Homework Assignment #4

[Starting with this assignment, written form will count.  Please note below formal features to attend to in this assignment.]

Below are four passages from the Analects that appear consecutively in Book II.  All comment on filiality:  behaving as a good son (in early China, filiality, like so many things, was basically gendered, and almost never was used to speak of daughters).  The passages are simple enough, but they reward careful reading.  Your assignment last week employed some of the material in these passages in inviting you to compare the Confucian and Mohist approaches to filiality.  This week's task is to be comparative within the single tradition of Confucianism.

Briefly characterize what the most essential point of each passage seems to you to be, and state how you reasoned to the core message of each passage on the basis of its text.  Stay within each passage – that is, read closely and analyze how the individual passage works to convey an idea.  Don’t bring in external knowledge of Confucian doctrine to impose a meaning on the passage that it is not clearly expressing independently.  Be suspicious of any conclusions that suggest that some of the passages are just saying the same thing in different ways – assume that they have been arranged as a set in order to illustrate distinct ideas about their common subject (a normal expectation for literature of this type).

Your paper should be one page, double spaced.  It is due at the start of class, Wednesday, October 5.

2.5     Meng Yizi asked about filiality.  The Master said, “Never disobey.” 

          Fan Chi was driving the Master’s chariot, and the Master told him, “Meng Yizi asked me about filiality and I replied, ‘Never disobey.’”  Fan Chi said, “What did you mean?”  The Master said, “While they are alive, serve them according to li.  When they are dead, bury them according to li; sacrifice to them according to li.”

2.6     Meng Wubo asked about filiality.  The Master said, “Let your mother and father need be concerned only for your health.”

2.7     Ziyou asked about filiality.  The Master said, “What is meant by filiality today is nothing but being able to take care of your parents.  But even hounds and horses can require care.  Without respectful vigilance, what is the difference?”

2.8     Zixia asked about filiality.  The Master said, “It is the expression on the face that is difficult.  That the young should shoulder the hardest chores or that the eldest are served food and wine first at meals – whenever was this what filiality meant?”

FORM:

In reading your first three assignments, I have not corrected or graded for written style.  From this point on, I am going to begin specifying formal features I want you to pay attention to, and I'll mark errors on these. Multiple errors will lower your grade. 

 

1.  Non-English words must be underlined or italicized (dao, ren) [underscoring & italicizing indicate the same thing -- choose either one, but don't mix them].

        EXCEPTION:  Proper names, with capitals, are left unchanged (Tian, Mozi).

                EXCEPTION to the EXCEPTION:  Book titles do take italics or underscoring (Mencius, Mozi).

 

        -- If I see an error of this kind, I'll write "ital." in the margin of that line.

 

        (Note:  We also use italics or underlining to emphasize ordinary English words.)

 

2.  Punctuation with quote marks.  Use American rather than British form:

        The following marks always go inside quote marks:       ? / ! / . / ,        "What?"  "Yes!"

        The following marks always go outside quote marks:     ; / : / --            He said, "No"; she said, "Yes" -- what a mess!

 

        -- An error of this kind will be marked "punc."

 

3.  Agreement in tense and agreement in number.  

    Tense: Make sure that you do not switch arbitrarily between past and present tenses.  This is a very common error, and one that you should look for carefully when you proofread assignments.

 

        "When Confucius speaks about Tian, he was actually repeating what his mother told him." ("Speaks" and "was" shift
        from past to present tense)

    Number: Agreement in number includes two aspects: agreement between the form of the subject and the form of the verb (a plural subject takes a plural verb) and agreement between pronouns.  The second of these is complicated because the rules are in the process of change.  Agreement between subject and verb usually only becomes a problem when the subject is complex, denotes a group by means of a singular form, or is separated from the verb:

"The form and content of the Mozi is very unstructured."  (The verb should be are; the subject includes two items.) 
"The population were very happy to hear that Confucius had tripped the duke according to li." ("Population" is a singular noun.)
"Mozi's widow, like the cheering courtiers and the visiting dignitaries, were delighted to see Confucius's house burn."  (The verb should be was, because the subject is the widow.

-- An error of this kind will be marked "agr."

In later assignments, I'll list other issues to attend to.  One other consistent problem I've been seeing is imprecise word choice.  Please make an effort to use the right word for what you mean.  If you use a word whose meaning you're not quite sure of, look it up.  This problem has undermined key statements in several papers, which have, I'm pretty sure, not said what they were meant to say because of it.