Interpreting Heidegger in China

Over the past four decades, Heidegger’s philosophy has exerted a profound influence on Chinese intellectual thought. Within Mainland Chinese academia, two primary approaches to interpreting Heidegger’s work can be identified. The “contemporary” approach, championed by Sun Zhouxing, is rooted in the concerns of modernity, particularly nihilism and the dominance of technology, using these issues as a foundation for proposing a philosophy of the future (未來 哲學). In contrast, the “Chinese” approach, represented by Zhang Xianglong, emphasizes cross-cultural comparisons between Heidegger’s philosophy and Chinese traditional thought, seeking to develop a phenomenology of kinship affection (親親現象學) and a “philosophy of family/home” (家哲學). Both approaches constitute concrete practices of phenomenological interpretation, and through their respective explorations, they demonstrate the universal validity and methodological robustness of Heidegger’s phenomenology, showing its applicability across different cultural and conceptual contexts

Kinship · Mainland China · Modernity · Nihilism · Zhàng · Chinese history and philosophy · Hermeneutics and Narrative Identity · Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy