Faculty & Staff

Faculty

Edward L. Shaughnessy

Edward L. Shaughnessy, Ph.D.

Lorraine J. and Herrlee G. Creel Distinguished Service Professor in Early Chinese Studies and Department Chair, East Asian Languages and Civilizations and the College; Director of the Creel Center for Chinese Paleography.

eshaughn@uchicago.edu


CV

Teaching/Research Interests (中文):

conferenceI am interested generally in the cultural and literary history of the Zhou period, and am committed especially to the study of its archaeologically recovered textual materials, from oracle-bone and bronze inscriptions through the bamboo-strip manuscripts that have been unearthed in such breathtaking profusion in the last two decades.  At the same time, I remain fascinated with the received literary tradition of the period, especially the three classics: Zhou Yi, Shang shu and Shi jing. Indeed, I find it most rewarding when it proves possible to use these two types of texts to explicate each other.

Within this general scholarly agenda, I have resolutely maintained two focal points: bronze inscriptions and the Zhou Yi, both of which reached their full maturity toward the end of the Western Zhou period (1045-771 B.C.). I am presently completing a monographic study to be entitled conference“The Changes Unearthed,” a survey of recently excavated manuscripts of or relating to the Yi jing.  I hope in the near future to turn my attention to an analytic dictionary of the language of Western Zhou bronze inscriptions, and in the long term to prepare a comprehensive history of the Western Zhou period.

In addition to these individual research projects, under the auspices of the Creel Center for Chinese Paleography I am also collaborating with my colleague Don Harper as well as other colleagues at other institutions both in the United States and in China and Taiwan, to produce a synoptic overview of the manuscript culture of ancient China.

Recent Publications

Books:

Chinese Wisdom: Philosophical Insights from Confucius, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi and Other Masters. London: Duncan Baird Publishers, 2010; American edition entitled Confucian & Taoist Wisdom: Philosophical Insights from Confucius, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi and Other Masters.

Articles:

"Xing’ yu ‘Xiang’: Jian lun zhanbu he shige de guanxi ji qi dui Shi jing he Zhou Yi de xingcheng zhi yingxiang" “興”與“象”: 簡論占卜和詩歌的關係及其對《詩經》 和《周易》的形成之影響 (‘Arousal’ and ‘Image’: A simple discussion of the relationship between divination and song and of its influence on the formation of the Classic of Poetry and the Zhou Changes), Luojia jiangtan 珞珈講壇 (Luojia Forum) 6 (2011): 71-89.

"Fuyang Han jian Zhou Yi jiance xingzhi ji shuxie geshi zhi lice" 阜陽漢簡《周易》簡册形制及書寫格式之蠡測 (Estimating the nature and written form of the Fuyang Zhou Changes bamboo strips), Jianbo 簡帛 (Bamboo and silk) 6 (2011): forthcoming.

"Cong Zuoce Wu he zai kan Zhou Mu Wang zai wei nianshu ji niandai wenti" 從作冊吳盉再看周穆王在位年數及年代問題 (From the Zuoce Wu he looking once again at the length of reign and dates of King Mu of Zhou), in Zhu Fenghan 朱鳳瀚 ed., Xinchu jinwen yu Xi Zhou lishi 新出金文與西周歷史 (Newly appearing bronze inscriptions and Western Zhou history) (Shanghai: Shanghai Guji chubanshe, 2011), pp. 71-78.

"History and Inscriptions, China," in The Oxford History of Historical Writing, Volume 1: Beginnings to AD 600, General Editor Daniel Woolf, Volume Editors Andrew Feldherr and Grant Hardy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), pp. 371-93.

"Of Riddles and Recoveries: The Bamboo Annals, Ancient Chronology, and the Work of David Nivison." Journal of Chinese Studies 52 (2011): 269-90.

"Zhou Yi ‘Yuan heng li zhen’ xin jie: Jianlun Zhou dai xi zhen xiguan yu Zhou Yi gua yao ci de xingcheng"《周易》“元亨利貞”新解——兼論周代習貞習慣與《周易》卦爻辭的形成 (A new explanation of the phrase “Yuan heng li zhen” in the Zhou Changes: Together with a discussion of the practice of repeat divination in the Zhou period and the formation of the hexagram and line statements of the Zhou Changes), Zhou Yi yanjiu 周易研究 (Studies of the Zhou Changes) 2010.5: 3-15.

"You Meixian Shan shi jiazu tongqi zai lun Shanfu Ke tongqi de niandai: Fudai zai lun Jin Hou Su bianzhong de niandai" 由眉縣單氏家族銅器再論膳夫克銅器的年代:附帶再論晉侯蘇編鐘的年代 (A new discussion of the dates of the Shanfu Ke bronze vessels from the perspective of the Meixian Shan family bronzes: With an appended renewed discussion of the date of the Jin Hou Su bell set), in Zhongguo gudai qingtongqi guoji yantaohui lunwenji 中國古代青銅器國際研討會論文集, ed. Shanghai bowuguan and Xianggang Zhongwen daxue Wenwuguan (N.p., 2010), pp. 165-78.

"The Beginnings of Writing in China," in Visible Language: Inventions of Writing in the Ancient Middle East and Beyond (Chicago: The Oriental Institute, 2010), pp. 215-24.

"Zai shuo Xici Qian zhuan zhi, Kun xi pi" 再說《繫辭》乾專直坤翕闢 (Once again on the Appended Statements’ Qian’s being curled and straight, Kun’s being closed and open), Wenshi 文史 91 (2010.2): 273-75.

"Arousing Images: The Poetry of Divination and the Divination of Poetry," in Divination and Interpretation of Signs in the Ancient World, ed. Amar Annus. Oriental Institute Seminars 6 (Chicago: The Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, 2010), pp. 61-75.

"Cong chutu wenzi ziliao kan Zhou Yi de bianzuan" 從出土文字資料看《周易》的編纂 (Looking at the composition of the Zhou Changes on the basis of excavated written materials), in 2009 Zhou Yi jing zhuan wenxian xin quan 周易經傳文獻新詮 (2009 New hermeneutics on the Zhou Changes classic and commentary texts), ed. Zheng Jixiong 鄭吉雄 (Taipei: Taiwan daxue chuban zhongxin, 2010), 34-49.

Courses