About Us
Old Poems Repurposed: Loanwords and the History of Early Chinese Material Culture
School of Chinese Seminar
Old Poems Repurposed: Loanwords and the History of Early Chinese Material Culture
Speaker: Prof. Wolfgang Behr
(Professor, University of Zurich)
Date: 28 August 2026 (Friday)
Time: 16:30-18:00 (HKT, GMT+8)
Venue: CRT-7.30, 7/F , Run Run Shaw Tower, Centennial Campus, HKU
Language: English
Format: In Person
Registration 報名連結:
https://hku.au1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_85DZHYtHxFvN9z0
Abstract 摘要
This talk revisits Berthold Laufer's pioneering Sino-Iranica (1919) in light of a century of advances in historical linguistics, archaeology, and the study of early Chinese and Central Asian cultures. Focusing on recent evidence on early Transeurasian migratory terms, it will argue that ancient loanwords remain an underused source for reconstructing cultural contact, since it often usefully complicates or complements both historical narratives and the archaeological record.
Bio 簡介
Prof. Wolfgang Behr is the Traditional China Chair at the University of Zurich, Director of its Institute of Asian and Oriental Studies and President of the European Association for Chinese Studies (EACS).
His research mainly focuses on old Chinese Phonology, Morphology, Etymology & Paleography and History of Chinese Philology; Epistemological Foundations of Historical Linguistics in China, Conceptual and Cultural History, Philosophy of Language beyond Standard Average European.
He also held visiting professorships in Hong Kong in 2014 at The Chinese University of Hong Kong and in 2017 at The Jao Tsung-i Academy and was Senior Visiting Fellow at the Institute for Research in the Humanities at Kyôto University in 2022 and at Ca'Foscari University, Venice, in 2025. Between 2018 and 2022, he served as Dean of Research at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences of University of Zurich.
Registration 報名連結:
