This paper explores the extent to which our past and present knowledge can help us to be future-ready, and suggests a theoretical basis for future-readiness. Drawing on the thought of the Daoist philosopher Zhuangzi, it is argued that future-readiness is primarily about having an open and flexible mindset where one responds appropriately to…

In this paper, Leonard Waks investigates connections between listening and expertise or mastery, contrasting approaches from Eastern and Western philosophy. The first section accounts for listening in the Daoist classic "Zhuangzi", a work addressing themes in Chinese philosophy through metaphor and story narratives. In one story a…

Exemplarism -- the view that exemplary people, whom we admire, are the bearers of our moral concepts -- presents considerable challenges to the (widely-assumed) place of moral "theory" in how we learn to be moral. Exemplarism has been garnered by Amy Olberding to articulate a Confucian approach to moral learning. This paper extends…

This essay draws on empirical research from two studies examining creativity, activism, and education in Hong Kong. We use a decolonizing and deimperializing approach to centering creativity as a lever for social change, and demonstrate the ways in which the specifics of culture, region, time, and place uniquely produce forms of creativity, as has…

Inequality and injustice in education have been viewed from the perspective of social justice. Since the emergence of John Rawls's "A Theory of Justice," social justice issues have attracted the attention of social and political philosophers. Theoretical consequences of social and political philosophy have been actively incorporated into…

The inclusion of 'consciousness' in Michael Bonnett's paper signals to me that the "right place" for examination of the ongoing and deepening environmental disasters that humans face is human consciousness itself: the way we think, perceive, and feel, which flows into the way we relate to and act towards nature. Against the still…

Addressing a research gap concerning the insufficient philosophical discourses on social justice from non-Western traditions, this article conceptualises social justice in education from a Daoist perspective. Drawing upon a Chinese classic "Daodejing," it is argued that Daoism is aligned with relational justice through its emphasis on…

The U.S. government identifies Chinese as one of the 15 critical languages important for the nation's economic competitiveness and security interests (U.S. Department of Education, p.1). Consequently, the U.S. government has funded Chinese language programs through the National Security Language Initiative (NSLI) to increase the number of U.S.…

The concept of Tao occupies a core position in Taoism and even the entire Chinese classical philosophy. For philosophical Taoism, 'Tao' is the ultimate reality. Therefore, exploring Taoist epistemology, its role in governance, education and self-cultivation is necessary. The only way that can be approached beyond human ability to fathom 'Tao' is…

In this study we investigated: (i) the historical development of Songyang Academy, and (ii) the educational philosophy and general education of Songyang Academy. This research employs qualitative research methods, including document analysis and field data collection through surveys, interviews, observations, group discussions, and workshops.…

Dewey's philosophy of education was heavily criticized by the Chinese Communist Party in the 1950s, which led many to believe that Dewey's education was in complete opposition to that of the CCP. However, this study intends to prove that Dewey had a tremendous influence on the early CCP members of the 1920s. Dewey's Chinese visit closely coincided…

Cultivating "wenhua dacai" (great cultural talent) is a central goal of the ongoing "dujing" (classics reading) education movement, which is an integral part of the broad Confucian revival in contemporary China. Focusing on the concept of "wenhua dacai," this article explores three interrelated issues. First, as a…

This article considers a postcolonial approach to comparative philosophy of education as comprising four key features: ethnography, translation, hybridity, and critique. This conception of comparative philosophy of education is first located in the postcolonial context that demands sensitivity to the ongoing dangers of orientalism. Each of these…

Higher education has long established primary importance to the formation of students, manifest in ideas such as Confucian "xiushen" (self-cultivation) and "Bildung." However, despite the shared focus on the idea of humans becoming humans, "xiushen" and "Bildung" are built on divergent philosophical…

Education, which is as old as humanity, has existed in various personal forms in non-western societies, where an osmotic exchange of wisdom, values and life skills within families, tribes and communities was instrumental in the formation and continuation of diverse wisdom traditions all over the world. A personal system of education, called…