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Academics Call for Academia Sinica Name Change

Brian Hioe
Proposals for Academia Sinica to change its name have been floated several times in the past. For example, the idea came up in March 2020 in the Taiwanese legislature after the Chinese government sought to take credit for a virus reagent developed by Academia Sinica scientists to test for COVID-19. Since then, pan-Green lawmakers have continued calls for a name change on several occasions. The issue was floated again recently, however, after the circulation of a Chinese-language petition by two dozen Academia Sinica researchers...
EnglishOctober 2021Politics5 min read

Continued Debates Over The Role Of Classical Chinese In Taiwan

Brian Hioe
The defeat of a recent push by language and literature scholars to reform the teaching of Chinese in Taiwan has had surprising implications. Namely, despite the defeat of a push by the Association for Taiwan Literature to reduce the amount of classical Chinese currently taught in Taiwanese, this drew comment from high-ranking Chinese government officials including An Fengshan of the Taiwan Affairs Office. It seems, then, that the debate over the teaching of classical Chinese in Taiwan has become significant enough to draw attention from China...
Arts and CultureEnglishLiterature and PoetrySeptember 20176 min read