PhD Candidate in Asian Languages and Cultures
About
I am interested in investigating early Chinese views, covering the period c. 500–100 BCE, on standing apart from the collective and its ethical and political stakes. My research specifically examines how early texts portray withdrawal, isolation, and solitude as experiences that individuals and communities may choose or endure, and how they shape moral action, social bonds, and political legitimacy. I consider a range of forms—from refusal of service and forced exile to collective marginalization and rulership shaped by deliberate distance or isolation through abandonment—attending to their spatial as well as affective and intellectual dimensions. I trace these themes through paradigmatic figures and episodes, drawing on a wide range of sources, including philosophical writings, historical records, and literary anthologies. By examining these themes across individual, communal, and sociopolitical contexts, my research asks how these narratives recur as sites where early Chinese thinkers negotiate values and their place amid precarious social and political conditions. More broadly, I hope my work deepens how we read early Chinese thought and connects it to contemporary debates on moral agency and political life.
Languages (other than English)
- Mandarin Chinese
- Classical Chinese
- Turkish
