – 15:50 Panel 7. Self-Cultivation and Modern Ethos: Sex, Gender, and Identity
Deborah Goldgaber: Sex and self-transformation: Foucault, Bersani and the ‘End of Sex’
Becca Bashford: What’s in a name? The Refusal of Recognition and Its Effect on the Cultivation of the Self
15:50 – 16:10 Coffee Break
16:10 – 17:40 Panel 8. Which Self is at Stake? Towards a Diverse Ethics of Self-Cultivation
Oliver Spinney: Wittgenstein on Confession, and Working on Oneself
David Collins: Authenticity and Self-Cultivation in Beauvoir’s Ambiguous Ethics
Emma Syea: The Limits of Self-Cultivation
17:40 – 18:00 Coffee Break
18:00 – 19:00 Keynote Lecture
Graham Parkes: Self-Cultivation through Others: People, Things, and Internet
19:00 – 19:30 Closing Remark
Laura Sjoberg
Society for European Philosophy 