BCCDS Annual Lectures/Seminars, Brussels 2022 BCCDS International Seminar Journalistic Journey into Understanding the Orient Date: December 15, 2022, 6:30-8:30 pm Guest speaker: Dirk Tieleman, VRT Journalist Interviewer: Catherine Vuylsteke, Sinologist, author, journalist After a brief introduction by Prof. Lutgard Lams on Western assumptions and myths about China, and a complementary talk by Prof. Lieven Buysse (dean of Subfaculty of Arts) on the importance of understanding the cultural Other, the keynote speaker, Mr. Dirk Tieleman first shared his impressions of his journalistic missions to the Orient, starting with the Far East, in particular China. Buttressed by enlightening visual material, he discussed how he saw the Chinese population cope with changing life conditions and policies over the last forty years. Following this introduction, Catherine Vuylsteke entered into a lively discussion about Tieleman's latest book "Waarom we niets van de Orient begrijpen... en waarom we dat wel zouden moeten doen" [Why we don't understand anything about the Orient and why we should]. Given the current dire situation in Iran and Tielemans's impressive expertise on the Middle East, the talk moved, over the Silk Road, to the plight of the Iranian women and, more in general, questions about the pros/cons of Western intervention in authoritarian regimes or assistance to democratic nations' call for help, in the face of rising authoritarianism. *************** 2021 BCCDS International Seminars Western Media Representation about China (November 25, 2021-hybrid) Chinese and Russian Narratives about NATO/US' (December 16, 2021-online) Guest speakers for the first seminar were Prof. Qing Cao (Durham University, UK), Prof. Shasha Wang (Bangor University, UK) and dr. Damien Ng (Julius Baer, Switzerland) with three eye-opening talks about Anglophone media reporting about China. As an introduction, Prof. Lutgard Lams presented an overview of Western popular opinion about China with figures from opinion polls, followed by a brief outline of her study on China framing in the Dutch and French-language media. At the second seminar the keynote speaker, Prof. Robert Hinck (Air University, Alabama, US) presented his study on the way the 2020 US presidential election and the Jan. 6th insurrection of the Capitol were covered by Chinese and Russian media. As he argued, understanding how nations such as China and Russia cover US democratic politics is crucial. Robert Hinck suggested strategic narratives as an alternative approach, rather than only looking at news framing, to get a more comprehensive understanding of the enduring themes of Chinese and Russian media coverage of US electoral politics. Preceding Prof. Hinck’s talk was a presentation given by Prof. Lutgard Lams, Prof. Hedwig de Smaele, and three former students of the M.A. Journalism and M.A. Multilingual Communication, Fien De Coninck, Lisbeth Smeyers and Charlotte Lippens. They shared with the audience the findings of their comparative study on Russian and Chinese media representations of the NATO Summit in Warsaw, 2016. Both events, complementary in their design, showed the importance of understanding the media framing process and its potential impact on public opinion. They also gave an insight into how various communities frame the Self and the Other. Above all, the audience was shown how the various frames cumulatively construct larger strategic narratives that are being disseminated by official voices through their national media. These international seminars do not only fulfill the fundamental missions of both BCJS and BCCDS for education and research, but also bring added value by engaging and valorising students' participation into the research process and letting them taste the international flavor of their chosen studies. And not to forget, both seminars benefited from simultaneous interpretations from English into Dutch by our exquisite team of interpreter-students from the M.A. of Interpretation, led by colleague Prof. Filip Noé-Haesendonck. Thanks for the service! Finally, the two events marked a successful end to the challenging COVID-19 year for the BCCDS members and partners. Western Media Representation about China (November 25, 2021-hybrid)
Chinese and Russian Narratives about NATO/US' (December 16, 2021-online) Webinar Moderators & Guest Speaker
*************** 2020 BCCDS Annual Lecture 'Identifying shifts in interpreter-mediated formal interaction' Date: March 19, 2020, 12:30-1:30 pm Guest speaker: Zhang Rui, Dalian University of Technology, P.R. of China *The event was cancelled because of corona-virus health measures *************** 2019 BCCDS International Seminar 'China's Global Media Narrative and its Engagement with Hong Kong' Date: December 12, 2019, 6:30 - 9 pm Guest speakers: Eric Florence, University of Liège, Belgium David Bandurski, University of Hong Kong Ida Leung, Chinese University of Hong Kong, KU Leuven Interviewer and panel moderator: Gie Goris, chief editor, Mo*magazine
On 12 December, the Brussels Center for Journalism Studies
and the Brussels Center for Chinese Discourse Studies joined hands in welcoming
a diverse audience of graduate students, PhD students, academics, journalists
and diplomats for the international seminar on China’s Global Media Narrative
and its Engagement with Hong Kong. The event gave a forum to three
international speakers and Gie Goris, chief editor of the Flemish Mo*magazine
as interviewer and moderator of the ensuing panel discussion. Lutgard Lams of
BCJS introduced the double focus of the seminar –China’s global media
narrative and China/Hong Kong
relationship-- and described the interrelatedness of both themes by sketching
some political contours, within which the topics of the three presentations
found common ground. She also made the link to the ongoing street protests in
Hong Kong and shared some fieldwork visuals from Taiwan, demonstrating great
solidarity of Taiwan students with the Hong Kong protesters. This way, each
talk was contextualized within a larger geopolitical narrative with China as
the protagonist in its search for international discourse power. In recent years,
even as journalism in China has faced an unprecedented level of control, Xi
Jinping has urged state media to be more active in the advancing what he calls
"China's story" globally. In the first speech, “Deciphering China's Global Media Narrative”, media expert David
Bandurski from the China Media Project, University of Hong Kong, reviewed major changes to the information and propaganda space in China
and the shaping of its global narrative. He explained why these changes are
relevant not only for the immediate
neighbors in the Pacific region, but also for global society. During his
discussion about China’s engagement with Hong Kong, he drew the attention to
cultural friction and misunderstandings between Chinese PLA forces and some
local Hong Kong citizens with the aid of video footage. In the next talk, “Hong
Kong, How Did we Get There?”, Eric Florence, Professor at the University of
Liège, delved into the political and socio-economic background that led to the
current waves of protest in Hong Kong, focusing on the period between the 2014
“Occupy Central with love and peace movement” and the “Umbrella Movement”. This
was followed by an excellent speech, entitled “Journalism from background to
Spotlight – in Midst of Hong Kong Protests” by Ida Leung, M.A. student KU
Leuven and holder of a B.A. in Political Science from the Chinese University of
Hong Kong. She shed some light on the relationship between Hong Kong society
and the local media professionals and zoomed in on the dilemmas facing
journalists reporting on the Hong Kong protests. Each talk was followed by a brief question and answer
session, led by Gie Goris, who also took up the role of moderator of the final
panel discussion. This offered the audience valuable insights into the
complexities of Chinese politics and media operations and some first-hand information
on Hong Kong affairs. This event was interpreted simultaneously from English
into Dutch in collaboration with the Master of Interpretation. Much gratitude
to the team of students and their coordinator for this wonderful service!   **************** 2018 BCCDS Annual Lecture 'The Chinese Media in a New Era of Disruption' Date: October 25, 2018, 7 - 9 pm Guest speaker: David Bandurski, co-director of the China Media Project, research program in partnership with the Journalism and Media Studies Centre at the University of Hong Kong Interviewer: Catherine Vuylsteke, journalist and author For this event, two China experts were invited to share their views about contemporary Chinese official discourse on the role of the media. First, David Bandurski, co-director of the China Media Project, University of Hong Kong, presented a chronological survey of continuities and changes in the Chinese official media policies since Chairman Mao came to power. Drawing on his years of experience observing Chinese political and media affairs, Bandurski positioned contemporary Chinese state/media connections within a broad historical context and offered the audience a fascinating insight into the cyclical nature of disruptions of the ‘normal’ in the Chinese political and media scene. This presentation was followed by an in-depth interview of David Bandurski by the Belgian Sinologist-author-journalist Catherine Vuylsteke, who opened up the discussion into the wider area of Chinese political guidance of public opinion. The event was closed with some keen observations and questions from the public.  **************** 2017 BCCDS Annual Lecture'The Historical Development of Taiwanization of Buddhism after 1945: the Politics of Religion' Date: May 18, 2017, 6:30-8pm Guest speaker: Dr. Cheming Yang, Associate Prof. Cheng Kung University, Taiwan; Taiwan Studies Chair, Fac. Soc. Sciences, KULeuven In this lecture, Prof. Yang discussed the different types of Buddhism as practiced in Taiwan. He focused on the role of discourse in the politics of promoting a particular brand of Buddhism, through the development and consolidation of Buddhist monasteries (i.e. Fokuangshan, Dharma Drum, Chung-tai, and Tsu Chi), against the backdrop of the emerging quasi-Buddhist denominations such as I-Kuan Tao, Ching-Hai or Falungong.  *************** 2015 BCCDS Annual Lecture 'The Asian Paradox: Cultures of Trade and Politics' Date: June 25, 2015, 7-9 pm Guest speaker: Dr. Wolfgang Pape, Research Fellow Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS) In this lecture, dr. Pape, former Principal Administrator for Asia-Policy, at EU Commission, DG RELEX-H1, discussed the apparent paradox between the economic interdependence of the growth economies in Northeast Asia (China, Taiwan, Korea and Japan) and the tendency to preserve their national cultural identities. The ‘Asian Paradox’ appears to be particularly evident in the North East of that continent if seen through European eyes. While one of the tightest networks of intra-regional trade binds the economies of China, Taiwan, Korea and Japan, their political leaders hardly ever connect with each other in substantive exchanges. The media these days serve us permanently cold images of frozen faces and of an ‘icy lady’ that seem to contrast with the warm embraces, which their business people frequently enjoy after successful deals over political borders. However, dr. Pape wondered whether this is the view only in the eyes of the European beholder, who is used to the myriad of regular institutionalized meetings at all political and bureaucratic levels of the EU? *************** 2014 BCCDS Annual Lectures 'A Critical Study of Chinese Political Discourse: the Case of Taiwanese Presidential Speeches' Date: December 04, 2014, 7-9 pm Guest speakers: Prof.dr. Wei-lun Lu, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic; Prof.dr. Lutgard Lams, KULeuven Campus Brussels In the first lecture, Wei-lun Lu discussed how Cognitive Linguistics, as a linguistic sub-discipline that gives special focus on how language is used to create a construal, is applied to critically investigate Chinese Political Discourse. The first part of the talk consisted of the theoretical groundwork, where dr. Lu introduced the Contemporary Theory of Metaphor. In the second part, he showed how CMT can be applied to investigate Taiwanese presidential speeches. The second lecture dealt with the dynamics of meaning generation in the ROC/Taiwan nation-building process against the background of regionalization and globalization tendencies. Based on the insights of Language Pragmatics, Lutgard Lams traced the ideological processes of ‘Taiwanization’ and ‘Sinicization’ in Taiwanese presidential speeches.
Date: April 24,2014, 7-9 pm Guest speaker: Prof.dr. Tao Xie, School of English and International Studies, Beijing Foreign Studies University In this lecture, Prof. Tao Xie unraveled the enigmatic formula of the 'Chinese dream', coined by President Xi Jinping. As he explained, "the Chinese people have dreams too, just like other peoples around the world. But the China Dream has never been as powerfully and eloquently articulated as the American dream until President Xi Jinping came into power in 2012". Prof. Xie examined the China Dream in the broad context of rhetorical campaigns by Chinese leaders since Deng Xiaoping. From Jiang Zemin's Three Represents to Hu Jintao's Harmonious Society to the most recent China Dream, each rhetorical campaign represents not only the top leader's attempts to distinguish his tenure from his predecessors but also different governance challenges faced by each top leader. The talk analyzed, in particular, the instruments of communication that have been employed by the Chinese government to promote the China dream, as well as foreign and domestic perceptions of the China Dream. *************** 2013 BCCDS Lectures
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