Peking University, Nov. 7, 2014: Session1 of Panel session “Chinese Problematics and Paradigms for Chinese Studies” kicked off in meeting room No. 1, Yingjie Exchange Center, Peking University on November 7, 2014, afternoon. The session chaired by Professor Jin Yongbing and Professor Lee Cheuk Yin.
Professor Jin Yongbing made a brief introduction of all the professors and welcomed warmly the participants. Then Professor Chen Yuehong came to the opening remarks, he said, “Beijing Forum is held at the same time with the APEC meeting, although Beijing Forum has a relatively smaller scale that does not mean it is not important. The history and contemporary significance of Chinese studies have received considerable attention, Chinese studies field has made very useful contribution.”
After that, Professor Chen Yuehong made a comprehensive explanation of “Chinese Problematics and Paradigms for Chinese Studies” in his report.
First, he reviewed the history of Chinese studies development, given that we can see Chinese studies had been very unpopular. After the contemporary era, the foreign researches and Chinese researches concerning about Chinese studies are mixed, because a large number of Chinese scholars study abroad and many of them lived there to continue their research.
After 1920s, Chinese studies developed rapidly, the paradigms of Chinese studies gradually become one of the focus of research and hot news. But there are some different voice about Chinese studies popping out, such as Orientalism, post-colonialism, Western Marxism, which are defensive criticism about Chinese studies.
The two sides have been debating with each other. He said, “Actually, the classical paradigm of Chinese studies has no lack of theories and research methods but the breakthrough of modernizing them.
At present, we have not yet built the paradigms for Chinese studies receiving the widely recognition among the scholars at home and abroad, we still are obstructed by the conception of chasing after the western paradigms and the defensive criticism about Chinese studies.
Therefore, there are two main problems “lack of modernized theories” and “paradigms anxiety” blocking the way of the development of Chinese studies, so the foremost target we devote to achieve is to build the Chinese-style paradigm for Chinese studies .
The rest of speakers interpreted the “Chinese Problematics and Paradigms for Chinese Studies” in their unique perspective.
Professor Lee Cheuk Yin discussed the Chinese studies paradigms in the view of overseas scholar, his speech “From Sinology to China Studies: The Study of China in the Humanities” identified three definition “sinology”, “Chinese studies” and “China studies”, from that we can be aware of the development track of Chinese studies. Professor Lee said a vivid metaphor that seeing China in the view of foreign culture just likes seeing an apple to describe an orange. Finally, he suggested to build internationalized China studies, promoting the localized Chinese studies and foreign Chinese studies.
Professor Chen Xiaoming’s speech “The Impossible Troika: On the Origin and Construction of Contemporary Chinese Literary Criticism” illustrated the complexity of building Chinese paradigms in modern China through demonstrating the complexity of the studies of contemporary Chinese literary criticism.
Professor Sun Chao Fen gave us the speech titled “ Chinese Language Studies in the Age of Big Data”, he elaborated the default rule of structure “是……的”, then came out with that the Chinese teacher should not teach the beginner who do not have language sense the default rule.
The speech “Case Studies on Texts Collection by Taking Advantage of Unearthed Documents” given by Professor Hu Chirui and the speech “Uniting the Pleasure of Antiques: The Colored Letter Papers with the Stone Inscriptions as Their Background” given by Professor Cheng Zhangcan respectively displayed the concrete paradigms for Chinese studies, and also make all the participants feast on the charm of Chinese culture.
Reported by: Du Danping
Edited by: Choisum Kwok
