THE SOAS CENTRE FOR CULTURAL, LITERARY AND POSTCOLONIAL STUDIES
(CCLPS)
LECTURE SERIES 2009-2010
THE COMPLEXITY OF DIFFERENCE: A METHODOLOGICAL ISSUE IN CROSS-
CULTURAL STUDIES
PROFESSOR ZHANG LONGXI
CITY UNIVERSITY OF HONG KONG
TUESDAY 16 MARCH 2010
3-5 PM
ROOM 4421
Abstract
Difference is a basic fact in life and in our understanding of life, as people are
all different as individuals and as social groups and communities. In humanities
and social sciences, however, differences are often ignored on the individual
level, while emphasized on the collective level. This is particularly true in
understanding different cultures. By examining some recent works in East-
West cross-cultural studies, the lecturer will argue that we should pay
attention to the complexity of difference and what Geoffrey Lloyd calls
the gmultidimensionalityh of things so as to avoid the mistake of subsuming
individual differences under collective categories, and to go beyond the
simplistic claims of universalism as well as the relativist dilemma of cultural
incommensurability.
ZHANG Longxi holds an MA from Peking University and a Ph. D. from Harvard.
He taught at the University of California, Riverside, before moving to Hong
Kong, where he is currently Chair Professor of Comparative Literature and
Translation at the City University of Hong Kong. His research area is East-
West comparative studies, and his major book publications include The Tao
and the Logos: Literary Hermeneutics, East and West (Duke University Press,
1992), which won honorable mention for the Joseph Levinson Book Prize;
Mighty Opposites: From Dichotomies to Differences in the Comparative Study
of China (Stanford University Press, 1998); Allegoresis: Reading Canonical
Literature East and West (Cornell University Press, 2005); Unexpected
Affinities: Reading across Cultures (University of Toronto Press, 2007), and
most recently, sär¶{€üåt[An Introduction to Comparative Literature]
(in Chinese, Fudan University Press, 2008). He was elected a foreign member
of the Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities in 2009.
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