Open Access Journal: Sino-Platonic Papers

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[First posted 8/30/10. Most recently updated 13 November 2012]

Sino-Platonic Papers

Sino-Platonic Papers is an occasional series edited by Victor H. Mair of the University of Pennsylvania's Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations. The purpose of the series is to make available to specialists and the interested public the results of research that, because of its unconventional or controversial nature, might otherwise go unpublished.

Since issue no. 171 (June 2006), Sino-Platonic Papers has been published electronically on the Web at no cost to readers, with older back issues also being released periodically for free in e-editions. Paper copies of issues nos. 1–170 will continue to be available for purchase until our stock runs out, at which point those issues too will be available for free on the Web.

What's Recent

August 2012

• brand-new SPP (no. 229): New Thoughts on an Old Controversy: Shina as a Toponym for China, by Joshua A. Fogel
• brand-new SPP (no. 228): The “Silk Roads” in Time and Space: Migrations, Motifs, and Materials, edited by Victor H. Mair

July 2012

• brand-new SPP (no. 226): To Inherit the Ancient Teachings of Confucius and Mencius and Establish Modern Confucianism, by ZHOU Youguang
• brand-new SPP (no. 227): The StÅ«pa of the Kushan Emperor Kanishka the Great, with Comments on the Azes Era and Kushan Chronology, by Hans Loeschner

June 2012

• brand-new SPP (no. 225): The Image of the Winged Celestial and Its Travels along the Silk Road, by Patricia Eichenbaum Karetzky
• brand-new SPP (no. 224): Developments in Chinese Language and Script During the Twentieth and Twenty-first Centuries, edited by Victor H. Mair
• brand-new SPP (no. 223): Water Management in Jingjue Kingdom: The Transfer of a Water Tank System from Gandhara to Xinjiang in the Third and Fourth centuries C.E., by Arnaud Bertrand

May 2012

• brand-new SPP (no. 222): Buddhism Across Boundaries: The Interplay of Indian, Chinese, and Central Asian Source Materials, edited by John R. McRae and Jan Nattier
• brand-new SPP (no. 221): The Dao De Jing Minus Ninety-six Percent: A Troubled Text Relieved of Its Politics and Bloat; and Another Look at the Indic Influence Puzzle, by Conal Boyce

April 2012

• brand-new SPP (no. 220): Ogimawkwe Mitigwaki and “Axlu yyr kut”: Native Tongues in Literatures of Cultural Transition, by Mark Bender
• brand-new SPP (no. 219): The Foundation of Myth: A Unified Theory on the Link Between Seasonal/Celestial Cycles, the Precession, Theology, and the Alphabet/Zodiac (Part One), by Brian R. Pellar
• brand-new SPP (no. 218): Magician’s Map, by Michael Turk

December 2011

• brand-new SPP (no. 216): Is Shuma the Chinese Analog of Soma/Haoma? A Study of Early Contacts between Indo-Iranians and Chinese, by ZHANG He
• rerelease of SPP 105: Postmodernist Theory in Recent Studies of Chinese Literature, by Anne Birrell
• rerelease of SPP 87: Canine Conundrums: Eurasian Dog Ancestor Myths in Historical and Ethnic Perspective, by Victor H. Mair

October 2011

• brand-new SPP (no. 215): An Investigation of Orthographic Variance in Shang Writing, by Matthew Anderson
• rerelease of SPP 125: Correspondences of Cultural Words between Old Chinese and Proto-Indo-European, by ZHOU Jixu
• rerelease of SPP 121: Dicing and Divination in Early China, by Mark Edward Lewis
• rerelease of SPP 117: Baihua, Guanhua, Fangyan and the May Fourth Reading of Rulin Waishi, by SHANG Wei
• rerelease of SPP 115: Correspondences of Basic Words Between Old Chinese and Proto-Indo-European, by ZHOU Jixu
• rerelease of SPP 114: Beyond the Question of the Monkey Imposter: Indian Influence on the Chinese Novel, The Journey to the West, by Ramnath Subbaraman
• rerelease of SPP 113: Etymology of the Word "Macrobiotic:s" and Its Use in Modern Chinese Scholarship, by Ray Collins

September 2011

• rerelease of SPP 85: Tokharian Buddhism in Kucha: Buddhism of Indo-European Centum Speakers in Chinese Turkestan before the 10th Century C.E., by Mariko Namba Walter

July 2011

• brand-new SPP (no. 209): Japan and Inner Asia: Some Connections, by Mark A. Riddle
• brand-new SPP (no. 210): Turkic "Balbal" in Japan, by Mark A. Riddle
• twenty-fifth anniversary issue (no. 208): Reviews XIII, edited by Victor H. Mair

January 2011

• brand-new SPP (no. 207): Barbaricum Depictum: Images of the Germani and Xiongnu in the Works of Tacitus and Sima Qian, by Randolph Ford
• rerelease of SPP 83: Tense/Aspect markers in Mandarin and Xiang dialects, and their contact, by Minglang Zhou
• rerelease of SPP 84: The New Old Mummies from Eastern Central Asia: Ancestors of the Tocharian Knights Depicted on the Buddhist Wallpaintings of Kucha and Turfan? Some Circumstantial Evidence, by Ulf Jäger
• rerelease of SPP 91: Phonosymbolism or Etymology: The Case of the Verb "Cop", by Victor H. Mair
• rerelease of SPP 96: Alexandrian Motifs in Chinese Texts, by E. Bruce Brooks
• rerelease of SPP 100: Zhuangzi, Mysticism, and the Rejection of Distinctions, by Wayne Alt
• rerelease of SPP 132: On the Presence of Non-Chinese at Anyang, by Kim Hayes
• rerelease of SPP 133: Scientific Evidence for Pre-Columbian Transoceanic Voyages, by John L. Sorenson and Carl L. Johannessen
• rerelease of SPP 134: Two Steps Toward Digraphia in China, by Xieyan Hincha
• rerelease of SPP 135: The Secret History of the Mongols and Western Literature, by John J. Emerson
• rerelease of SPP 136: Influences tokhariennes sur la mythologie chinoise, by Serge Papillon
• rerelease of SPP 137: Some Classical Malay Materials for the Study of the Chinese Novel Journey to the West, by Hoong Teik Toh
• rerelease of SPP 139: A Hypothesis on the Origin of the Yu State, by Taishan Yu
• rerelease of SPP 140: Shih and Zong: Social Organization in Bronze Age China, by Yinpo Tschang
• rerelease of SPP 141: Chaos in Heaven: On the Calendars of Preclassical China, by Yinpo Tschang
• rerelease of SPP 143: Sleep in Dream: Soporific Responses to Depression in Story of the Stone, by Victor H. Mair
• rerelease of SPP 169: Conversion Tables for the Three-Volume Edition of the Hanyu Da Cidian, by Victor H. Mair

December 2010

• rerelease of SPP 80: A Study of Saka History, by Taishan Yu
• rerelease of SPP 86: Siba: Bronze Age Culture of the Gansu Corridor, by Jidong Yang

September 2010

• brand-new SPP (no. 205): Nomad Culture, Greek Style: Steppes Jewellery and Adornment (1.6 MB PDF), by Heleanor B. Feltham
• brand-new SPP (no. 204): The Earliest Tocharians in China (650 KB PDF), by YU Taishan

October 2010

• brand-new SPP (no. 206): Lions, Silks and Silver: The Influence of Sasanian Persia (5.5 MB PDF), by Heleanor B. Feltham

July 2010

• brand-new SPP (no. 199): Other Laozi Parallels in the Hanfeizi: An Alternative Approach to the Textual History of the Laozi and Early Chinese Thought (1 MB PDF), by Tae Hyun KIM
• brand-new SPP (no. 203): How the Earth's Geology Determined Human History (3.1 MB PDF), by Donald F. Beaumont

May 2010

• brand-new SPP (no. 202): An "ABC" Exercise in Old Sinitic Lexical Statistics (800 KB PDF), by David McCraw
• brand-new SPP (no. 201): Notes on the Earliest Sanskrit Word Known in Chinese (420 KB PDF), by Hoong Teik TOH
• rerelease of SPP 76: The Evolution of the Symbolism of the Paradise of the Buddha of Infinite Life and Its Western Origins (2.9 MB PDF), by Patricia Eichenbaum Karetzky
• rerelease of SPP 79: A Southeast Asian Voice in the Daodejing? (400 KB PDF), by Dennis Grafflin
• rerelease of SPP 101: The Viêt Peoples and the Origins of Nom (5.12 MB PDF), by C. Michele Thompson

April 2010

• brand-new SPP (no. 200): Arthur Schopenhauer and China: A Sino-Platonic Love Affair (8.3 MB PDF), by Urs App
• rerelease of SPP 21: Two Cross-Cultural Studies on Reading Theory (1.6 MB PDF), by Philippa Jane Benson
• rerelease of SPP 44: The Three Thousand Year Old Charchan Man Preserved at Zaghunluq (2 MB PDF), by Dolkun Kamberi
• rerelease of SPP 54: Introduction, Grammar, and Sample Sentences for Jegün Yogur (1.6 MB PDF), by Ãœjiyediin Chuluu (Chaolu Wu)
• rerelease of SPP 62: Reflections on the "Unity" of Spoken and Written Chinese and Academic Learning in China (550 KB PDF), by William C. Hannas
• rerelease of SPP 73: Blue Cloth and Pearl Deer; Yogur Folklore (4.6 MB PDF), by ZHANG Juan, Kevin Stuart, et al.
• rerelease of SPP 92: The Presbyterian Church in Taiwan and the Advocacy of Local Autonomy (8.6 PDF), by Christine Louise Lin

March 2010

• rerelease of SPP 68: New Research on the Origin of Cowries Used in Ancient China (1.2 MB PDF), by Ke Peng and Yanshi Zhu
• rerelease of SPP 72: The Life and Mentorship of Confucius (4.1 MB PDF), by E. Bruce Brooks
• rerelease of SPP 116: On the Problem of Chinese Lettered Words (700 KB PDF), by LIU Yongquan
• rerelease of SPP 126: A Southern Min Word in the Tsu-t'ang chi (700 KB PDF), by Tim Miller
• rerelease of SPP 138: Dogs and Cats: Lessons from Learning Chinese (1.2 MB PDF), by Julie Lee Wei
• rerelease of SPP 153: The Mysterious Origins of the Word "Marihuana" (1.3 MB PDF), by Alan Piper
• rerelease of SPP 166: Reviews XII (3.6 MB PDF), by Julie Lee Wei, Hodong Kim, David Selvia, and the Editor

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