Sinology and Chinese Scholarship: Toward the Integration of Knowledge

Zhang Longxi
City University of Hong Kong

For many decades, Sinology or Western China studies used to neglect native Chinese scholarship based on the assumption that theoretical models and methodologies are exclusively Western, generated from a uniquely Western philosophical tradition, while native Chinese scholarship could be ignored either as theoretically naive or irrelevant or as ideologically controlled propaganda. In an increasingly globalized world today, the changing situation has made such an assumption highly questionable. In this essay I shall present a critique of what I would call a kind of “social science arrogance” manifested in those Sinological works based on such a questionable assumption, and I shall argue for the integration of knowledge of Sinology and native Chinese scholarship in understanding China, its history, society, and cultural tradition.

汉学与中国学术：走向知识的整合

张隆溪
香港城市大学

多年以来，汉学或西方中国研究总倾向于忽略中国本土学术，认为所有理论模型和方 法论均来自西方，并源于一个西方所独有的哲学传统，而中国本土学术则因理论不成熟、不切题或宣传意识形态话语而可以被漠视。然而，在日益全球化的当今世 界，形势的不断变化强烈质疑了这种观点。基于这种颇成问题的观点而完成的汉学著述体现了一种“社会科学的自负”，本文对这种态度进行评论，并提出在理解中 国及其历史、社会和文化传统方面，应整合汉学的知识与中国本土学术。