From the 14th to the 16th November, Professor Ian Gow OBE, Principal and CEO of SBC and Dr Lindsay Shen, Director of Research and Head of Events Management, attended the 2012 International Symposium on Sinology and Sino-Foreign Relations and Exchanges in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province.
The symposium was co-organised by Zhejiang University’s Institute of English Literature, the Institute of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies at Copenhagen University and the University of Edinburgh’s School of History, Classics and Archaeology.
Professor Gow was invited to act as moderator at a session on Missionary Schools and Colleges and speaker for the session on Education and Culture Exchange. His paper, “British and European Institutional Contributions on the Development of Chinese Higher Education 1850-1950” focused on British and European initiatives in China and evaluated their contribution to the development of university education in the country’s experience with modernity.
Dr Shen attended the conference’s ‘When China Meets the West’ session, delivering two papers on “Florence Ayscough and the North China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society” and “Finding Eliza in the Bibliotheca Zikawei”. This talk followed on from another paper that Dr Shen had given at the Hong Kong International Literature Festival in mid-October. Drawing from Dr Shen’s new book “Knowledge is Pleasure – Florence Ayscough in Shanghai”, this discussion widens the debate on the transmission of Chinese art and tastes to the west in contemporary scholarship in both the west and China.
The Sino-British College has set a new path, embarking on fresh initiatives to encourage the development of research amongst SBC staff, especially research on China-related topics in any field. Under these new initiatives, support is provided to faculty members and students to conduct and disseminate research through conference presentations, journal publications and e-resources. The talks given at this November’s Hangzhou event are, we hope, a sign of great things to come from the SBC.
