Linguistic Strategies in Daoist Zhuangzi and Chan Buddhism: The Other Way of Speaking

As the first systematic attempt to probe the linguistic strategies of Daoist Zhuangzi and Chan Buddhism, this book investigates three areas: deconstructive strategy, liminology of language, and indirect original texts, placing them strictly within soteriological contexts. Whilst focusing on language use, the study also reveals some important truths about these two traditions and challenges many conventional understandings of them. Responding to recent critiques of Daoist and Chan Buddhist thought, it brings these two traditions into a constructive dialogue with contemporary philosophical reflection. It discovers Zhuangzian and Chan perspectives and sheds light on issues such as the relationship between philosophy and non-philosophy, de-reification of words, relativizing the limit of language, structure of indirect communication, and use of paradox, tautology and poetic language.

Youru Wang teaches Asian thought in the Philosophy and Religion Department at Rowan University, Glassboro, New Jersey.