Join us for the launch of Daoist Phenomenology at the Keele Bookstore on May 15th from 4:30 pm to 6:30 pm
Special Speaker- Professor Jay Goulding
Daoist Phenomenology: A Vertical Reading by Jay Goulding
Click on the title to purchase the book
Jay Goulding's Daoist Phenomenology represents a lifelong project of interpolating the works of Martin Heidegger with the interweavings of Daoism and Zen.
Illustrating styles of reading complex texts from Europe and East Asia, Goulding moves away from horizontal reading of simple comparisons on a single plain to vertical reading as a deep dive of ideas into ancient worlds. Vertical Reading is hermeneutic strategy that captures the depth of connection between phenomenology and Daoism, especially Heidegger and classical Daoists Laozi and Zhuangzi.
His method reveals Daoist implications of Dogen's Zen and draws on writing and ideas from popular culture including Jules Verne, H. P. Lovecraft, Philip K. Dick, George Lucas' Star Wars universe and martial artist Bruce Lee. Original and wide-ranging, Goulding's interconnected approach to phenomenology and Daoism enhances and promotes further intercultural dialogues between two great traditions in world philosophies.
About the Author
Jay Goulding is an Associate Professor in the Department of Equity Studies, with expertise in classical and modern Chinese and Japanese philosophy, religion, and culture, as well as hermeneutic phenomenology. His scholarly work has appeared in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Sociological Analysis: A Journal of Comparative Religion, Political Theory, Catalyst, Anhui Normal University Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities, Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy, Journal of Chinese Philosophy, China Review International, and Beijing University's Gate of Philosophy.Dr. Goulding has been recognized by the Journal of Chinese Philosophy as a distinguished scholar in Chinese philosophy, comparative thought, and hermeneutics. In 2025, he authored a commemorative article reflecting on his decades-long personal and scholarly encounters with Cheng Chung-ying (1935–2024), a pioneer of Chinese and comparative philosophy. In 2022, Dr. Goulding contributed a monograph-length chapter introducing the concept of “Heidegger’s Daoist Phenomenology” for Daoist Resonances in Heidegger: Exploring a Forgotten Debt, edited by David Chai (London: Bloomsbury). His forthcoming book, Daoist Phenomenology: A Vertical Reading (London: Bloomsbury), the third volume in the Daoism and the Human Experience series, examines intersections among Heidegger, Friedrich Schelling, Dao, and Zen.
Dr. Goulding’s teaching includes courses such as “Popular Culture and Human Rights, East and West,” “Language, Linguistic Rights and Human Rights,” “Human Rights and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms,” and “Chinese Rights and Virtues in East Asia.”