Civilizations illuminating one another through dialogue

The second World Conference of Classics is being held in Athens, Greece, on Tuesday and Wednesday, under the theme "Dialogue between Ancient and Modern: Contemporary Inspirations from Classical Wisdom".

Since the inaugural conference convened in Beijing in 2024, the joint hosting of this event by China and Greece, together with the establishment of the Chinese School of Classical Studies at Athens, has created a new platform for the exchange and mutual civilizational learning between China, Greece and the broader international community alike.

A joint initiative titled "Illuminating Humanity's Path Forward with Classical Wisdom" is to be announced at the conference, alongside the launch of the "Global Scholar Residency and Exchange Program" of the Chinese School of Classical Studies.

Following the conference, participants will be invited to visit the Angelokastro archaeological site, the first joint Sino-Greek archaeological project, moving from discursive dialogue toward substantive collaboration in joint archaeology and youth exchange programs.

Classical studies is an epistemological and methodological key capable of moving civilizational exchange from surface-level dialogue to genuine mutual understanding.

But to achieve this depth of mutual learning, Chinese classical scholarship must go beyond the passive acceptance of existing academic frameworks and establish a comparative discourse that reflects China's own scholarly subjectivity.

Comparative research between ancient China and ancient Greece is precisely the arena in which such a discourse can be built, tested and refined.

The World Conference of Classics is reshaping the overall landscape of comparative and mutual learning research between ancient China and ancient Greece in the following respects.

First, testing comparative discourse through joint archaeology and substantive collaboration.

One of the most defining transformations of the Second World Conference of Classics has been the forging of a closer bond between academic discourse and fieldwork practice.

The Angelokastro Archaeological Project was officially launched in April, marking the first time Chinese scholars have taken a leading role in an archaeological project at the very heart of Western classical civilization.

The project focuses on the Aetolian region of Greece, which during the Hellenistic period served as a nexus of extensive cultural exchange across the Eurasian continent.

Archaeologists hope that excavation will bring to light early evidence of long-distance trade networks.

This collaborative venture signals a broader shift: the comparative study of civilizations is moving beyond textual analogy toward an evidence-based dialogue rooted in material remains.

It is hoped that joint archaeology will serve as a catalyst for building a comparative framework — one grounded in China's own scholarly traditions yet fully engaged with Greek and international academia — where discourse and fieldwork reinforce and validate each other.

Second, talent development in Sino-Greek comparative studies — equally versed in Confucius and Plato.

These words speak directly to the most tangible human foundations sustaining Sino-Greek comparative research.

Over more than two decades, classical education in China has established well-structured training programs at Peking University, Tsinghua University, Renmin University of China, Sun Yat-sen University and Chongqing University, among others.

A new generation of young and mid-career scholars, deeply grounded in Chinese classical literature and internationally minded, has risen rapidly, making substantial strides in their command of ancient Greek, Latin and other classical languages, as well as in the close reading of classical texts.

Third, building an equal and open comparative dialogue across civilizations.

Classical studies can serve as a powerful bridge in international cultural exchange, bringing together scholars from different countries to deepen mutual understanding through shared inquiry, built on respect for each other's heritage.

To truly achieve this, we must move beyond the long-standing practice of interpreting Chinese civilization solely through borrowed frameworks.

Building a comparative discourse that reflects China's own scholarly voice calls for the principle of "two-way interpretation" — treating the core concepts and modes of thought within Chinese civilization as an independent knowledge system, and thereby offering the global classical studies community a truly dialogic comparative framework.

This effort both enriches existing comparative paradigms and meaningfully advances the vision of civilizational dialogue.

In this sense, classical studies hold the key to deeper exchanges between civilizations precisely because it does not merely study their differences, but asks how civilizations can speak to one another across those differences — and illuminate each other through dialogue.

With this in mind, we call on the scholarly community to take a more proactive stance: systematically mapping China's existing body of Sino-Greek comparative scholarship from its own perspective; continuing to examine homegrown comparative concepts such as "the dao and the Logos" and "the Kingly Way (wangdao) and democracy"; and exploring diverse approaches — from broad comparisons of historical philosophy and civilizational patterns to close readings of key concepts and intellectual history.

The goal is to gradually build a comparative theoretical framework that is firmly rooted in China's own scholarly traditions yet capable of deep engagement with the international classical studies community — one that is continuously tested across different civilizational contexts and remains vital and generative over time.

To understand the civilizational character of contemporary China, one must truly grasp the unique fabric of historical China — and to grasp historical China, one must engage in dialogue with other classical civilizations, such as ancient Greece, in order to see more clearly what makes Chinese civilization uniquely its own.

As the Sino-Greek joint archaeological project and the youth exchange program advance steadily, and as the second World Conference of Classics opens in Athens, this is a moment of exceptional opportunity for the deeper development of comparative ancient civilizational studies.

Drawing on a century of Chinese scholarship in comparative ancient civilizations, and using that legacy to establish China's own voice in classical studies, this is both a timely intellectual mission and China's meaningful contribution to civilizational exchange across the world.

The author is an assistant researcher at the Institute of Literature at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences.

The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.

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