Objectives: Familiarise students with a tradition of philosophy they may have ignored so far. Use the chance to make them aware of their prejudices about “Philosophy” and to encourage them to rethink familiar categories such as “Philosophy of Language”, “Ethics”, “Religion”, etc.

Evaluation: Participation in class (questions, lively engagement): 20%. Weekly assignments (2 questions to be answered shortly at the beginning of each class): 25%. Written summary of an additional philosophical conference one has listened to during the semester: 5%. Two papers during the semester (topics to be agreed upon with me): 25% + 25%.

Week 1: 1.What do we mean by “South Asian Philosophy”? Where was it composed? In which languages? By which kind of people? Is there a shared kernel for it? Reading: “Introduction” in Perrett, Introduction to Indian Philosophy and “Introduction” in Ganeri, The Oxford Handbook of Indian Philosophy.
2. History of South Asian philosophy: six schools or many more? Reading: Wilhelm Halbfass, “Darśana, anvīkṣikī, philosophy” in his India and Europe.
Week 2: 3. Form of South Asian philosophy: Commentaries and reuse. Reading: “Introduction”, in Elisa Freschi, The Reuse of Texts in Indian Philosophy and Jonardon Ganeri, “Sanskrit Philosophical Commentary”, Journal of the Indian Council of Philosophical Research.
4. Form of South Asian philosophy: Dialectics and Argumentation style. Reading: B.K. Matilal, “Debate and Dialectic in Ancient India”, in Philosophical Essays. Professor Anantalal Thakur Felicitation Volume.
Week 3: 5. What is present and what is absent in South Asian philosophy, the case of ethics. Reading: B.K. Matilal, Epics and Ethics.
6. Selected topics in South Asian philosophy: Epistemology and the instruments of knowledge. Reading: Definition of instrument of knowledge from Māmameyodaya of Nārāyaṇa. An Elementary Treatise on the Mīmāṃsā.
Week 4: 7. Selected topics in South Asian philosophy: Epistemology, common experience and justification. Reading: John Taber, “What did Kumārila Bhaṭṭa mean by svataḥ prāmāṇya?”
Week 5: 8. Selected topics in South Asian philosophy: Epistemology of testimony. Reading: A. Chakrabarti, “Introduction” in B.K. Matilal and A. Chakrabarti, Knowing from words: Western and Indian philosophical analysis of understanding and testimony.
Week 6: 9. Selected topics in South Asian philosophy: Logic. Reading: Frits Staal, “Indian Logic” in The Macmillan Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Week 7: 10. Selected topics in South Asian philosophy: Philosophy of Language and the problem of the signifier. Reading: K. Kunjunni Raja, Indian Theories of Meaning.
11. Selected topics in South Asian philosophy: Philosophy of Language and the problem of the signified. Reading: E. Freschi and A. Keidan, “Understanding a philosophical text: a multi-disciplinary approach to the problem of “meaning” in Jayanta’s Nyayamañjarī, book 5″, in P. McAllister (ed.), Jayanta on Buddhist Nominalism.
Week 8: 12. Selected topics in South Asian philosophy: Philosophy of Language and aesthetics. Reading: Lawrence McCrea, The Teleology of Poetics in Medieval Kashmir.
Week 9: 13. Selected topics in South Asian philosophy: Philosophy of Religion and rational theology. George Chemparathy, An Indian rational theology: Introduction to Udayana’s Nyāyakusumañjali.
Week 10: 14. Selected topics in South Asian philosophy: Philosophy of Religion and atheism. Reading: Parimal Patil, Against a Hindu God.
Week 11: 15. Selected topics in South Asian Philosophy: Ontology and Metaphysics. Reading: Ch. Ram-Prasad, Divine Self, Human Self. The Philosophy of Being in Two Gītā Commentaries.
Week 12: 16. Selected topics in South Asian philosophy: Contemporary Indian Philosophy. Readings: Nalini Bhushan and Jay L. Garfield “Introduction”, in their Minds without Fear, Adluri Raghuramaraju, Modern Frames and Premodern Themes in Indian Philosophy.

Selected Bibliography for final essays:
Christopher Bartley, An Introduction to Indian Philosophy
Erich Frauwallner, The Philosophy of Buddhism
Jonardon Ganeri (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Indian Philosophy (selected articles only)
J.N. Mohanty, Classical Indian Philosophy: An Introductory Text
Roy Perrett, An Introduction to Indian Philosophy
John Taber, Kumārila on Perception