Gian Duri Rominger

“Aurality and the Search for Sound and Meaning in Early Chinese Texts” explores how sound in language use—especially patterns like rhyme and wordplay—shaped meaning in ancient Chinese argumentative writings that stand at the beginning of Chinese philosophy, specifically in texts from the Warring States period to the Han dynasty (ca. third century BCE–first century CE). While these texts are studied primarily as philosophical treatises, this project shows that their literary form was just as important as their content. Challenging the idea that philosophy and literature are separate, this project show that early Chinese texts often blur these boundaries. It combines philological close readings that draw on recent historical reconstructions of Old Chinese phonology with a custom-built computational tool for detecting recurrent sound patterns across a large corpus of transmitted and excavated texts. Moreover, it argues that early Chinese thinkers used sound-based techniques not just for style or memorization, but to build arguments, coordinate textual units, and express complex ideas.