Please find below details of The British Inter University China Centre Lectures at the Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institute 2007-2008.

All lectures take place at 7.30PM unless otherwise stated

For enquires please contact Regina.Llamas@bristol.ac.uk or Mark O'Sullivan (mark.osullivan@resourcesynergies.co.uk)

• October 11th 2007
  Wu Xin 'Gardens as Living Memory: The Eight Scenes of the Yuelu Academy'
  Ass. Curator of Contemporary Landscape Design Collection
  & Coordinator of Asia Programs Garden and Landscape Studies
  Dumbarton Oaks / Trustees for Harvard University
  
  Through out the thousand-year history of Yuelu Academy, landscape appreciation and neo-Confucian pedagogy intertwined in its scholarly life. The Eight Scenes of the Academy built in the 18th century both harked back to and differed from the ethical demands of the founders of the 12th century. These academy gardens embodied a collective culture in material forms, allowing masters and students to shuttle between a living and a textual memory of the neo-Confucian tradition.
  
  

• December 13th 2007
  Dr Susan Whitfield 'The Silk Road: History and Myth'
  Director, The International Dunhuang Project, The British Library“
  
  The Silk Road, a term only coined in the 19th century, is now ubiquitous both as a brand for luxury and exoticism and as an example of pre-modern global interactions in peoples, trade, culture, art, religion and politics. This lecture will introduce some of the explorers and archaeologists who uncovered the forgotten kingdoms of the Silk Road and look at its history and mythology, thereby questioning what we mean by the Silk Road and why we find it so appealing today.
  

• February 21st 2008
  Hilde De Weerdt 'Maps and Media: The Cultural History of Map Reading'
  University Lecturer in Chinese History, University of Oxford
  Fellow, Pembroke College
  
  Dr. De Weerdt discusses the first printed maps of the Chinese Empire dating to the twelfth century. Comparing early examples of maps in print to monumental imperial maps on stone steles and to the first printed European atlases, she demonstrates how the pedagogical interests of the first Chinese printers of maps inspired the articulation of specific ways in which map viewers were to navigate and understand maps.
  
  

• April 16th 2008
  Zheng Yongnian 'Will China become democratic?'
  Professor of Chinese Politics, Director of Research in the School of Contemporary Chinese Studies, University of Nottingham
  

  In this presentation, I argue that democratization is inevitable in China in the long run.  However, so far, for the Chinese leadership, democratization is only one of the many goals that it has to pursue.  China's transition at this stage is more about socio-economic development and state-building.  Democratization in China seems to be following the path that takes it first through economic reforms, then social reforms, and eventually political reforms. Rapid socio-economic transition is generating enormous pressure for political democratization on one hand, and creating a better socio-economic infrastructure for democracy in China.

  
  
• May 29th 2008
  Dr. Adam Yuet Chau 'Technologies of Exuberance in Chinese Popular Religion'
  Lecturer in the Social Anthropology of China, Department of Anthropology and Sociology School of Oriental and African Studies
  
  

  This richly illustrated presentation will compare and contrast the different uses of technologies in "religions of the Book" and Chinese popular religion. The importance of producing sensorially rich temple festivals as a key Chinese popular religious practice induces an incredibly fecund elaboration of what can be called "technologies of exuberance."

• 23rd October, 2008
  Michel Hockx, Professor, Modern Chinese Literature and Language, SOAS, University of London.
  Internet Literature in China
  The Internet is the most important medium for the production and distribution of literary texts in China today. It is not only a place where massive amounts of amateur writing and popular writing are brought to a wide audience, it is also the main site for creative expression by, and academic discussion about, authors belonging to the literary establishment and the avant-garde. Yet most western discourse about the Internet in China continues to be bogged down in eurocentric debates about censorship. This lecture hopes to provide both a general overview and a more sophisticated analysis of the state of internet culture in China, focusing on forms of innovative writing that make creative use of the Chinese language and that reinvent traditional genres for contemporary usage.
  
  
• 10th December, 2008
  Robin Porter, (2002 - 2005) Counselor for Science and Innovation at the British Embassy in Beijing. Visiting Professor at the Centre for East Asian Studies, University of Bristol.
  Science and Technology in China
  Following very substantial early achievement in science and technology, China in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries lagged behind the West in science.  To-day, however, it is pushing ahead in S and T on many fronts simultaneously. This talk will explore some of the reasons for this uneven pace of development, and will reflect on China's current policies to promote science and technology, and some of the issues which remain to be resolved.
  
  
• 22nd January, 2009
  Craig Clunas, Professor, History of Art, University of Oxford.
  Beyond the Ming vase: new light on the art of Great Brightness
  China in the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) has long been famous for the art it produced, and in particular for the porcelain it exported to all parts of the globe, objects which were perhaps the first truly global 'brand'. Improved accessibility to the collections held in China itself, as well as some spectacular archaeological discoveries, are changing our understanding of the art of this period. The lecture will introduce some of this new material, from gold table ware to miniature painting of imperial festivities, and talk about how our understanding of the dynasty of 'Great Brightness' has changed in recent years.
  
  
  
• 25th February , 2009
  Karl Gerth, University Lecturer, Modern Chinese History, University of Oxford.
  Is to Get Rich Glorious?: The Implications of Turning Contemporary China into a Consumer Society
  Why should we care that urban China now has gated communities with single-occupancy homes, gigantic shopping malls, private automobiles, meat-based diets served in fast-food outlets, international brand-name fashions, and an ever-expanding array of new leisure activities--like golfing, vacationing in exotic locations, and designer drugs? This talk examines how the re-introduction and spread of Western-style consumerism over the past few decades has dramatically altered everyday life in China.  It also suggests how Chinese consumerism is re-shaping the modern world.
  
  
• 27th March, 2009
  Jimin Zhao, University Lecturer, Geography, University of Oxford.
  Governance and China’s Environmental Crisis
  The emergence of China as an economic power has been accompanied by serious environmental problems at the local, regional and global levels such as water pollution, air pollution, and climate change.  China has made great efforts in institution building, policy and regulatory reform, and public investments to reduce pollution, but progress is still limited.  Why? This lecture examines the extent to which China’s current institutions and policies can successfully address the country’s major environmental and energy challenges and discusses how reforming environmental governance can promote a more sustainable development path.