François Jullien is a Professor at Paris Diderot University and director of the Institute of Contemporary Thought and the Marcel Granet Center. He is also a senior member of the Institut Universitaire de France. Jullien was President of the French Association for Chinese Studies (from 1988 to 1990), director of the East Asian Department of the University of Paris VII (1990–2000) and is former President of the Assembly of Collège international de philosophie (1995–1998). He is the author of Detour and Access: Strategies of Meaning in China and Greece, The Propensity of Things: Toward a History of Efficacy in China, and In Praise of Blandness: Proceeding from Chinese Thought and Aesthetics all published by Zone Books.