Global China Research Centre

Global China Research Centre

Global China Research Centre

The rapid expansion of China and its increasing appetite for internationalisation need to be understood through the perspective of cultural diversification and global interaction. Currently there are University of Exeter faculty members in several departments who are involved in China-related research. There are also growing numbers of faculties who are developing research connections with scholars working in China. The centre aims to establish UoE as a hub of scholarly exchange. It will, first stimulate new interdisciplinary research within the realm of humanities, arts, and social sciences; and second, channel the existing works of UoE scholars in these areas to the large Chinese-speaking audience.

The centre has paradigm-shifting potential. With the growing connection between the UK and China, more British universities have introduced Chinese studies programmes and research centres. However, almost all of them have taken the conventional approach of area studies. By proposing the concept of “Global China”, the centre will provide an innovative perspective of seeing China not only as a geographic region, but more importantly as a non-European epistemology. It will mobilise UoE’s academic strength and serve as an incubator for scholarly innovation, which transcends the conventional boundaries of area studies and stimulates the construction and reconstruction of knowledge in general.

Contact us

Centre Director

Dr Yue Zhuang

General enquiries

Email: Y.Zhuang@exeter.ac.uk

News and events

The Global China Research Centre organises a variety of seminars, talks, conferences, workshops, lectures and symposia. Our upcoming events are displayed below. Seminars will usually take place between 3 and 4pm, unless otherwise stated. Locations may vary.

Forthcoming seminars

There are no current events to display, but please come back soon for updates.

Past seminars

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13 March 202412:00

Global China Research Centre Graduate and Early-Career Research Seminar Series

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11 March 202416:15

Global China Research Centre Graduate and Early-Career Research Seminar Series

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26 February 202412:00

Global China Research Centre Graduate and Early-Career Research Seminar Series

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14 February 202411:00

Global China Research Centre Graduate and Early-Career Research Seminar Series

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31 January 202416:00

Global China Research Centre Graduate and Early-Career Research Seminar Series

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15 January 202416:15

Global China Research Centre Graduate and Early-Career Research Seminar Series

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13 December 202312:00

Global China Research Centre Graduate and Early-Career Research Seminar Series

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15 November 202315:00

Global China Research Centre Graduate and Early-Career Research Seminar Series

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15 November 202315:00

Global China Research Centre Graduate and Early-Career Research Seminar Series

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18 October 2023TBC

The Global China Research Centre's Graduate and ECR Seminar Series

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3 October 202311:45

Keynote lecture for the Global China Research Centre's Graduate and ECR Seminar Series 2023-24

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26 April 202314:00

Missionaries and Diplomats

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9 January 2023TBC

Keynote lecture for the Global China Research Centre's Graduate and ECR Seminar Series 2022-23

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7 December 202216:30

Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio

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17 February 202112:30

Learning from pictures? Illustrations of porcelain manufacture as ‘how to’ guides.

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26 - 27 June 201910:30

Lecture series and workshop on ‘Translating Chinese Poetry’

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30 January 201912:30

Dubious Distinctions: Why Europe, not China was Responsible for the Great Divergence?

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5 December 201815:00

Translation as a Lingua Franca. The East Asian Response to Global English

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5 December 201815:00

Global China Research Centre Seminar Series: Translation as a Lingua Franca, the East Asian Response to Global English

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21 November 201815:30

Chinese and European Perspectives on Architecture and Heritage

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29 June 201812:00

Translating Chinese Classics Tao Te Ching

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24 January 2018TBC

Historical Links between Indochinese Islam and China

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16 - 17 December 2017TBC

The First International Conference on Global Discourse and Chinese Experience

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13 July 201710:30

China's Belt and Road Initiative

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16 June 2017TBC

Postutopian Returns: The Peach Blossom Spring in Contemporary Chinese Landscape Aesthetics

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10 May 201716:00

Reviving the past, civilising the modern: cultural governance and hegemonic discourse in China

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8 March 2017TBC

How China Sees Global Governance

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11 June 2016TBC

“China in the Modern World: Paradigms and Methodologies”

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27 January 201615:00

Eating food in China, Greece, India: taste, the humours and the Cosmos

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15 - 18 May 2015TBC

Advanced International Workshop on the Senses in Sino-Western Cultural Exchanges in the Early Modern Period

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16 March 201515:00

Chinese Studies Seminar Series

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4 March 201516:00

Russian emigres in Shanghai

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25 February 201516:00

Sex in the cloister: cross-cultural perspective of late imperial Chinese anticlerical literature

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16 February 201516:00

From Constitutionalisation to Revolution: The Politics of "Fa-Tong" and the Disenchantment of Constitutionalism in China, 1912-1925

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14 January 201516:00

The Mid-Eighteenth-Century Novel: A Dream of Red Mansion in Comparison with Clarissa and Tom Jones

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25 November 201415:00

Workshop: Body, Medicine and Landscape: China and Europe, 17-19th centuries

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11 November 201415:00

Displacing the Western Powers in the Gulf: the Strategic Implications of China's Growing Role in the Arab/Persian Gulf Region

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Find out more

GCRC aims to first encourage interdisciplinary research about China. It also facilitates scholarly exchanges between University of Exeter and Chinese institutes in order to encourage joint research activities on other subjects within the border area of Humanities and Social Sciences.

Recognising the growing connection between UoE and Chinese institutes, we have established GCRC in order to serve as:

  • A hub for scholarly exchange
  • An umbrella organisation which accommodates scholars and postgraduates with research interests in and about China.
  • An incubator for creative interdisciplinary research published in both English and Chinese
  • A stage to inspire a paradigm-shifting new approach to Chinese Studies
  • An outpost to promote Exeter scholars in China and attract Chinese students to pursuit postgraduate studies

Our people

Management Board

Professor Adam Watt

Professor Adam Watt

Deputy Pro-Vice Chancellor

A.A.Watt@exeter.ac.uk Exeter

Dr Yue Zhuang

Dr Yue Zhuang

Senior Lecturer in Chinese and Art History and Visual Culture

01392724274 Y.Zhuang@exeter.ac.uk Exeter

Postgraduate and ECR Seminar Co-convenors

Jia Liu

Postgraduate Researcher

jl1375@exeter.ac.uk Exeter

Affiliated members

Postgraduate affiliated members
Zhangmei Tang PhD student in Politics
External members
Dr Bruce Currey  
Dr Catherine Owen Assistant professor in Xi’an International Studies University
Dr Junqing Wu Past & Present Fellow, Institute of Historical Research, University of London
International fellows
Dr Han Liu International Fellow
Professor Yongle Zhang Associate Professor of Legal History, Peking University

The Centre has partnerships with institutes and universities the world over.

The Centre for Studies in Politics and Law, Peking University

‌The vice director of the Centre for Studies in Politics and Law at Peking University, Prof Zhang Yongle was invited to the University of Exeter in 2014. He gave a talk in the Global China lecture series during his visit. Prof Zhang is an international affiliated fellow of the Global China Research Centre. Dr Zhiguang Yin has also been a fellow of the Centre for Studies in Politics and Law since 2015. Prof James Devenney, Dean of Exeter Law School, visited the centre and gave a talk in October 2015. The two centres are now discussing a summer school programme.

Consilium Research Institute, Chongqing University

Dr Zhiguang Yin is a fellow in the Consilium Research Institute.

Dujia Media network

Dujia Media is a growing Chinese new Media company. One of the students in Modern Languages Department, Chris Sargent, who is currently (2015-16) conducting a year abroad in China appears as a guest host in one of their programmes, sharing his observation of living in China as a foreigner. The Global China Research Centre is currently discussing further collaborative projects with Dujia Media.

National Institute of Strategic Communication, Peking University

Dr Zhiguang Yin gave a talk in the National Institute of Strategic Communication lecture series in 2015. NISC also hopes to host a series of collaborative conferences with Global China Research Centre.