POLI 113A - East Asian Thought

The fate of UCSD podcast lecture series is invariably they disappear from the web by the end of the semester. Also, eventually, most of them, are back in due time. And so, POLI 113A - East Asian Thought, which I followed in the summer of 2008, is back now. (feed) This is formally a political theory course, but it dwells in relevant realms for philosophy, anthropology and is generally recommended to anyone.

Professor Victor Magagna is a very good lecturer, though he does not make any attempts to make the matter easy or entertaining. Magagna delivers a clear and well structured course and this is the stuff for every serious student. He systematically introduces us to East Asian Thought (Confucius, Mencius and others), makes a point how this thought permeates through all cultures in East Asia - China, Japan, Korea, Indo-China etc - even among the Maoists who formally reject Confucianism. He also compares these basic lines of thought about man and social order with fundamental Western thought.

This is the time to pick up this course, and grab all the lectures (we have reached lecture 10 by now) and safely store them. Then, one must take the time and concentration to carefully go through them. This is no leisure listening, but when sufficiently attended, this podcast lecture series is extremely worthwhile.

More POLI 113A:
East Asian Culture.