UIC Vice President (Academic Affairs), as well as internationally acclaimed scholar in Chinese Studies, Prof Chen Zhi, was invited to share his insights into Chinese linguistics, culture and classics at four lectures in the UK during April. His research was shared with the audience at the University of Edinburgh and the University of London.
Prof Chen Zhi is invited to give a lecture at the University of Edinburgh
Prof Chen Zhi’s first port of call was the Confucius Institute for Scotland at the University of Edinburgh on 18 April, where he spoke of “Chinese Bronze Inscriptions and Early Chinese Culture and Classics” at the Distinguished Lecture Series.
Prof Chen led the audience in reading the newly discovered bronze inscriptions of the late Shang and early Zhou dynasties and their significance for understanding early Chinese culture and classics. He demonstrated the importance of these excavated texts as sources that require close reading.
Prof Chen Zhi speaks of “Chinese Bronze Inscriptions and Early Chinese Culture and Classics”
Focusing on recently discovered 11th century BC bronze vessels, Prof Chen also re-interpret some of the texts of the transmitted Chinese Confucian classics, including the Book of Odes, the Book of Documents, and the Books of Etiquettes.
Prof Chen’s next stop was the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) at the University of London, as an invited speaker of the A. C. Graham Memorial Lecture series, lecturing “Hidden Binomes in Chinese Canonical Texts: Both Transmitted and Excavated” on 23 April.
Binomes are compounds of two characters that regularly appear together with distinctive meaning. Prof Chen introduced his article that was published in Jianbo Yanjiu (Journal of Bamboo Strip and Silk Writings), which examined the variegated uses of some binomes. He gave the example that exemplifying the initial exploration of how these binomes hidden behind the extent texts, both transmitted and excavated.
Prof Chen says the binomes can provide new understandings of passages from the received classics that had previously been misinterpreted
Prof Chen explained how the binomes are used within received classical texts, bronze inscriptions, as well as bamboo and silk manuscripts. He showed how the analysis of these binomes can help people to better understand the inscriptions uncovered on recently excavated manuscripts. Moreover, they can provide new understandings of passages from the received classics that had previously been misunderstood or misinterpreted.
Prof Chen Zhi then continued his research sharing at the SOAS on 24 and 25 April and talked about “Tetrasyllabic Poetry on Bronze Inscriptions and the Zhou Hymns”.
In this presentation Professor Chen Zhi examined formulaic expressions and set phrases that appeared both in the received version of the Shijing (Book of Songs), China’s earliest anthology of poetry, and excavated Western Zhou bronze inscriptions (1045-771 BC). Prof Chen demonstrated how the shaping of a specific poetic form in the bronze inscriptions can be dated to mid-Western Zhou, primarily to the reigns of kings Gong (ca. 917-900 BC) and Yi (ca. 899-873 BC). He explained that this implies that the early rhyme poems in the Shijing’s “Ya” and “Song” sections can be dated no earlier than this.
Prof Chen talks about "The Zhou Bronzes and the Shaping of Tetrasyllabic Poetry in China"
Prof Chen argued that the early development in form and style of tetrasyllabic meter and rhyme structure of texts grew out of songs recited by worshippers in sacrificial and ceremonial activities. He shed new light on the origin of the tetrasyllabic poem and traced its roots back to elite court music related to ritual activities. Prof Chen ultimately disagreed with the commonly held opinion that the tetrasyllabic poems, the earliest poetic genre in Chinese literary history, were improvised folk songs.
All the lectures were well received and garnered a lot of interest. Prof Chen was thanked for taking the time to share his knowledge.
Reporters: Samuel Burgess, Deen He
Editors: Marissa Furney, Étienne Fermie
(from MPRO)
