Dr. Grégoire Espesset
Internationales Kolleg für Geisteswissenschaftliche Forschung "Schicksal, Freiheit und Prognose. Bewältigungsstrategien in Ostasien und Europa"
Home Institution: Centre de recherche sur les civilisations de lAsie orientale, Paris (France)
IKGF Visiting Fellow November 2012 - October 2013
IKGF Research Project
Pattern Precognition in Three “Spring and Autumn” Weft Texts
Curriculum vitae
Grégoire Espesset has a PhD from the University of Paris 7/Diderot (2002) and studies Chinese ideologies and religions of the early imperial era (Later Han to early Tang). The originality of his approach to traditions, their texts, and the ways in which they interact with society, is the priority he gives over the official canons to sources that are often avoided due to their unofficial or fragmentary nature and peculiar language, such as the Great Peace Scripture (Taiping jing), which he was the first to define as a scriptural corpus rather than a text, and the fragmentary Weft (wei) materials, the so-called “Confucian apocrypha”. His publications bridge the ideological gap between the Weft hermeneutics of Han times, the quasi-millennial expectations of Great Peace, and some of the beliefs and practices of late Han religious mass movements and subsequent Taoist communities. His work on the Great Peace corpus and Dunhuang manuscripts provided the main material for his teaching at the École Pratique des Hautes Études (EPHE), Section des Sciences Religieuses, Paris, while chair of “History of Taoism and Chinese Religions” (2008-2010). In Taiwan, Japan and France, he has participated in half a dozen international projects, including “Rituals, Pantheons and Techniques: A History of Chinese Religion Before the Tang”, directed by John Lagerwey (EPHE, Paris), and “the Daozang Jiyao Project”, directed by the late Monica Esposito (Kyoto University, Japan).
Education
| Institution and Location | Degree | Year(s) | Feld of Study |
|---|---|---|---|
| Université de Provence, France | Maîtrise (M.A.) | 1994 | Chinese Studies |
| Université de Provence, France | D.E.A. (pre - PhD) | 1996 | Comparative History |
| Université Paris-7/Diderot, France | Doctorat (PhD) | 2002 | Far-Eastern Studies |
Positions and Honours
Employment/Experience
| 2003 | Analyst of Sources, UMR 8582, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Paris, France |
| 2003 - 2005 | Postdoctoral Fellow, Institute of History and Philology (IHP), Academia Sinica, Taiwan |
| 2006 - 2008 | Visiting Scholar, Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, Japan |
| 2008 - 2010 | Substitute Lecturer and Researcher, Chair on History of Taoism and Chinese Religions, École Pratique des Hautes Études (EPHE), Paris, France |
| 2011 - 2012 | Visiting Scholar, IHP, Academia Sinica, Taiwan |
Honors, Awards and Scholarships
| 2001 | Research Grant for Foreign Scholars in Chinese Studies, Center for Chinese Studies (Taiwan) |
| 2001 - 2002 | PhD Dissertation Fellowship, Chiang Ching-Kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange (Taiwan) |
| 2003 - 2005 | Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellowship, Academia Sinica (Taiwan) |
| 2006 - 2008 | Postdoctoral Fellowship for Foreign Researchers, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (Japan) |
| 2011 | Research Grant for Foreign Scholars in Chinese Studies, Center for Chinese Studies (Taiwan) |
| 2011 - 2012 | Taiwan Fellowship Program, Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Taiwan) |
Other Scientific Activities
| 2003 - 2005 | Participant in the international project “Religion and Healing” under the directorship of Lin Fu-shih, IHP, Taiwan |
| 2006 - 2008 | Participant in the international project “The Relationship Between Confucianism, Daoism and Buddhism in Medieval China” under the directorship of Mugitani Kunio, Kyoto University, Japan |
| 2006 - 2009 | Participant in the international project “Rituals, Pantheons and Techniques: A History of Chinese Religion Before the Tang” under the directorship of John Lagerwey, EPHE, Paris |
| Since 2010 | Participant in the international project “The Daozang Jiyao Project” under the directorship of Monica Esposito, Kyoto University, Japan |
| Since 2010 | Participant in the international project “Individuals, Human Groups and Society in Early Mediaeval China” under the directorship of François Martin, EPHE, Paris |
Selected Publications
Books and Editions
- Grand Dictionnaire Ricci de la Langue Chinoise (with other authors), edited by the Ricci Institute (Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 2001)
- The Encyclopedia of Taoism (with other authors), edited by Fabrizio Pregadio (London and New York: Routledge, 2008)
Articles
- “The Date, Authorship and Literary Structure of the Great Peace Scripture Digest”, Journal of the American Oriental Society 133/2 (2013): 321351.
- “À vau-l’eau, à rebours ou l’ambivalence de la logique triadique dans l’idéologie du Taiping jing”, Cahiers d’Extrême-Asie 14 (2004): 61-95.
- “Revelation Between Orality and Writing in Early Imperial China: The Epistemology of the Taiping jing”, Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities (Östasiatiska Museet) 74 (2002; published 2004): 66-100.
- “Criminalized Abnormality, Moral Etiology, and Redemptive Suffering in the Secondary Strata of the Taiping jing”, Asia Major (3rd series) 15/2 (2002; published 2005): 1-50.
- “Le manuscrit Stein 4226 Taiping bu juan di er dans l’histoire du taoïsme médiéval”, in Jean-Pierre Drège with Olivier Venture (eds.), Études de Dunhuang et Turfan (Geneva: Droz, 2007), 189-256.
- “Editing and Translating the Taiping jing and the Great Peace Textual Corpus”, Journal of Chinese Studies (Hong Kong) 48 (2008): 469-486.
- “Latter Han religious mass movements and the early Daoist church”, in John Lagerwey and Marc Kalinowski (eds.), Early Chinese Religion, Part One: Shang through Han(1250 BC-220 AD) (Leiden: Brill, 2009), 1061-1102.
- “Les Directives secrètes du Saint Seigneur du Livre de la Grande paix et la préservation de l’unité”, T’oung Pao 95/1-3 (2010): 1-50.