Chinese academics visit UCLan for research

25 July 2016

International deaf studies project sees Chinese visitors sample UK life

A unique international research partnership has enabled a group of Chinese academics to visit the University of Central Lancashire (UCLan) for the first time.

Six Zhengzhou Institute of Technology (former Zhongzhou University) Deaf and hearing researchers attended UCLan’s Preston Campus to collaborate for the first time on the project aimed at teaching English, British culture and Deaf Studies via online multimedia platforms.

To celebrate their trip, the visitors, along with more than 50 other invited guests, took part in a Chinese Culture and Art Showcase in which they watched a demonstration of the Baduanjin martial arts and were encouraged to gets hands-on with Chinese paper-cutting, painting and calligraphy. All these activities were run by the Chinese academic visitors, the University’s Confucius Institute and Deaf Studies academics.

Project Lead academic Dr Junhui Yang, Senior Lecturer in Deaf Studies at UCLan, said: “This is the first time that deaf Chinese academics have visited to undertake a project of this kind and it was fantastic to have them here.

“We are working very closely on this project so to have the opportunity for the British Deaf Community to access information regarding Chinese art, culture, martial arts and Chinese sign language was great.

“This is a very interesting research project and this trip was a fantastic start to our work.”

"This is the first time that deaf Chinese academics have visited to undertake a project of this kind and it was fantastic to have them here."

The £76,760 provided by the British Council will allow lecturers from UCLan and China to create an online platform for sign language-based teaching of English rather than current inappropriate sound based learning.

The UCLan team will visit China during 2017-2018 to observe deaf students being taught English, and moderate the multimedia teaching materials that the Chinese lecturers will have created. The UCLan lecturers will offer training seminars and the Zhengzhou lecturers will demonstrate teaching English with sign language and the online platform.

For more images from the event, visit our Flickr album.

A unique international research partnership saw Chinese visitors sample UK life
A unique international research partnership saw Chinese visitors sample UK life