一、Basic Information

1. Name of Discipline: Philosophy

2. Discipline code：0101

3. Secondary Discipline：

（1）010101 Marxist philosophy

（2）010102 Chinese philosophy

（3）010103 Foreign philosophy

（4）010105 Political Philosophy

（5）010107 Religious Studies  

（6）010106 Aesthetics

二、Brief Introduction

The history of philosophy department of Sichuan University dates back to the 20th century. As early as the beginning of the 20th century, it has already offered such courses as Outline of Philosophy, Ethics, Logic, and History of Western Philosophy, etc. In 1926, the department was officially established; in 1959, it was reestablished after the war, as one of the seven philosophy departments inChina.

Presently the department has 56 professors and researchers: 24 of them are full professors, 18 associate professors, and 14 assistant professors. Among them, one is Distinguished Professor of Liberal Arts, one is Yangtze River Scholar Distinguished Professor, three are Trans-Century Outstanding Talents, one is a member of Committee of Social Science (Ministry of Education), two are members of the National Social Science Foundation Review Committee, one is a member of the Steering Committee on Philosophy Teaching, and one is the vice president of the Chinese Religious Society. Its teaching and research team for undergraduate program is well-organized both in terms of age and area of competence. It offers MPhil and Master Degree to researches in the following six directions: Marxism, Chinese Philosophy, Western Philosophy, Ethics, Aesthetics and Religious Study. It offers PhD Degree to the above directions except Ethics.

The philosophy department embarks on the research of various Chinese and Western philosophical theories. It also inherits the humanitarian and reality concerns from its own past. The department stresses Classics study as well as analytical method. Along the way, it develops a way of conducting research that is of its own characteristics.

First of all, taking Philosophy of Religion as the specific stream, the Discipline of Philosophy focuses on the in-depth study of the history of religions, and particularly, it has made some outstanding achievements on the study of Taoist history. In 1980, the Ministry of Education approved the establishment of theInstituteofReligious Studies, which is the first academic institution that studies religions in the higher educational system ofChina. In academic research, the Discipline of Philosophy undertakes several national key projects. Based on the academic front and in response to national strategic needs, it established extensive academic links with a wide range of international high-level research institutions and has become an important training base of national religious personnel and a national religious policy advisory think tank. As regards the training for masters and doctors, the Discipline relies on traditional advantages as well as interdisciplinary approaches such as sociology, history and anthropology. It encourages students to expand research ideas and to link theory with practice.

Secondly, an integrated research pedigree ranging from Greek philosophy to modern philosophy has taken form in this Discipline and languages like Classical Greek, Latin, German, French, English and other research-oriented languages are frequently used in academic research. In particular, it has gained gratifying achievements in the field of Greek and German philosophy. In the field of ancient philosophy, besides ‘The Translation of Greek Philosophy Classics’, which is the national social science fund key project, this Discipline has also undertaken over 10 national social science fund projects and several projects of the Ministry of Education. Our academic staffs have published over 30 translated books and more than 20 monographs. It not only made contribution to the development of the study of western philosophy inChina, but also intensifies the self-understanding and development of Chinese philosophy. Besides those long-formed research advantages mentioned above, this Discipline also trains masters and doctors in the direction of Marxist Philosophy, Ethics, Aesthetics and et cetera, highlighting these majors’ common characteristics as practical philosophy and emphasizing the connection and innovation of academic development.

Third, on the basis of the arrangement and interpretation of Chinese philosophical literature, investigates the origin of Confucianism and Taoism, and develops the applied research and relevance research about the two. In this area, our institution undertakes the Project 211 - Project 985 named Ruzang (Confucian Canon), the Key Project of the Philosophy and Social Science of the Ministry of Education named Integration of the century Select of Taoism, and the specially-entrust major Project of National Fund of Philosophy and Social Science named Century Research and Innovation Project of Taoism; in the expansion of the domain of Chinese philosophy, in the combination of the theory and application of Chinese philosophy, as well as in the transformation of the traditional civilization, our institution has made great and important achievements. The education programs of Master and PhD also focus on these aspects, especially highlighting the specialized subjects, i.e., Neo-Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism.

Fourth, in the aspect of academic, based on the characteristics and advantages of the discipline, in the stage of postgraduate education, our institution offers many language courses, e.g. Ancient western language courses (ancient Greek, Latin) and professional foreign language courses (English, French, and German).

三、Research Direction

Doctoral Research Direction：

1. Marxist philosophy        

2.Foreign philosophy            

3. Chinese philosophy              

4. Religious Studies

（1）Chinese Daoism

（2）Chinese Buddhism

（3）Christianity

（4）Theory of Religion

（5）Religion of Ethnic Minorities in China

（6）Sociology of Religion

（7）Tibetan Buddhism      

5. Aesthetics

（1）Chinese Aesthetic Thoughts

（2）Aesthetic Theory and Contemporary Aesthetic thoughts

（3）Religious Aesthetics and Aesthetic Anthropology      

Master's Research Direction：

1. Marxist philosophy

（1）Marxist philosophy and Mordern Western philosophy

（2）Western Marxist philosophy

（3）Marxist philosophy and tradition of German philosophy

（4）Mao Zedong’s philosophy thought

2. Chinese philosophy

（1）History of Chinese Philosophy

（2）Modern Neo-Confucian philosophy

（3）Confucian philosophy

（4）Principles of Confucious classics

3. Foreign philosophy

（1）History of foreign Philosophy

（2）Ancient Greek philosogy

（3）German philosophy

（4）Western modern philosophy

（5）Western religious philosophy

4. Ethics

（1）History of ethics

（2）Ethics of religion

（3）Philosophy of politics

（4）Ethics of economics

5. Aesthetics

（1）Chinese Ancient Aesthetic Thoughts and Culture

（2）Aesthetic Theory and Contemporary Aesthetic thoughts

（3） and Aesthetic Anthropology

6. Religion

（1）Chinese Daoism

（2）Chinese Buddhism

（3）Christianity

（4）Theory of Religion and Contemporary Religion

（5）Religion of Ethnic Minorities in China

Philosophy（0101）Doctoral curriculum