THE UNIVERSITIES’ CHINA COMMITTEE IN LONDON ANNUAL REPORT 2023/2024
Registered Charity No 314133
THE
UNIVERSITIES’
CHINA COMMITTEE
IN
LONDON
ANNUAL REPORT 2023/24
List of Members……………………...…….............2-4 Report of the Executive Council…………………...5-6 Grants made in 2023/2024…………………............7-10 Financial Report……………………………............11 Accounts……………………………………............12-13 A selection of post-project reports…………............14-25
Swire House 59 Buckingham Gate London SW1E 6AJ Telephone 020 7963 9480
Email: info@universitiesccl.org.uk Website: www.universitiesccl.org.uk
THE UNIVERSITIES’ CHINA COMMITTEE IN LONDON
Representative of The Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs O’Neill, Ms G
Representative of Sino-British Fellowship Trust Ely, Mr Peter
Elected Members as at 1[st] October 2024
Altehenger, Dr J Hammond, Dr D Murphy, Professor R Ash, Professor R F Harrison, Professor H Pattinson, Dr D Barrett, Professor T H Hillenbrand, Dr M Pringle, Dr T Bickers, Professor R Hird, Dr D Standen, Professor N Boecking, Dr F Hook, Professor B G Starr, Mr D F Bramall, Professor C Huang, Dr X Sterckx, Professor R Brazelton, Dr M Hubbard, Professor R Sturrock, Mrs M Chau, Dr A Johnson, Dr T R Sunuodula, Dr M Collins, Mr C Kan, Mr S Y Taylor, Professor J Dauncey, Professor S Leow, Dr R Topgyal, Dr T Dian, Ms H Li, Dr R Tsang, Professor S Dryburgh, Professor M Lincoln, Dr T van de Ven, Professor H Ferlanti, Dr F Liu, Professor J Wang, Dr Y Fielder, Dr C Mitter, Professor R Wielander, Professor G Gentz, Professor J Moffett, Mr J Zhang, Dr Z Gentz, Professor N Moore, Dr A Zheng, Professor B Gerritsen, Professor A Morton, Professor K Zheng, Professor Y Goodburn, Dr C Munro, Dr N
Representing Great Britain China Centre
Borge MacLeod, Ms M
Nominated Members
by the Association of Commonwealth Universities Riordan CBE, Professor C
by The British Library
Chiesura, Ms S and Doumy, Ms M Harrison, Mrs E and Hsieh, Ms H-L
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EX OFFICIO MEMBERS
as at 1[st] October 2024
University Aberdeen Aston Bath Belfast Birmingham Bristol Brunel Cambridge City Durham East Anglia Edinburgh Essex Exeter Glasgow Heriot-Watt Hull Keele Kent at Canterbury Lancaster Leeds Leicester Liverpool London Loughborough Manchester Newcastle Nottingham Open Oxford Reading Regent’s University London Sheffield Southampton St Andrews Stirling Strathclyde Surrey Sussex Ulster Wales, Trinity Saint David Warwick Westminster York
Vice-Chancellor or Principal Professor S Bhattacharya Professor A Subic Professor I White Professor I Greer Professor Adam Tickell Professor E Welch Professor A Jones
Dr S Robinson
Professor K O’Brien Professor D Maguire Professor P Mathieson Professor M Fasli Professor L Roberts Professor Sir Anton Muscatelli Professor R Williams Professor D Petley Professor A Raghubansie Professor G Randsley de Moura Professor S Guy Professor H-S Yu Professor N Canagarajah Professor A Hollander Professor W Thomson Professor N Jennings Professor D Ivison Professor C Day Professor S West Professor T Blackman Professor I Tracey Dr C Baylon Professor G Smith Professor K Lamberts Professor M Smith Professor Dame Sally Mapstone
Professor Sir James McDonald Professor M Lu Professor S Roseneil Professor P Bartholomew Professor E Evans
Professor D Anand Professor C Jeffery
Representative Dr H Battu Mr M Dean
Mr G Brown Professor J Frampton
Professor H Zhao Professor R Sterckx Dr D Tawakkul Mr D F Starr Professor T Davies Professor N Gentz*
Ms R Jones Professor W Cushley Mr J Philippi
Dr A Manning
Ms T Li
Mr R Cotton Dr J Smith Finley Dr J Taylor Professor G Mohan Professor R Mitter
Dr Y Yu Dr M Dryburgh* Professor S Padmadas Dr F Huang Dr L Zhuang
Mr P Degg
Dr T Jansen Professor A Gerritsen Professor G Wielander Mr L Cook
- also an elected member
2 3
EXECUTIVE COUNCIL as at 1[st] October 2024
Professor Gerda Wielander November 2021 In the Chair (2022) Dr David Pattinson November 2021 Vice Chair/Convenor of
Experts’ Committee (2023)
Mr Charles Collins Hon Treasurer Professor Naomi Standen November 2021 Dr Derek Hird November 2022 Dr Xuelei Huang November 2022 Dr Tsering Topgyal November 2022 Dr Zhong Zhang November 2022 Professor Marjorie Dryburgh November 2023
Representatives to the Executive Council
Mr Peter Ely, Sino-British Fellowship Trust
Ms Merethe Borge MacLeod, Great Britain-China Educational Trust Ms Gemma O’Neill, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office
Experts’ Committee
Dr David Pattinson (Convenor) Dr Derek Hird Dr Zhong Zhang
Finance Committee
Professor Gerda Wielander (In the Chair) Mr Charles Collins (Hon Treasurer)
UCCL Representative on the GBCET Committee
Mr John Moffett
Executive Director
Ms Lindsay Jones Swire House, 59 Buckingham Gate, London SW1E 6AJ
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REPORT OF THE EXECUTIVE COUNCIL FOR 2023/24
It has been another busy year for the UCCL in which we have seen a steady rise in applications for our travel grants which have now returned to pre-pandemic level. Our PhD bursaries have also received a higher number of excellent applications, and we were pleased to have been able to award close to the annual maximum we set aside for this scheme. There continues to be uncertainty around accessibility to Chinese online databases which we support through a significant annual grant to The Library Group, and we are keenly awaiting a further update on this.
As part of the travel grant applications, we increasingly see applications from PhD students working on China (often Chinese nationals) whose supervisory team in the UK does not have any China related expertise, let alone Chinese language expertise. This is sometimes evident in the design of the projects and the associated fieldwork plans which may display a lack of awareness of the sensitivity or otherwise practical difficulties the student may encounter. We are sufficiently concerned about this development to now require one of the two references to be from an academic supervisor with a long-standing record and experience in conducting research in China and the Chinese language.
2025 will see UCCL’s centenary. I think it is fair to say that there is barely an academic in Chinese studies in the UK whose work hasn’t been impacted by the UCCL, be it through a travel grant in the early stages of their careers, by enjoying the UCCL funded key note speakers at the annual conference of the British Association for Chinese Studies, or by being able to direct their PhD students towards our travel grants to enable essential fieldwork. We are keen to hear members’ testimonials as we are approaching this landmark and thinking about how to most appropriately mark it. Look out for more communications on this!
I would also like to issue a reminder of our dedicated UCCL website www.universitiesccl.org.uk where all updated application forms can be found. They should always be downloaded from here rather than any previous websites kind enough to host us. We also draw attention to our updated requirements in relation to ethics clearance and risk assessments, as well as references (as mentioned earlier).
Enormous thanks, as always, to the members of the Executive Council who give so much of their time to support the work of the UCCL and without whom we
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couldn’t be able to function. Many thanks to Marjorie Dryburgh for taking over the stewardship of the PhD bursaries and to David Pattinson for chairing the experts’ committee this year. Charles Collins hit the ground running as our excellent new treasurer, reassuring us of our financial health and that our finances are in the most solid hands with him.
I also want to express our gratitude to the Sino-British Fellowship Trust for their continued support of the UCCL. Most enormously, however, I would like to thank Anne Ely for her incredible work as chairman of the SBFT for the last sixteen years and her unfailing support of the UCCL during this time. Her dedication to supporting academic exchanges between the UK and China has been unfailing and exemplary; she has made such a difference to so many people. We wish Anne all the very best for her much-deserved retirement and look forward to continuing our strong relationship with the SBFT under its new chairman Peter Ely.
October 2024
Gerda Wielander, Chair
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GRANTS MADE UNDER CHARTER PURPOSES
DURING 2023/24
Notes: Those starred were funded by the UCCL thanks to the generosity of the Sino-British Fellowship Trust.
Charter Purpose
| (i) Grants to enable the interchange of lecturers and academic visitors between the UK and China (ii) Hospitality to Chinese Students and Scholars in the UK (iii) Orientation for Chinese Studies in this country (iv) Teaching of Chinese Language and Literature in this country British Chinese Language Teaching Society*The UCCL provided support for the BCLTS Annual Conference. (v) Intellectual and Cultural Relations with China (a) Grants for Libraries and Museums The China Library Group (b) Publication Grants (c) Travel Grants Dr Thomas Burnham, University of Exeter ‘Ghostly Occurrences That Deserve Attention’: Comparing Soviet and Chinese Perspectives on Coups in Africa During the First Decade of Decolonisation. Man-Sing Cheung, University of Oxford* Economic Stabilization in China, 1945-1949. |
0 0 0 £5,000 |
|---|---|
| £5,000 £24,000 |
|
| £24,000 0 £1,948 £875 |
8 7
| *Timothy Cheung, University of Manchester | |
|---|---|
| A Living Remnant: the history of Hong Kong's Coin- | |
| supplying System. | £1,600 |
| *Luna Fu, University of Leeds | |
| “Men in the system”: Exploring Chinese Hegemonic | |
| Masculinities, Gender, and Bureaucracy. | £1,900 |
| *Professor Hong Han, University of Electronic Science | |
| and Technology of China | |
| Collection, research and digitization of Tibetan newspapers | |
| published in the Himalayan region in the first half of the 20th | |
| century. | £2,000 |
| *Xiaohuang He, King’s College London | |
| Focus group on transition stress in British and Chinese | |
| emerging adults. | £2,000 |
| *Dr Tingting Hu, Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University | |
| Understanding transmedia engagement of English-speaking | |
boys’ love (BL)/danmei (耽美) fandom. |
£2,000 |
| *Matthew Hurst, University of York | |
| Secret Activists and the Transfer of Hong Kong: How | |
| Informal Diplomats and Civil Society Shaped Hong Kong’s | |
| Decolonisation, 1979-97. | £2,000 |
| *Tersa Irigoyen-Lopez, University of Oxford | |
| Where Are Chinese Labourers润(run)ning? A Multi-sited | |
| Ethnography of Domestic and International Return Migration | |
| between Zhejiang Province and Europe. | £2,000 |
| *Xinyue Li, University of Manchester | |
| The transformation of meteorological knowledge in China, | |
| 1840 – 1937. | £1,886 |
| 9 *Ruoxi Liu, University of Cambridge Craft- Production and Creation in Transition: Self- |
|
| Realisation and Alternative-seeking in Post-socialist Rural | |
| China. | £1,666 |
| *Juncheng Lyu, King’s College London | |
| Investigating the implementation and effectiveness of the | |
| East-West partnership program in county-level poverty | |
| reduction in China. | £1,895 |
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| Dr Manuela Madeddu, University of Liverpool* Feng Shui in Hong Kong: authenticity and the value of Chinese geomancy in urban planning. Dr Mark McLeister, University of Edinburgh ‘Audio Bibles’ in Christian Worship Experience in China. Yuxi Pan, SOAS Picturing a Social Aesthetics in the Mongol World: Horses in the Art and Visual Culture of the Yuan Dynasty (c.1206- 1368). Ji Shi, King’s College London* Rural-urban Educational Social (In)justice: A case study of the intra-system educational migration, and its impact on rural-urban disparity in Guizhou Province in China. Yi Hang Shum, University of Oxford Vowels in Canton-Zhanmi: System and Diachronic Change. Tongming Wang, University of Southampton The impact of urban-rural migration on employment absorption patterns in rural tourism in China. Yuwei Wang, University of Birmingham NGO Accountability: Selected Chinese Case Studies Yashi Yuan, Institute of Education An exploration of young Chinese adults' understanding of modern Chinese history (1840-1949): National narratives, international influences and transnational epistemologies. Dr Mariana Zegianini, SOAS* The Lives of the Wanli Emperor Portraits: Embodied Memory and Living Power. Dr Chi Zhang, University of St Andrews Understanding Terrorism through Historical Artifacts. Mr Congwei Zheng, University of Glasgow Surrogacy research among gay men in China. |
£1,460 £475 £2,000 £2,000 £1,758 £2,000 £1,940 £2,000 £1,990 £2,000 £2,000 |
|---|---|
| £41,393 |
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(d) Miscellaneous
| British Association of Chinese Studies For the survey of Chinese Studies in the UK of HEIs Grants to the Great Britain-China Educational Trust For support in 2024 of Chinese students and scholars undertaking PhD courses in the UK. UCCL Completion Bursaries in Chinese Studies 2024 William Beswick, University of Oxford Intra-national Becoming: The Relational Construction of Ethnic and National Identity in Taiwan and Tibet. Lucy Fox, University of Nottingham Experiences of women working in STEM academia in the UK and China. Yingbai Fu, SOAS Dressing up the Manchu Way: Visual Representations of Women’s Hair and Dress in China and Beyond, 1850s- 1940s. Total of Grants made |
£1,400 £14,000.00 £2,500 £10,000 £5,000 £32,900 |
|---|---|
| £103,293 |
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FINANCIAL REPORT 2023/24
UCCL has investments with three fund managers: M&G, Blackrock and CCLA. The combined capital value of these three investments has increased during the last year by 6% or £94,774.
This is particularly favourable for UCCL as the investments which give an income do not cover our costs and during the year we had to realise £50,000 to make up the shortfall, more than recouped by the increase in value.
Our endowment (non-income bearing) funds with CCLA grew substantially (11%) because of their exposure to international markets.
Expenditure on charitable activities decreased slightly when compared with 2023, from £105,000 to £103,000. We increased 4[th] year bursary payments but there was a drop in the number of travel grants offered during the year. The overall picture comparing the two years is a stable and consistent level of activity for the charity. We are adapting to the changing climate of access to inperson study in China.
We continue to support the China online library database, our largest single expenditure, though the full effect of changes in levels of access is not yet known. It is noteworthy that our Bursary grant for the doctoral write-up 4[th] year is successful and will continue.
Administration and support costs have risen from £18,316 to £19,994. The charity is fortunate to be administered and managed by Lindsay Jones and Fiona Duong.
The Sino-British Fellowship Trust continued their generous support during 2024. We are very grateful for their support and continued interest in our charity.
This is my first year as honorary treasurer. It has been enlightening to learn about the work of this wonderful organisation, and to start to get to know all the excellent individuals who offer so much to UCCL. I look forward to continuing as your honorary treasurer into the future.
October 2024
Charles Collins Hon. Treasurer
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STATEMENT OF FINANCIAL ACTIVITIES FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30 JUNE 2024
| Incoming resources Incoming resources from generated funds Donation – Sino-British Fellowship Trust Investment income and deposit interest Total incoming resources Resources expended Charitable activities Grants made during the year under Charter headings (i) Interchange of lecturers (ii) Hospitality to Chinese students and scholars in the U.K. (iii) Orientation for Chinese studies in the U.K. (iv) Teaching of Chinese language and literature in this country (v) Intellectual and cultural relations with China (a) Library and museum grants (b) Publication grants (c) Travel grants (d) Miscellaneous Support Costs Secretarial and other administration costs Members’ travel Bank charges Audit fees Printing and stationary IT costs Telephone and internet Total Net income/(expenditure) Transfers between funds OTHER RECOGNISED GAINS/(LOSSES) Gains/(losses) on investments Net movement in funds RECONCILIATION OF FUNDS Total funds brought forward Total funds carried forward |
Income Fund £ 35,000 42,220 77,220 - - - 5,000 24,000 - 41,360 32,900 19,865 1,260 90 1,590 165 237 15 126,482 (49,262) 50,000 85,345 86,083 783,689 869,772 |
Endowment Fund £ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - (50,000) 59,399 9,399 879,905 889,304 |
2024 Total Funds £ 35,000 42,220 77,220 - - - 5,000 24,000 - 41,360 32,900 19,865 1,260 90 1,590 165 237 15 126,482 (49,262) - 144,744 95,482 1,663,594 1,759,076 |
2023 Total Funds £ 35,000 41,655 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 76,655 | ||||
| 4,285 - - 5,000 24,000 - 43,175 29,000 18,316 951 70 1,530 - - - |
||||
| 126,347 | ||||
| (49,692) - 37,391 |
||||
| (12,301) 1,675,895 |
||||
| 1,663,594 |
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BALANCE SHEET AS AT 30 JUNE 2024
| FIXED ASSETS Investments CURRENT ASSETS Debtors – Donations receivable Cash at hand and in bank Total current assets CURRENT LIABILITIES Creditors: amounts falling due within one year Net current assets/(liabilities) Net assets/(liabilities) THE FUNDS OF THE CHARITY Endowment Income Total charity funds |
2023 £ - 82,819 82,819 59,988 |
£ 1,736,245 22,831 1,759,076 889,304 869,772 1,759,076 |
2022 £ - 70,968 70,968 48,875 |
£ 1,641,501 22,093 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1,663,594 | ||||
| 879,905 783,689 |
||||
| 1,663,594 |
C Collins Trustee and Treasurer November 2024
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A SELECTION ON POST-PROJECT REPORTS
(Notes: The reports from individuals are reproduced verbatim.)
British Chinese Language Teaching Society (BCLTS)
UCCL Grant Value: £5,000 awarded in April 2023
Purpose of grant: To support attendance of UK based BCLTS members at Annual International Conference in July 2023. This was held at Edinburgh University from 29[th] June to 1[st] July.
Dates of project: 29[th] June – 1[st] July 2023
The funding from the UCCL was used for the purpose for which we applied, i.e, to subsidise the accommodation, food and travel costs of BCLTS full members (all local UK Chinese teachers) participating in the academic activities of the conference. This conference is the biggest annual academic event for BCLTS members and all British Mandarin Chinese teachers. It serves as a platform for BCLTS members to exchange ideas with national and international figures in the Chinese language teaching field. It has enabled many BCLTS members to develop from being hourly paid or part-time Chinese teachers into full time permanent teachers, scholars and academic leaders.
The 2023 BCLTS Annual Conference was a great success as our first large-scale in person international event since COVID-19. In collaboration with the Confucius Institute for Scotland, the conference invited 6 prestigious scholars to give 5 keynotes:
-
Professor Lijun WANG, Beijing Normal University
-
Professor Shijuan LIU, Indianna University of Pennsylvania
-
Professor George ZHANG, Richmond American University London
-
Associate Professor Thomas BAK, the University of Edinburgh
-
Retired Assistant Professor Yang LU, the University of Nottingham
and 1 special lecture:
- Emeritus Professor Boping YUAN, the University of Cambridge
The conference’s Call for Papers received 106 responses from 17 different countries and regions, including the UK, Ireland, China, Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, Japan, America, Australia, Canada, Croatia, Slovakia, Romania, South Africa, Sweden, Switzerland, and Uzbekistan. 140 individuals registered to attend, with 50 oral presentations, 12 poster presentations, 8 workshops and 1 exhibition talk. 74 BCLTS
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UK members in total (67%) attended the event either in person or online. 31 members in total (28%) contributed to the conference. The feedback of the conference was outstanding, with 49% ‘extremely satisfied’ and 52% ‘very satisfied’. 84% of the participants state that they would like to recommend the event to a friend or colleague.
In addition to the annual conference, BCLTS arranged a workshop at Southampton University on 21[st] – 23[rd] April to coincide with the European Association of Chinese Teaching conference. BCLTS members contributed to the EACT symposium with 15 in-person attendance (and more online attendance), 9 oral presentations and 10 chairing of sessions. There were an estimated 40 participants on site and 25 participants online (including non-members from other countries and regions) for the BCLTS teacher training workshop which concluded the EACT symposium on 22 April 2023.
The BCLTS is continuing to play a vital role in promoting the teaching of Chinese at UK universities through such national and international academic activities. The continued generous support of the UCCL is a very important resource for us in carrying out this work, and on behalf of BCLTS I should like to express our great gratitude for your continued support.
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Hannah BENNETT, SOAS
Hannah Bennett was awarded a 4th Year PhD Completion Bursary of £10,000 in January 2023.
My sincerest thanks to the UCCL for a bursary that was very much life changing. My PhD in anthropology explored caddies working at golf courses in China, to analyse political history, gendered labour, and vocational education. The PhD included several innovative theoretical contributions, including the concept of affective labour being actively trained. It also debunked the perceived incompatibility between feminization and professionalization, consequently coining the term ‘affective professionalism’. The PhD was examined by Professor Jieyu Liu and Professor John Osburg, who described the work as such: “The data and analysis illuminate recent transformations in the broader dynamics of gender, labour, education, and class in China offering the reader a new portrait of the migrant worker in China, who is increasingly male and likely to be the product of a vocational school.” With the support of the bursary, I was able to attend the Association for Asian Studies conference, where I was approached by an Editor interested in turning my work into a book. I am currently in talks regarding this and hope to publish the book in the next year and a half. I have given multiple invited guest lectures on my topic, and have consequently sparked an interest in studying China amongst many students. The bursary also enabled me to reduce my teaching load in the final year of my PhD and focus on job applications. I am happy to report, that I am now a Lecturer in Social Anthropology, and the Anthropology BA Programme Convenor at SOAS.
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Man-Sing CHEUNG, University of Oxford
Man-Sing Cheung was awarded a grant of £875 in June 2024. The topic of his research was “Economic Stabilization in China, 1945-1949.”
I am very grateful to UCCL for generously supporting this research trip. The visit to Guangzhou has tremendously assisted my project. During the visit, I visited Guangdong Provincial Archives and Sun-Yat Sen Library of Guangdong Province to collect archival material and consult rare manuscripts related to the Kuomintang government’s post-war economic stabilization efforts between 1945 and 1949. The materials collected ranged from central government directives, proposals and correspondence of regional and local governments, as well as papers of state-owned enterprises, particularly the Central Trust of China and the Kwangtung Industrial Corporation. The materials and data collected are very important in revealing the complex economic controls and rationing activities operated by state enterprises, a hitherto under-studied aspect of China’s post-war economic crisis. Papers which recorded the subtle power struggle between state enterprises and commercial guilds over the exercise of the central government’s emergency economic regulations, and reports of physical assaults on economic police also reveal the dynamics of the government policy in action, beyond the well-studied example of Shanghai in 1948.
I have also met with the research group led by Professor Xiao Zili (South China Normal University), specializing in the economic history of Guangdong during WWII, to discuss my project and ask for comments and advice on conducting archival work in China. Their feedback has been very helpful in navigating the bureaucratic maze of Chinese state archives, and in clarifying the concept of Fuyuan “ 復員 ”, that is demobilization, restoration and (re-)construction in post-war China.
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Dr Anton HARDER, LSE
Dr Harder was awarded a grant of £1,465 in February 2020. The title of his research was “Defining Independence in Cold War Asia: Sino-Indian relations 1949-62”.
In April 2021 I modified the original plan due to Covid. However, after finding a researcher to work in HK for me I then lost them as they decided they felt uncomfortable with the political atmosphere in the territory. The end result was that I focused on two archives in Taiwan: the National Archives and the Academica Sinica Archives. And hired a researcher to do that for me. This person also helped me locate some out-of-print books in Taiwan. There was rather more work for them in the end than initially thought because during their period of work the archives in Taiwan closed/reopened for Covid a number of times, and they found themselves doing more trips back and forth than expected. However, this has led to a very large amount of material being gathered from these archives.
This material has three main benefits: First, mainly I've gained a broader understanding of the international dimension of the Khampa/Tibetan rebellion(s) in the 1950s due to the monitoring of these events and also GMD communications with persons involved. This has expanded my sense of the way in which instability in Tibet created difficulties in Sino-Indian relations during my period of research [i.e. 1949-1962]. Second, this material has given me more detail about responses to the Air India Kashmir Princess disaster of 1955, particularly what Taibei thought of Beijing’s accusation that the GMD was involved. Finally, this material has given me more detail on various transnational actors in the Himalayan region in this period. I am writing up all this in a book now, with Oxford University Press having approved my proposal and in fact scheduled to receive two complete chapters at the end of this week.
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Matthew HURST, University of York
Matthew Hurst was awarded a grant of £2,000 in November 2023. The title of his research was “Secret Activists and the Transfer of Hong Kong: How Informal Diplomats and Civil Society Shaped Hong Kong’s Decolonisation, 1979-97”.
This UCCL grant was essential in supporting my fieldtrip to Hong Kong (HK). My PhD asks how HK people influenced the handover from Britain and Beijing. The seven HK archives I visited were the Legislative Council (LegCo) Archives, HK Heritage Project oral history collection, HK Baptist University Elsie Tu collection, Polytechnic University Library, Public Records Office, Chinese University of HK Hilton Cheongleen collection and HK University oral history collection; the last two were additional to my original plans.
Reviewing some 500 files, I drew the following significant conclusions (plus myriad incremental advances). Firstly, the colonial government possessed the infrastructure to survey public opinion and claimed to welcome HK opinion about the handover but chose not to use this due to political sensitivity. Secondly, contra perceptions of the Urban Council (UrbCo) and LegCo as ineffectual (e.g. Lo, ‘Last Stand of Colonialism?’), archives evidence correspondence and consultation with Westminster officials and the Governor. Thirdly, archives reflect the colonial government’s repression of HK activism, a topic that has only recently begun to be covered (e.g. Mok, Covert Colonialism ; Ng, Political Censorship in British HK ). This includes reports of social/political activists and protests, and copies of reports by the Standing Committee on Pressure Groups – a secret group established to subvert activists whose papers were believed destroyed.
I am grateful to UCCL for supporting this fruitful research trip. I have digitised several hundred archive items that will inform my PhD, which will be published open access via White Rose Research Online around January 2024.
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Anqi LI, University of Hong Kong
Anqi Li was awarded a grant of £2,000 in June 2023. Her research looked at "The Rise and Fall of Shanghai's West Bund".
This fruitful trip centred around my presentation on "The Rise and Fall of Shanghai's West Bund" at the 16th Annual Conference at the Center of Chinese Visual Arts, Birmingham City University, held on November 23 and 24, 2023. I had the privilege of connecting with esteemed scholars such as Dr. J. Jiang, Dr. J. Xiao, Dr. H. Bao, H. Shi, as well as fellow doctoral students and researchers including Dr. E. Emrich-Rougé and Dr. E. Larson. The reception for my paper was positive, leading to an invitation to submit a full paper for peer review and publication in the upcoming issue 11.2&3 of the Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art.
In addition, I stayed in London to engage in a series of meetings with key stakeholders and conduct field research. I had the privilege of meeting and interviewing journalist G. Adam and V. Chow, curator J. Chao, W. Bao, N. Yu, and E. Li, gallerist S. Liu, researcher Y. Zhang and S. Guo, artist A. Li, and arts administrator K. Huen. Additionally, I established connections with arts professionals from London-based organizations and museums, including M. Landolt and L. Nittve. I also visited institutions such as the Barbican Centre, Tate Britain, Tate Modern, the South Bank district and the Southbank Centre, Serpentine Gallery, Victoria and Albert Museum, Royal Academy of Arts, and Cromwell Place.
In summary, this UK trip has provided me with valuable connections and resources for my doctoral research on museum policies and enriched my understanding of the London arts scene. I am sincerely grateful to UCCL for your trust and unwavering support throughout this journey.
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Tobias ROSS, University of Nottingham
Tobias Ross was awarded a grant of £1,825 in June 2020. The title of his research was “State-business relationships in contemporary China: Insights into China’s recent ‘ Football Dream’ policy”.
Through the grant of UCCL I was able to travel to Beijing and Shanghai in April 2023 to conduct fieldwork for a tentative journal article and academic book chapter publication. During my fieldwork I have conducted 16 interviews with experts from the wider Chinese football industry, including club representatives, investors, sport governing bodies, former players, and journalists. The research can be situated in the academic fields of China’s political economy, sport, and business. The trip was particularly useful since my overarching research interest – Chinese football – has been undergoing substantial developments since my last visit to the country in 2019. After numerous online interviews for my PhD research and other academic publications during Covid-19, the in-person interviews substantially helped me gain a more nuanced and updated view of my general research interests. Furthermore, the grant allowed me to follow-up on previous (online) interviews and meet interview participants in their work environment, thereby further contributing to a better understanding of the current situation in Chinese football.
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Mengyuan TIAN, University of Cambridge
Mengyuan Tian was awarded a grant of £2,000 in November 2022.
During my fieldwork trip, I accomplished several key objectives. I meticulously reviewed primary sources, enhancing my understanding of the subject matter. Additionally, I refined my interview questions, ensuring they were well-structured for future interactions. I also organized and cataloged video recordings and participant observation notes, streamlining my research materials. My fieldwork spanned three provinces over several months. In March, I conducted the fourth round of fieldwork in Henan Province, followed by the initial round in Shaanxi Province in April, and the debut round in Zhejiang Province in May. I actively participated in the official Huangdi worship ceremonies, attended the international symposium on Huangdi culture, and engaged in various related events. I also ventured into the field to visit and interview self-organizing religious groups of Huangdi followers, religious personnel, and conducted research in Huangdi-related tourism attractions, including Huangdi Hometown, Juci Mountain, and Huangdi Theme Park.
Throughout my fieldwork, I conducted in-depth interviews with a diverse array of individuals, including government officials, scholars, entrepreneurs, temple managers, and media professionals. I also engaged with religious practitioners, local residents, and visitors. Importantly, I cultivated strong relationships with many of these informants, fostering trust and facilitating productive conversations.
In summary, my fieldwork was comprehensive and multi-faceted, covering a wide range of interviewees and research areas. It enabled me to gather valuable insights into the subject matter and establish enduring connections with key individuals. The support from UCCL significantly contributed to the success of this fieldwork, enhancing the depth and breadth of my research.
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Dr Mariana ZEGIANINI, SOAS
Dr Zegianini was awarded grant of £1,990 in February 2024. The title of her research was “The Lives of the Wanli Emperor Portraits: Embodied Memory and Living Power”.
I arrived in Beijing on 23 May 2024 and went directly to the National Museum of China, as I had a timed entry on that day to visit their exhibition on the portraiture of Li Wenzhong and his clan, one of the founding members of the Ming dynasty. I also saw two other exhibitions that were important to my research: an exhibition on fashion and dressing across China’s dynastic time and an exhibition about bronze mirrors. The next day, I had an appointment with Palace Museum curator Xu Wangling who had kindly extended an invitation to visit the Museum. She took me to see several exhibitions within the precincts of the Forbidden City. She also directed me to the Nanxun Hall, the space designated by the Qianlong emperor to store the imperial portraits created during the Song to the Ming dynasties. It was a very productive visit, and we ended the day by having dinner together. Further on, I also visited the National Art Museum of China where they had an exhibition of landscape painting by the Xin’an school. Other places of interest were the Yuanming yuan and the Ming tombs, where I spent time conducting research on the Dingling Mausoleum, the tomb of the Wanli emperor and his two empresses. I was also invited to the graduate show at the Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA), where I was invited to present my research by Prof. Wang Hao. I was also invited by a member of the Peking University to visit the University Library and the campus.
From Beijing I travelled to Taipei via Japan. There I met with the National Palace Museum Curator Dr Chiu Shih Hwa who had curated an exhibition about imperial portraiture and the Nanxun Hall a few years ago. We examined some paintings together in the reserve collections of the National Palace Museum, and she also invited me to attend the MA Art History student presentations at National Taiwan Normal University. In Taipei, I also scheduled a visit to the National Central Library where I examined some woodblock printed books stored in their Rare Books Department. My final visit was to the newly opened National History Museum where I saw many paintings, including portraiture by 20th century artists.
This research trip greatly contributed to my understanding of how portraiture is curated and researched in both mainland China and Taiwan. It also allowed me to gain knowledge on the topic of imperial portraiture and to discuss my ideas with museum curators and scholars from the region.
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Dr Chi ZHANG, University of St Andrews
Dr Zhang was awarded a grant of £2,000 in February 2024. Her research was titled “Understanding Terrorism through Historical Artifacts”.
During my fieldwork in Shanghai, I visited several key museums, including the Exhibition Hall of CPC Shanghai Underground Organization Struggle History, the Shanghai History Museum, and the Shanghai Museum of Public Security. These visits were integral to my research on how heroes are commemorated and how such commemoration contributes to the construction of the Chinese Communist Party's legitimacy. My research focuses on the ways historical narratives have shaped the conceptualization of resistance and martyrdom, legitimizing certain forms of resistance while de-legitimizing others.
This trip provided valuable insights into the concept of martyrdom, particularly in the context of the communist revolution. A notable example is Qiu Jin, whose heroic legacy has been appropriated by various ideologies to legitimize their causes across different historical periods, including the late Qing, Republican, and PRC eras. The grant from the UCCL greatly enhanced my understanding of these themes, offering a deeper perspective on the intersection of history, ideology, and legitimacy in China. I also utilized the UCCL grant to visit Qiu Jin's grave in Hangzhou. The reconstruction, preservation, destruction, and surrounding discourses of the grave offered valuable primary sources that enriched my understanding of martyrdom within the Chinese context.
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The China Library Group
Since 2013, at the request of the China Library Group (CLG), the UCCL has redirected its support for the purchase of Chinese books for academic research and teaching at a group of universities to support for a consortial subscription to essential Chinese language e-journal databases. These databases are provided by the Chinese digital giant CNKI and purchased through a Canadian company Eastview. The resources included in this subscription cover almost all significant PRC journal publications across the arts, humanities and political and social sciences (though not STEAM subjects, which have to be purchased separately). Members of the consortium (currently 20 institutions) can select which specific databases they wish to subscribe to and the number of consecutive users who can have access, according to their needs and financial resources. The grant for £24,000 p.a. in 2023 was, as before, shared out equally between the 20 members of the consortium.
The past 18 months saw great uncertainty surrounding the continued provision of these e-journal databases due to changes in PRC data laws and a government investigation into CNKI’s business practices. These issues have now been resolved, and I am very pleased to report that Eastview confirmed recently that it should be “business-as-usual” going forward. They have also confirmed that the consortium deal can be carried forward to the academic year Oct. 2024-Sept.2025.
The statistics provided by Eastview for the period Jan-Sept.2024 indicate that use of the databases may end up down slightly on the previous 2 years. However, with an average of around 160,000 article downloads per annum over the past few years, the databases continue to be the single most important source of information for researchers in the UK about China and the research being done there.
I would like to take this opportunity on behalf of all the members of the consortium to thank the UCCL once again for its most generous and timely support.
Member Institutions for 2024
| Bangor University | Lancaster University | Queen Mary University |
|---|---|---|
| Bristol University | Leeds University | Sheffield University |
| British Library | London School of Economics | SOAS |
| Cambridge University | Manchester University | University College London |
| Durham University | Newcastle University | Westminster University |
| Exeter University | Nottingham University | Warwick University |
| King's College London | Oxford University |
November 2024
John Moffett Convenor, China Library Group
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