Barbarism and Civilization

Abstract

Abstract The opposition of civilization versus barbarism has long been considered one of the most potent discursive frames of international orders in world history. The ideas of barbarism and civilization carry long and complex historical memories of shifting antithesis, symbiotic existence, and dialectic relationship in intercultural encounters, exchanges, and conflicts. Through explorations of moments of their articulation and invention in a kaleidoscope of slices of Western and Chinese history, this chapter seeks to provide an analysis of the conceptual co-evolution of barbarism and civilization in contrasting cultures and intellectual traditions with a certain level of historical granularity, to unpack the fluid webs of contested intersubjective meanings of these two ideas in historical complexity, and to tease out the historicity of these two concepts. In so doing, this chapter sketches the intricate historical construction of the opposition of barbarism versus civilization as a discursive framework for international ordering and highlights the contentious nature of such a construction in shaping contemporary international practices.