This subject is the first semester of four that forms an introduction to modern standard Chinese, commonly called Mandarin, the language with the largest number of native speakers in the world. It is the official language of Mainland China and Taiwan, and one of the official languages of Singapore. The course presupposes no prior background in the language. Course objectives are to master Mandarin pronunciation, including the recognition and writing of Pinyin romanization, basic reading and writing skills (around 150 characters in the traditional character set or the simplified set), and to develop the ability to participate in simple, practical conversations on everyday topics. The relationship between Chinese language and culture and the sociolinguistically appropriate use of language will be stressed throughout. Typical class format will include performance of memorized basic conversations, drills, questions and discussion, and various types of communicative exercises.
The collection “The Cultural Revolution in Images: Caricature-Posters from Guangzhou 1966-1977” showcases the two hundred and sixteen original posters from the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) Library. The posters are divided into two groups: Red Guards’ posters dated between 1966-1967; and images produced against the Gang of Four dated between 1976-1977. The aim of this digital collection is to make these valuable visual sources available to the academic community, and to allow scholars to employ them for research and teaching.
This collection of Qing Daoist texts will contribute to the study of history of Daoism in the Qing Dynasty. Daoist scholars rarely examine the history of Qing Daoism mainly due to the deficiency of primary sources. Some researchers even mistakenly conclude that the period from Qing to the Republic is the time of declination of Daoism. As it is known, although each of the major empire compiled the Daoist Canon, there is no such project from the Qing dynasty to the 20th century after the publication of Daoist Scriptures of the Great Ming (Da Ming Daozang Jing) under the reign of Ming Yingzong and the Scriptures in Supplement to the Daoist Canon of The Great Ming (Da Ming Xu Daozang Jing) in the 35th Wanli year of the late Ming.
