What is it about?
This paper aims to explain the shift from positive to negative views of Chinese culture in the turn of the 19th century. With reference to Said's concept of Orientalism. With a renewed attention to the anthropological basis of modern German idealism.
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Why is it important?
This paper is important for the use of the concept of "Orientalism" coming from cultural studies into the field of comparative philosophy. Moreover, its importance comes from the fact that it doesn't intend simply to criticize Kant's and Hegel's problematic anthropological views but to deconstruct their very basis: the notion of an everlasting "National Mind", the essentialization of Otherness.
Perspectives
In the context of rising Sino-Western tensions, it's important to see how representations of the (so-called) "Other" can change - and to understand what may triggers this change. However that does not mean that history merely repeats itself. If Eurocentric Orientalism was the key in Kant's and Hegel's times to understand shifting representations; Sinocentric Occidentalism is playing an important part today.
Jean-Yves Heurtebise
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This page is a summary of: Hegel’s Orientalist Philosophy of History and its Kantian Anthropological Legacy, Journal of Chinese Philosophy, March 2017, Brill,
DOI: 10.1163/15406253-0440304007.
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