MAP Diversity Reading Group
New addition to our department’s Minorities and Philosophy (MAP) programming: a diversity reading group run by graduate students, to discuss philosophical texts beyond the Anglophone tradition. The goal is to promote familiarity with philosophical works beyond the ‘canon’, as well as to promote consideration of such works for pedagogical purposes.
Faculty as well as undergraduate majors are welcome to attend. Please let me know (lemueltang@wustl.edu) if you would like to be added to the mailing list.
For this semester, we will be reading Nāgārjuna’s Mūlamadhyamakakārikā (The Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way), a foundational text in the Madhyamaka school of Mahayana Buddhist philosophy and concerns Buddhist metaphysics and epistemology. The edition we will discuss is translated with a chapter-by-chapter commentary by Jay Garfield. You can read more about Nāgārjuna on the SEP: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/nagarjuna/.
The plan is to meet every two weeks, for a total of 7 meetings, on Fridays, from 4pm-5pm/5.30pm, in person, Wilson 212, barring conflicts with Departmental events.
Here is the tentative meeting schedule:
|
Date |
Reading |
|
Jan 24 (4pm-5pm) |
Mūlamadhyamakakārikā, Dedicatory Verses, Chapters 1 – 3 |
|
Feb 7 (4pm-5pm) |
Mūlamadhyamakakārikā, Chapters 4 – 7 |
|
Feb 21 (4pm-5pm) |
Mūlamadhyamakakārikā, Chapters 8 – 11 |
|
Mar 7 (4pm-5pm) |
Mūlamadhyamakakārikā, Chapters 12 – 15 |
|
Mar 21 (4pm-5pm) *possible conflict with Tech & Society Interdisciplinary Conference on AI & Finance |
Mūlamadhyamakakārikā, Chapters 16 – 19 |
|
Apr 4 (4.30pm – 5.30pm) *possible conflict with Ian Pebbles (ASU) 3pm-4.30pm |
Mūlamadhyamakakārikā, Chapters 20 – 23 |
|
Apr 18 (4pm-5pm) * conflict with Pacific APA; will reschedule if majority cannot attend |
Mūlamadhyamakakārikā, Chapters 24 – 27 |
There are 27 chapters in the primary reading, accompanied with 27 commentaries. For each meeting, we will discuss 4 chapters from the Nagarjuna with the accompanying commentary. That is roughly between 9-15 pages of primary material, and between 20-50 pages of secondary material, per meeting. This allows us to complete the book by the end of the semester.
The text is available as a digital copy through the WashU library, but feel free to pick up a copy from your preferred bookstore.
WashU Library full-text link here:
https://wash-primo.hosted.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/f/q1cvd5/TN_cdi_oup_oso_isbn_9780195103175