Messages from the Current board (2012-14)

President: Tongdong Bai, Fudan University

1. Continue with the transformation of ACPA. ACPA was founded mainly as an association of philosophers who are ethnically Chinese and are doing philosophy in North America. Working with two other ACPA board members, I have been helping to transform it to an association that promotes Chinese philosophy and comparative philosophy in America. The works include: establishing an emailing list, organizing panels at APA, etc. In particular, we have been working with other Chinese philosophy organizations (such as ISCWP), and have organized a stealth-mini-conference on political realism (Han Fei Zi, Machiavelli, and Hobbes) (APA Pacific 2010) that will encourage comparative engagements. I will work with other elected board members to continue with these works. 2. Continue with our coordination with other Chinese philosophy groups.
3. Explore the opportunity to start an annual international conference of Chinese philosophy.
4. Establish closer connections with philosophers and philosophy institutions in the Chinese-speaking world by organizing conferences, establishing visiting programs, and promoting book projects and other publication venues.

Vice President: Huaiyu Wang, Georgia College & State University

I will keep up my service for the community of philosophers working in the area of Chinese philosophy. As I fulfill various duties of ACPA such as organizing APA panels and maintaining the well development of the organization, the primary orientation of my service is to facilitate the communication among scholars and students working in the field of Chinese philosophy and to promote the status of Chinese philosophy in contemporary philosophical research.

Secretary/Treasurer: Steven Geisz, University of Tampa

I work in Chinese philosophy, philosophy of mind, and political philosophy, and my current research focuses on the philosophical psychology of early Confucianism and of various stages of Daoism.  If elected to the ACPA board as Secretary/Treasurer, I will support and continue the work JeeLoo, Tongdong, and Huaiyu (and Weimin before them) have been doing to promote the engagement with Chinese philosophy by the broader philosophical community, both in North America and internationally.  ACPA group sessions at APA meetings have provided opportunities both for scholars doing careful studies of the history of Chinese philosophy and for scholars doing comparative research that is driven more obviously by concerns of contemporary philosophers in other subfields.  I personally value both of those kinds of scholarship and hope that ACPA can continue to provide such forums.  The "stealth mini-conference" that the current ACPA board members organized at Pacific APA 2010 was a great idea, and I would love the opportunity to help ACPA continue to sponsor such mini-conferences (be they stealth or out in the open) and to find other new ways to bring Chinese philosophy into conversation with work being done in contemporary philosophy (including current work in the history of non-Chinese philosophy).  I hope that ACPA and the other Asian-philosophy-focused groups that sponsor sessions at APA meetings can work together to find ways to avoid having all of our sessions be scheduled at the same, late-night times, without reducing the overall number of spaces on the program that are dedicated to Chinese and/or comparative philosophy.