Best wishes,
Michael S. Allen, University of Virginia
Parimal G. Patil, Harvard University
Chairs, Hindu Philosophy Unit
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Call for Papers
We invite proposals for two sessions to be held at this year’s Annual Meeting:
1. Philosophical Roundtable. This experimental format will bring together several participants to discuss either a single argument or a closely related series of arguments from a single author. This year we will focus on Udayana’s arguments against
Buddhist idealism, found in the Ātma-tattva-viveka, section 2 (bāhyārtha-bhaṅga-vāda, “On the [Buddhist] Refutation of External Objects”). The goal is not to have traditional presentations but to create a space for lively and rigorous discussion.
In lieu of traditional paper proposals, therefore, we instead invite prospective participants to write a short philosophical analysis either of the section as a whole or a single argument from the section. One might, for example, criticize Udayana’s argument,
or extend it, or defend it against further objections, or note something surprising in the argument, or simply assess its strengths and weaknesses. (Note that the
Ātma-tattva-viveka has been edited and translated by N.S. Dravid, Shimla: Indian Institute of Advanced Study, 1995. Additional Sanskrit editions are readily available through the Internet Archive. Selections have also been translated in the appendix
to Kisor Kumar Chakrabarti’s Classical Indian Philosophy of Mind, Albany: SUNY, 1999.)
2. Traditional Papers Session. For this session we are looking for individual paper proposals (rather than full panel proposals). We are open to a wide range of topics related to Hindu philosophy. Possible topics include but are by no means limited
to: Philosophy of Language, Philosophy of Materiality, Discourses of Ultimate Reality, Philosophy and Pedagogy, Lived Philosophy, “Philosophy” as a Category, Stock Examples, Philosophy and Literature, and Philosophy in Vernacular Texts.