16 December 2014
The British Library and Shandong University sign a Memorandum of Understanding
On Wednesday December the 3rd, a delegation from Shandong University visited the British Library. During a ceremony at the presence of the Director of Collections of the British Library, Caroline Brazier, and the President of Shandong University, Zhang Rong, a Memorandum of Understanding between the two institutions was signed.
Zhang Rong (left), President of Shandong University and Caroline Brazier (right), Director of Collections of the British Library, sign the Memorandum of Understanding
Shandong University (山东大学Shandong Da xue) is a public university in the province of Shandong, with one of the largest students’ populations (about 60,000) in China, of which about 1.800 are international students. Shandong University offers master and doctoral degree programs in all major academic disciplines covering the humanities, science, engeneering and medicine. It was officially founded in 1901 in the city of Jinan as the Imperial Shandong University (山东大学堂 Shandong Da xue tang) and nowadays it comprises 8 campuses located in three different cities (Jinan, Qingdao and Weihai). Its notable alumni and professors are many. Among them, we find the German Professor and Nobel Prize for Physics Peter Grünberg and the Chinese novelist Mo Yan, Nobel Prize for Literature in 2012.
Zhang Rong (left), President of Shandong University, presents a gift from China
The British Library and Shandong University aim to cooperate in the future with cataloguing and the digitisation of especially important items held in the Chinese Collections at the British Library. These projects will form part of the Shandong University plan to publish selected titles and catalogues of rare books and manuscript collections of Chinese items in international libraries and institutions. They will be curated by the “Zihai” Editorial Centre of Shandong University in collaboration with the Asian and African Studies Department of the British Library. Prof. Zheng Jiewen and Prof. Liu Xinming, respectively Director and Deputy Director of the “Zihai” Editorial Centre, will work together with the curator of the Chinese section at the British Library in selecting the material for the project.
The delegation from Shandong University, together with the British Library representatives during the signature ceremony
Sara Chiesura, Asian and African Studies