Center on Contemporary China launches, Beijing added as Global Seminar location
Andie AyalaThe University has launched the Center on Contemporary China, added Beijing as a destination for the Global Seminar Program and appointed professor Yu Xie jointly with the sociology department and the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies as a result of a recent effort to gear courses and programs toward contemporary China, PIIRS director Mark Beissinger said.Beissinger said that the hope is that the appointment of Xie will invigorate student interest in the current issues of China, and will make the University one of the leading universities in research on contemporary Chinese society.He noted that while the University previously had a number of classes related to China under the Department of East Asian Studies, there was only one person in the social science department actually teaching about contemporary China.“It’s one of the most exciting things here to happen in the University, in terms of the study of contemporary China and it will be a transformative factor in terms of the opportunities available to students to study contemporary China,” Beissinger said about Xie’s appointment.Xie said that the study of China is a very contentious issue and that there is such an influx of information and opinions about the rapid development of China today, especially from foreign scholars.