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On the universality of “rights”: Absence and presence of “rights” in the Chinese language

  • Deborah Cao

    Deborah Cao is a Professor at Griffith University, Australia. She is a linguist and a legal scholar. She has published in many areas including legal language, legal translation, legal semiotics, pragmatics, animal law, and philosophical and linguistic analysis of Chinese law and legal culture. She is Editor of the International Journal for the Semiotics of Law.

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Abstract

This paper wishes to challenge the proposition that the word “rights” is a universal and innate concept in human societies. It provides an analysis of the absence and presence of the word “rights” in the Chinese language and culture in traditional and contemporary China. It presents a linguistic and cultural explanation for the fact that classical Chinese language and culture did not have an equivalent word or concept for the English word “rights.” After the word and concept of “rights” were introduced to China from the West in the second half of the nineteenth century, the new word quanli (rights) has since taken on Chinese shades of meaning, not entirely the same as its English counterpart. The paper proposes that the claim of the universal and innate nature of the word “rights” is not tenable.

About the author

Deborah Cao

Deborah Cao is a Professor at Griffith University, Australia. She is a linguist and a legal scholar. She has published in many areas including legal language, legal translation, legal semiotics, pragmatics, animal law, and philosophical and linguistic analysis of Chinese law and legal culture. She is Editor of the International Journal for the Semiotics of Law.

Acknowledgements

The author wishes to acknowledge Prof. Anna Wierzbicka for her comments, and Prof. Ray Jackendoff and her colleague Prof. Michael Haugh for their input.

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Published Online: 2017-6-3
Published in Print: 2017-6-27

© 2017 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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