François Jullien

François Jullien is a French philosopher, Hellenist and sinologist, born in 1951 in Embrun. A graduate of the École normale supérieure, he studied Chinese in Beijing and Shanghai from 1975 to 1977, later taught at Paris Diderot University and was president of the Collège international de philosophie from 1995 to 1998. His work uses Chinese thought as a vantage point from which to question the assumptions of European philosophy. Books available in English include The Propensity of Things, A Treatise on Efficacy, In Praise of Blandness, Vital Nourishment, The Philosophy of Living and There Is No Such Thing as Cultural Identity. He received the Hannah Arendt Prize in 2010 and the Académie française's Grand Prix de Philosophie in 2011.