Eastern Philosophy

The Eastern Philosophy course is an eight-week introduction to the major philosophies of the East, including Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Daoism, through the study of classic texts. Students learn to recognize and differentiate between historical South and East Asian texts by accurately and fully describing concepts and arguments and placing them in their social-historical contexts.

The course emphasizes careful reading of these texts, developing interpretations or expositions of the texts, followed by systematic comparisons between them in order to disclose the meaning(s) of the works studied.

The course also develops interdisciplinary and critical reasoning skills and applies these skills to a variety of cultural-historical, philosophical, and religious issues.

Students learn to evaluate and assess the content, structure, and strategies of philosophical and religious work, and to employ philosophical and religious concepts to contemporary issues through the construction of arguments and development of their own projects.