(a concluding lecture at the Beijing Semiotics Congress, March 28, 2004)
                                                               You-zheng Li
                                                The Center for Comparative Civilization Studies, CASS

(The paper in both Chinese and English versions will be published in the two proceedings co-edited by Ru Xin, in Beijing, and Posner, in Berlin)
                                     
Summary
This international congress implies both the substantially and symbolically historical significance. First, as far as I know, the present international dialogue in the humanities like this could be the first one in the world. A conference like this can hardly be held in the West because of the existing institutional and professional compartmentalization formed in the Western academic establishment. I mean a special dialogue between the Chinese scholarly classics and the Western theoretical frontiers. Certainly, as the first attempt at this interdisciplinary- and intercultural-directed scientific pursuance, the substantial aspect of this conference remains tentative and elementary with respect to the depth of the intellectual interaction; nevertheless it indicates a great symbolic importance for reflection on a desirable new orientation of both semiotics and the humanities in the world.  The classical slogan  “West is West and East is East” must be given up from a semiotic point of view. In general, the total knowledge of mankind must be grasped and developed in a general unified framework since now on. The pluralism of the humanities should be after all formed in a unified intellectual context of mankind, no matter how complicated the constitution of the latter could be. This meeting between IASS and CASS has a remarkably historic meaning as well. CASS is an academic family of multiple disciplines while IASS is an efficient dialogic ground for the all-round interdisciplinary practice. The intellectual exchange between the traditional Chinese scholarship and the modern Western theory could present an encouraging new horizon and set up  a more workable model for the unified academic practice of the humanities in the world.
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Preface: Historical Meaning of the Beijing Congress
1. Identity of semiotics
2. Human sciences
3. Traditional Chinese humanities
4. Chinese semiotics
5. Interaction between Chinese and European-American semiotics
 Preface

   The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences is one of the most all-inclusive institution for human-social scientific research in the world. The International Association for Semiotic Studies is one of the most successful  multinational society to organize the interdisciplinary-directed scientific explorations in the world. The scientific encounter of the two institutions will lead to the significant consequence for promoting the development of the global studies of human sciences through a comparative semiotic discussion like this. As the first step for this scientific cooperation the international semiotic experts offers a systematic presentation of their semiotic theories to Chinese scholars, making the latter more clearly grasp the spirit and technique of the Western semiotic scholarship today. The bilateral discussion also offers a chance for the international scholars to grasp the relevant meaning and huge potential of Chinese semiotic sources. The meaning of this cross-cultural scholarly encounter is not limited in its immediate outcome; it signifies a promising horizon for the cross-cultural semiotic cooperation in future regarding both semiotic scholarship  and human sciences.

   Is there any special significance of the Chinese-Western semiotic dialogue when Chinese semiotic study remains to be in its primary stage in comparison with the highly developed Western one? I attempt to say that there indeed exists a rich potential of the Chinese semiotics highly significant for both Chinese and Western humanities. I will explain my viewpoints in the following five sections.

1. Identity of Semiotics

As early as in the IASS Congress of Berkeley I stressed that the identity of semiotics should not be defined as a new discipline among others; it is an operative ground or working field for a multiple/inter-disciplinary academic practice. Here we should first distinguish between the professional and the scientific institutions. The semiotic activity exists within the established academic network following the general rules of the disciplinary compartmentalization rooted in the academic establishment.  While its essential part is indicated in playing a creatively synthetic role across different disciplinary borderlines. If so, it cannot search for a  theoretical foundation  from any existing disciplinary authority. For example, semiotics can have neither a pragmatic nor a phenomenological foundation; neither can it bases itself on some philosophy of language, as Umbert Eco maintains. Semiotic theory goes beyond any philosophical frame that has been traditionally regarded as the foundation of the humanities.  The semiotic approach indicates several basic aspects in its typical operation such as: the sign-formative, semantic, syntactic, pragmatic and academic-institutional. All such aspects are about the knowledge of structure and function of sign systems of all kinds. Exactly in this sense the Chinese and the Western cultures or learning can be described and analyzed in terms of the same procedure. The divergent cultural manifestations can be commonly treated with respect to their formalist dimensions at first. And the formalist manifestations of different cultures share some common procedures to be analyzed according to the same scientific knowledge.  The special efficiency of semiotics exactly rests on this interdisciplinary tendency.

2. Human Sciences

   Different from natural and social sciences, human sciences or the humanities have a rich historical dimension despite their modern scientific-directed development. The disciplines of learning such as philosophy, history, literature and arts contain respectively their own different historical dimensions. Modern studies of the results of those traditional disciplines must be faced with both the historical and scientific dimensions. If the scientific dimensions of disciplines in different cultures tend to be similar in constitution their historical dimensions must be linked to or determined by  different historical experiences containing different intelligent and pragmatic tendencies in mental operation. Regarding the compositional comparison between Chinese and Western scientific cultures today there is no difference for natural sciences, less difference in social sciences, but much more difference in human sciences. A genealogical reason of the latter is due to  historical divergence of the both. A more essential reason is due to the complicit structure of the humanities as such which consists of the divergent planes such as the semantic, psychological, axiological, and pragmatic. All these planes, besides their related academic operations, are connected to the establishment of faith and attitude in human mind. Human wisdom for choosing faith and belief of various kinds is the most complicated as well as the most crucial. While the modern semiotic approach is eventually found to be more capable of dealing with these delicately challenging issues. With respect to the above triple academic compartmentalization the special tie between the semiotic and the humanities seems to be the most noteworthy. In other word, the semiotic seems to be more suitable to treat problems concerning those less physical-positivist domains characterized by the humanities in all civilizations.  

    It is natural that the present intellectual globalization with respect to the humanities should cover the non-Western ones. The historical dimension has its own existence regardless of its special cultural characters. For the sake of unifying the historical experiences of different civilizations there emerges a general task for mankind at present to firstly unify or make commensurable  different formulations of the humanities in different traditions. Therefore a modern practice called as the cross-cultural humanities becomes more and more relevant for human academic progress today. Therefore, besides being an “Esperanto” tool for interdisciplinary exchange of ideas in the West, semiotics is also the one for the cross-cultural “Esperanto” in the world.

   In light of the above, far from being a separate discipline, semiotics lives and operates within the entire academic world, especially in the entire context of the humanities of the world. Because, compared with natural and social sciences, the humanities suffer from various kinds of semantic ambiguity and inferential weakness for that semiotics is more capable of dealing with.

3. Traditional Chinese Humanities

   Therefore the study of the non-Western humanities should be also a relevant part of the Western humanities today through forming different comparative studies. The key point for this purpose lies in promoting methodological feasibility for the cross-cultural studies of the humanities at the theoretical level. It is semiotics that can provide us with several approaches to the comparative theoretical analysis in divergent traditions of the humanities. Please permit me to explain why the Chinese traditional humanities could be one of the most important “others” for the Western humanities in the present cross-cultural academic practice shared by the both. Briefly, the Chinese cultural tradition presents the following unique traits to the Western: 1) as the longest cultural continuum in the entire non-Western civilization world; 2) as a pure cultural stranger to the Western with respect to its substantial and formalist contents, in comparison to other intellectual “strangers” of the West such as the Middle-Eastern and the Indian, with that the Western have kept a lasting interaction in history; and 3) because a current understanding of the Chinese humanities within the modern scientific framework becomes necessary for the whole task  of the present-day human sciences in the world. It looks like that there have already existed the regular ways of the Chinese classics studies in the Western academia. But the latter is generally restricted by their descriptive- and philological- directed scholarship formed in its special historic-cultural context. What we crucially require today are the more relevant methodology effectively operating at the higher theoretical and systematic levels that can be fully communicable with the theoretical achievements of the Western humanities. Another important development is that the theoretical practice today is far from being limited in the traditional philosophical type. It is the semiotic that provides the multiple theoretical possibilities and is therefore especially related to the development of the comparative humanities as a whole.

   In contrast with natural and social sciences, the characteristic traits of the humanities are specially related to the issues such as meaning, value, belief and morality. For dealing with such highly important but easily misleading themes the modern western humanities essentially require the complimentary experience of its major “academic others” which nevertheless should be at first reformulated in a more communicable way. Based on a rational epistemological position the humanities can be equivalent to the human sciences in a modern sense. Therefore both the Western and Chinese traditions in the humanities are faced with respectively different modes of their modernization. The present Chinese human sciences have their two compositional dimensions: the historical one and the scientific one. The latter must be linked with all related scientific sources on the globe, connecting naturally with various western sciences. Since the modern period therefore the Chinese humanities will present themselves as equivalent to a type of the Chinese-Western comparative humanities; namely the present-day Chinese humanities also include various scientific elements from the West. This kind of modernized mode of the Chinese humanities will lead to the two consequences: The development along the general modern scientific direction and their effective impact on the development of the Western humanities. In brief, the Chinese humanities today and in future consist of the original Chinese and the derived western elements alike.

   Let’s point out a basic fact that the most part of Chinese population shares the same structure of knowledge with the Western people today, including both the scientific and technological aspects. For the quite limited part of Chinese scholars specialized in the humanities the Western knowledge even becomes the main part of their basic intellectual sources. The situation could be indicated that there are more Chinese scholars studying the Western humanities than those for the traditional Chinese one. Moreover, even for the most Chinese scholars specialized in the Chinese classics the western theory from different disciplines also becomes the important part of their learning and knowledge. In other word, a current Chinese scholar specialized in the traditional humanities must be the knower of the both Chinese and Western learning. In such a sense the Western humanities have already become the constitutional part of the present-day Chinese humanities.

4.  Chinese Semiotics

   The term “Chinese semiotics” implies the three references: the historical source, the geographic scope of its current academic activities, and the cultural category. As a description of the academic area Chinese semiotics is  part of both the Eastern Asian semiotics and the global semiotics. But we mostly use it as a cultural conception that contains both its historical trace and its modern multi-comparative practice. It is easy to perceive the significance of Chinese semiotics for Chinese humanities, but the point here lies in that Chinese semiotics is also closely related to the development of the international semiotics. In the coming-up Eighth  international congress of  IASS, the first one in this century, its general theme consisting of the double-word  is the “interculturality and globalization” which happen to be especially linked to the Chinese-Western comparative semiotics. The semiotic movement starting from the Sixties of last century has spread to the entire world today, naturally progressing beyond its original European-American soil. More importantly, the term interculturality means the semiotic studies have also stepped beyond their original European-American origin. Semiotics has already more and more become a cross-cultural academic practice since now on. That means the European-American semiotics will invite its cultural “other” for dialogue and cooperation. Among all semiotic “others” the Chinese one is certainly greatly noteworthy for the Western because of its typical historical and cultural alien status, from a Western point of view. The historical-cultural specialty of China is even a more relevant reason for the Western semiotics to choose Chinese semiotics as one of its main dialogic partners. No doubt, the participation of Chinese semiotics in the world semiotic activities will in turn widely and deeply influence the intellectual topography of the semiotic practice of the world. It is interesting to note that for the Western mind whether its Indian or Mid-Eastern Other looks intellectually more accessible than this Chinese “Other”. The fact becomes a reason why the Western semiotics should pay a more, rather than a less, serious attention to Chinese semiotics. Therefore we can even say a breakthrough in the semiotic movement in the new century will be first promoted by the Western-Chinese comparative semiotic studies effectively reorganized.

5. Chinese semiotics and International Semiotics

   IASS or the present world semiotics rooted in its European-American origin will obtain a new perspective after it pays attention to the potential of  Chinese semiotics. How to measure the potential of Chinese semiotics and its positive contribution to the growth of world semiotics will be a quite relevant topic to the latter now. The meaning of the development of Chinese semiotics is not limited in China or Asia; in a deep sense it is related to the entire semiotic world. A developed Chinese semiotics in future is not a mere geographic expansion of the activity of world semiotics; it is also an energetic factor to cause an essential readjustment of the scholarly structure of modern semiotics itself. Because the developed Chinese semiotics must be characterized by its stronger  interdisciplinarity  and interculturality. These two academically revolutionary tendencies could someday become a fresh impetus to the international semiotic practice, even stressing a new semiotic turn, namely a comparative turn, in the world. It is semiotics that is tended to break up the bounds of disciplines and gaps of cultures, leading to an all-round reorganization of the world humanities. If the humanities of mankind must be someday a common global practice, the same must be the case with semiotics too. So the interaction and cooperation between the Western and Chinese semiotics will function at the two levels: the semiotic practice in its tactic level and the expanded practice in connection with the entire humanities in its strategic level. In other word, the Chinese and Western semiotics will share the cooperative practice at the semiotic level as well as at the level of the world humanities. Chinese semiotics is far from being the mere application of Western theory into Chinese material; its scientific achievements will in turn expand and deepen the empirical foundation of the Western theory, including its semiotic part. Accordingly, the expanded experience of human history must influence the formation of theoretical practice of mankind that was first shaped in the West. Semiotics will provide the tool for the effective interaction between the non-Western intellectual history and the Western academic theory. The academic globalization will strengthen and speed the process.  Therefore  “Chinese semiotics” as a cultural category is not limited in the studies of the Chinese tradition; it must be related to the entire academic scope of the world. Because the scientific exploration of the Chinese tradition logically implies the application of the entire positive theoretical sources of the world to the Chinese historical material. Its methodology tends to be a global one in character regarding structure and function.

   According to this perspective, it is no doubt that the reorganized Chinese humanities is far from being the historical reservoir of their intellectual past. Human sciences should be scientific in character, while the scientific mode should be pluralized in future beyond its historical modalities. The scientific should be reasonable and intelligible in any case, in contrast with all kinds of  epistemological irrationality, including the so-called post-modernist trend. The semiotic first refers to a scientific operation rather than to a quasi-artistic one. It is not an artistic game but an intelligent inquiry. Therefore the constructive development of Chinese semiotics is related to  all epistemological and methodological debates in the present-day human sciences. In light of this strategic vision we consider the future of Chinese semiotics and its connection to social-human sciences. With respect to this intellectual challenge concerning the Chinese-Western semiotics, the related practical methodology must be basically readjusted too. Without being limited in any philological traditions the comparative semiotics requires a multiple methodological cooperation. Along this new direction, the Chinese and Western semioticians should find the more effective mode of cooperation in performing cross-cultural semiotics. The expanded area of the Chinese-western comparative semiotics means also the expansion of the international semiotics and progress of semiotic movement on the whole. Semiotics, far from being a set of fixed academic procedures, is the operative ground providing the multiple possibilities for scholarly creations.

   Therefore there could happen two important consequences following the Chinese-Western comparative semiotic practice. First, the Chinese side will keep learning from all useful Western theory. Second, the result of the Chinese-Western comparative semiotic practice will be an organic part of the development of the international semiotic movement on the globe. As a result, Chinese semiotics will make its independent and original contribution to the world semiotics in future.