NTU Chinese Library hosted the Book Donation Ceremony of the Guangxi Bookshelves Project on 13 Nov 2015.
The Guangxi Bookshelves Project, a 5-year book donation project with a value of RMB 400,000 (equal to S$85,000), was initiated and sponsored by the Federation of Literary and Art Circles of Guangxi with the Association of Guangxi Studies (AGS), China. The project aimed to strengthen the cultural and academic exchanges between China, especially Guangxi Province, and ASEAN countries. Singapore is the first beneficiary country and NTU is the third organization in Singapore, after NLB and NUS, to benefit from this project.
The agreement between AGS and NTU Libraries was signed in June 2015, and the first batch of 203 donated titles with a value of RMB 230,000 arrived in Oct. All the titles were selected and recommended by NTU’s faculty and researchers, specialized on overseas Chinese studies, Chinese literature and history, and Sino-Foreign cultural exchange. The AGS will continue to donate books valued RMB 50,000.00 each year for the coming 4 years till June 2020.
The ceremony was a simple but formal event with about 35 participants including 4 guests from Guangxi, China. Before the books were presented and gifts exchanged, Mr Choy, University Librarian of NTU, gave a welcome speech to express our gratitude to the donors. Prof Liu Hong, Chair of the School of Humanities and Social Sciences emphasized the significance of the donated books from a researcher’s perspective. Prof He Linxia, Vice-chair of the Association of Guangxi Studies (AGS) who represented the donors, depicted this event as a starting point for bilateral cultural and academic exchanges. He hoped to deepen the academic communication between Guangxi and Singapore, especially between AGS and NTU, through this 5-year-long project.
The climax of this event was the keynote speech, “Contemporary Confucius Worship under the Concept of Global Asia”, delivered by Prof I Lo-fen, Head of the Chinese Division of NTU. Using many photos, she talked about Confucius worship in Asian cities, namely: Beijing, Seoul, Hanoi, Taipei, Ryukyu, Surabaya and Singapore and highlighted the cultural significance of similarities and differences of Confucius worship in the globalization era.
The talk was informative and inspiring, when it ended, it seemed the audiences were still longing for more.
More pictures
Fig7: group photo, from left to right: Ms Ye Yingying, Mr Lu Chaoyang, Ms Dianne Cmor, Mr Choy Fatt Cheong, Prof He Linxia, Prof Liu Hong, Prof I Lo-fen, Dr Sim Chuin Peng