My research focuses on the function and significance of aesthetic concepts and modes of reasoning in the philosophy of the early Chinese text the Xunzi.

More information about Michaël Schapers

Fields of interest

Chinese philosophy;
Comparative philosophy;
Confucianism; Xunzi;
Aesthetics; Rhetoric;
Early China

Research

The philosophy of the Xunzi can be interpreted as an aesthetically oriented system of thought, that is qualified by certain concepts and modes of reasoning that are best understood as primarily aesthetic in nature. My research focuses on a category of aesthetic concepts that play a key role in the central arguments of the Xunzi's system of thought, which have so far been neglected in philosophical studies of the text or have not been interpreted aesthetically.

Curriculum vitae

BA in China Studies, Leiden University, 2014
MA in Chinese Philosophy, Tsinghua University, 2023