The review presents the results of the first scientific conference "China Studies in an International Perspective: History and Modernity", which was successfully held in Beijing from October 31 to November 1, 2011. The conference, which was attended by 36 speakers from 13 countries and regions of the world, became an important event for world sinology. Russian scientists from the Institute of Chinese Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences presented at the forum the results of their three-year work in the framework of the international project "Sinology-Oral History". The forum's results confirm the fact that in recent years the center of world Sinology has increasingly shifted to Greater China. Annual international meetings of Chinese research experts can become a powerful incentive for bringing together, consolidating and scientific cooperation of representatives of the entire world of sinology.

The conference was organized by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CAON) with the support of a number of major universities in China. The speakers represented countries such as Australia, Belgium, Vietnam, Hong Kong, India, China, Korea, Mongolia, the Netherlands, Russia, Taiwan, Thailand, and Japan.

Thus, the first international specialized forum on Chinese studies held in China has become a truly important scientific event for the world of Sinology.

Russian Sinology was presented at the forum in two reports. V. G. Ganshin (1951-2011), an employee of the Institute of International Relations of the Russian Academy of Sciences, who died prematurely, devoted his report to the topic of cooperation between Russian and Chinese scientists, who should jointly improve the international image of China, and in particular jointly debunk the old speculative "theories about the Chinese threat" [International Sinological..., 2011, pp. 278-279].

The report "Writing an Oral History of Sinology and the New era of Global Sinology: a Russian perspective "by V. Ts Golovachev and S. V. Dmitriev, employees of the China Department of the Institute of Historical Sciences of the Russian Academy of Sciences, aroused great interest and lively discussion. In June 2011, this report was presented in Prague in English (Dmitriev, 2012). In Beijing, it was read in Chinese, taking into account the new format of the meeting and a wider international audience, and also published in full in the working materials of the conference in English and Chinese [International Sinological..., 2012, pp. 65-87].

The report describes in detail the results of the three-year work (2008-2011) of the Institute's staff on the Russian part of the international project "Sinology-Oral History", which involves sinologists from 13 countries and regions of the world (Australia, Vietnam, Hong Kong, India, Korea, Malaysia, Mongolia, Russia, Singapore, USA, Taiwan, Czech Republic, Japan). The project is being implemented on the initiative of Taiwan State University with the active participation of KAON, national academies of sciences and higher educational institutions of the mentioned countries. It consists of audio recordings of many hours of oral interviews with professional Sinologists in order to collect and introduce up-to-date information about the experience and traditions of studying (teaching) China around the world to the global scientific community. Original texts and translations of all interviews are published on the Internet in Chinese, English, Russian and other languages of the participating countries with the prospect of further distribution in the press (articles, books)and through other media.

As for the Russian part of the project, over the past years, colleagues from the Institute of Chinese Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Chinese Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences conducted a dozen and a half interviews with well-known Russian Sinologists

Older Russian Federation (Moscow, Vladivostok, Taipei). In particular, with the active participation of 10 current and former employees of the China Department of the Institute of Information Technology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, by the end of 2011, 12 interviews were recorded, edited and published on the Internet with a total working time of up to 70 hours and a text volume of up to 30 author's sheets. The truly invaluable information presented in them is available in the original and Chinese-language translation on the websites of the Institute of Information Technology of the Russian Academy of Sciences http://www.ivran.ru/project-modernization-models/57 and Taiwan State University http://politics.ntu.edu.tw/RAEC/act02.php.

In 2011-2012, the first volume with interviews was prepared for publication, which may mark the beginning of a book series. Even today, many of these interviews are actively used in scientific publications, quoted in the media, replicated on private Oriental sites, and even broadcast since June 2011 in the thematic program "Taiwan International Radio" in Russian (http://russian.rti.org.tw/ProgramSingle.aspx?UntilID=769). In general, the material collected through the project will serve as a valuable source for future research in the field of history, current state and prospects of domestic Sinology.

The conference participants ' reports covered a wide range of topics: from the presentation of national schools (Australia, Vietnam, Germany, India, Italy, Russia, Singapore, the United States, Taiwan, Japan) and consideration of the image of China in foreign literature and public opinion to discussions on the use of "discourse research" methods in sinology, about the essence and historical significance of China. the content of the terms " Sinology "(Chinese studies), "Chinese studies" or "Chinese studies", as well as reflections on the ambiguity of translations of these terms into Chinese (hanxue, zhongguo xue, Zhongguo yanjiu, etc.).

It is significant that Russian Sinology was the most widely and solidly represented national school at the conference (7 out of 36 reports). In addition to Russians, 5 Chinese scientists from different cities of the PRC (Beijing, Tianjin, Chengdu) devoted their reports to Sinology in Russia/the USSR. Chen Rui, an employee of the State Library of China, noted that the main book depository of the country traditionally pays special attention to the collection of foreign Sinological literature, which accumulates the achievements of foreign Sinology and the views of foreigners on China. The collection of Russian Sinological literature occupies a special place in these collections in terms of the number of titles, authors, and time range of publications. It contains rare publications issued by members of the Russian ecclesiastical mission in Beijing in the 19th and 20th centuries, works of pre-revolutionary, Soviet and modern Russian Sinologists, including many books with autographed donations, original and translated works, documents, periodicals, etc. All this, according to Chen Rui, reflects the historical specifics of Russian-Chinese relations, the scope of Russian Sinology, as well as the purposeful and systematic work of the State Library of China [International Sinological..., 2012, pp. 210-211].

Yan Guo-dong, Dean of the Faculty of Western Languages at Nankai University (Tianjin), reviewed " The image of China in the writings of the Russian cultural elite of the XVIII century." In his report, he noted the paradoxical fact that in the XVIII century. China has penetrated the Russian enlightened public not from the East, but from the West, through Europe. At the same time, the idealized image of monarchical China was presented as a kind of "mirror image" of Russian reality. The second aspect of the public perception of China in Russia during this period was associated with more reliable information about the Middle Empire, coming from Russian Siberia and the Far East. News of border conflicts with the Qing Empire generated calls to curb the" pride " of the Chinese. These ideas are clearly reflected in the odes of Lomonosov, Derzhavin, Sumarokov and other authors. Despite the obvious inconsistency, these two images were not mutually exclusive, but only reflected different spiritual moods and requests of the Russian cultural elite of that time [International Sinological..., 2012, pp. 96-97].

The use and representation of images of traditional China in Russian literature of the last 30 years was considered by the well-known Russian literary scholar Liu Ya-ding (Sichuan University, Chengdu). In his report "Back to the Stereotypes of the 'state of Sages'", he noted the growing interest of Russian authors in Chinese culture since the 1980s. Many of them consciously or unconsciously combine traditional Russian and Chinese cultures in their works, as if returning to the Russian stereotypes about China as the "state of sages" that were widely used in Russia in the XVIII century. Although Russian authors may be guided by their own ideas about the" new Eurasian doctrine " or other views, their appeals to the traditional culture of China are important for spreading the latter in modern Russia [International Sinological..., 2012, pp. 52-64].

Chen Jin-peng (Tientsin University of Pedagogy) presented Chinese studies of the early Soviet period. According to Chen, in the pre-war period, the Soviet government deliberately isolated domestic Sinologists, severely limiting their contacts with foreign colleagues. The "baptism" of Marxism-Leninism and the revolutionary events in China forced Soviet scientists to move away from the academic principles of pre-revolutionary Russian Sinology. Russian expatriate sinologists remained true to their views, but were cut off from domestic science, and their Soviet colleagues suffered irreparable physical damage during the war and political repression. All this led to a serious decline in Soviet Sinology of the early period (until the middle of the 20th century), although it could become the basis for the revival of Soviet Sinology in later times. According to the speaker, in the history of Soviet Sinology, this period was full of "white spots", gaps, general phrases and omissions, and the main emphasis was placed on Sinology in the USSR after the 1960s.

Thus, Chen Jin-peng concludes, the revolutions, wars, and ideological upheavals that occurred in 1917-1950 radically changed the Russian school of Sinology, deprived it of its former greatness, and relegated it to a secondary role in world science. Despite the emergence of a new generation of Soviet Sinologists in the 1950s, the Cold War also prevented them from engaging in a dialogue with world science [International Sinological Institute..., 2012, pp. 43-44].

Professor Li Min-bin, an authoritative Chinese Russian scholar and Director of the Institute of Russia at Peking State University, devoted his report to encyclopedic traditions in Russian Sinology. Noting the attention of Russian Sinologists to a comprehensive statistical description of the "country-object" of study, he draws a thread of encyclopedic traditions from the fundamental works of N. Ya. Bichurin (1777-1853) through the "China" series conceived and edited from 1940 by Academician V. M. Alekseev (1881-1951) to the six-volume "Encyclopedia of the Spiritual Culture of China" published in 2006-2010.". According to the speaker, today this encyclopedia has crowned a continuous two-century-old encyclopedic tradition of Sinological studies in Russia [International Sinological..., 2012, pp. 41-42].

The peculiarities of a number of national schools of Chinese studies (India, the Czech Republic, Vietnam, etc.) have already been briefly presented in a recent publication by S. V. Dmitriev [Dmitriev, 2012]. Therefore, with regard to the Indian school, I would like to mention only a few important points mentioned in the report "China Studies in India: a Path Less Traveled" published in Beijing.

According to the report's author, Rina Marwa, an associate professor at the College of Jesus and Mary at the University of Delhi, despite the centuries-old geographical and civilizational proximity, the scope and depth of Sinological research in India is still quite limited. One of the important positive links in this regard is the study of Chinese Buddhism, which determines the study of the Chinese language, texts, traditions and history. Particularly noteworthy are the projects of two-way translation of Buddhist texts (from Chinese to Sanskrit and vice versa), implemented after 1945 by scientists from various Indian universities. These projects allow us not only to compare Chinese and Tibetan versions of a number of Mahayana texts in order to identify their common archetypes, but also to reconstruct the originals of ancient, long-lost Buddhist texts by reverse-translating them from Chinese to Sanskrit. In addition, they provide an opportunity to translate and study ancient and medieval Chinese texts containing all sorts of news about India, Central Asia and Buddhism. Finally, another important factor stimulating Indian Sinology is the revival of interest in Buddhism in modern China. In addition to Buddhism and the "Tibet problem", an important element of modern Chinese studies in India is the "Taiwan problem". As the speaker points out, India has always adhered to the "one China" principle, even despite the Indo-Chinese conflict of 1962. At the same time, the rise of the Indian economy has opened up new horizons for India-Taiwan relations since the late 1990s. In turn, this has intensified "Taiwan studies" in India, although they always remain a subsection of Chinese studies [International Sinological Institute..., 2012, pp. 129-140].

Prapin Manomaivibul (Chulalogkorn University) spoke about the peculiarities of Thai Sinology. Thai Sinology has its own long-standing traditions, based on centuries-old ties with China (since the 13th century) and the deep influence of Chinese culture. Since the 18th century, Chinese literary works have been translated into Thai. At the same time, Thai sinology was always ten-

but it is connected with politics, especially during the Second World War and the post-war years. Today, following the growth of China's global and regional influence, the role and relevance of Chinese research in Thailand is gradually increasing. This trend is reflected in the fact that at least two Thai universities are opening Chinese studies courses for graduate students in order to meet the growing demand for professional sinologists in the country [International Sinological Institute..., 2012, pp. 45-51].

Huang Shih-ying, a Chinese scholar from the Vietnamese Academy of Social Sciences, introduced foreign colleagues to the current state of Chinese studies in socialist Vietnam. According to his report, after the normalization of Vietnamese-Chinese relations in 1991, Vietnamese sinology was revived and entered a new stage of rapid development. The Communist Party, government and scientists of Vietnam pay special attention to the experience of Chinese reforms and problems of bilateral relations between Vietnam and China. The main center for studying Chinese problems is the Research Institute of China - the only one of the 36 research institutes of the Vietnamese Academy of Sciences specializing in the study of one country. Today, the Institute has about 50 employees aged 25-40, including 11 PhDs, whose research covers traditional China, modern China, and Vietnam-China relations. In this case, the last two directions have a leading position. In modern topics, much attention is paid to the study of the experience of Sinicization of Marxism, the theory of the "three representative offices", the "three people's principles" of Sun Yat-sen, the experience of improving the Chinese system of the socialist market economy, and the influence of the "rise of China" on Vietnam. The subject of research is largely determined by applied goals related to attracting foreign experience in the interests of domestic development of the country. Reports on up-to-date research are published in the China yearbooks. According to the Vietnamese colleagues themselves, the weak points of their national Sinology are mainly the historical training of local sinologists, the dominant emphasis on Chinese sources and the high dependence on these sources [International Sinological Institute..., 2012, pp. 203-209].

Professor Emeritus at the University of Halifax, Colin Mcerras, noted that Australian Sinology is developing unevenly, although the positive trends clearly outweigh the negative ones. In recent years, the number of Sinologists, publications and scientific meetings in Australia has increased dramatically, and the range of Chinese studies has expanded. The Government actively supports the study of China, and ties with world Sinology have significantly strengthened. With the help of Beijing, Confucius institutes are being opened. Negative phenomena include the lack of attention of the Australian authorities to the development of relations with China, to the training of specialists in the field of Chinese language and Chinese culture [International Sinological..., 2012, pp. 98-109].

Yang Li, an employee of the Center for Foreign Sinology Studies, reviewed the main stages of the development of Italian sinology - from the "missionary" (XVI-XVIII centuries) to the post-war and modern sinology of the XX-XXI centuries. In particular, she presented leading modern sinologists, research centers and journals, identified priority topics and main results of modern Sinological research in Italy [International Sinological Institute..., 2012, pp. 201-202].

Professor Li Xue-tao of Beijing University of Foreign Languages, author of a number of well-known publications on German Sinology, made a report "My understanding of German Sinology", in which he highlighted its features: the lack of attention of German scientists to historiographic systematization, the evolution of applied research methods (from historicism and "sinology of philological, literary style" to "critical sinology" , etc.) and the predominant attention to the study of modern China that prevailed after the unification of Germany [International Sinological..., 2012, pp. 110-115].

The Chinese speakers ' historical reviews of sinology in Russia, Germany, Italy, the United States, and Japan show that almost all major national schools of the world (including those in France, Scandinavia, and Eastern Europe that were not represented at the conference) are in the field of view of specialists in foreign Sinology in China today. If we add to them the reviews of domestic schools made by scientists from Vietnam, Korea, Singapore and Taiwan, then we can say that almost all the world's Sinology was represented at the conference in Beijing.

Such broad coverage has led Chinese experts to understand the need for scientific generalizations. It is not by chance that the conference program gave priority to those reports whose authors tried to assess the overall potential of foreign sinology and called for the development of a new field of sinology.

expand the acquaintance of Chinese people with the achievements of foreign sinology, strengthen cooperation with foreign colleagues in the preservation, study and dissemination of Chinese culture [International Sinological..., 2012, pp. 282-283].

Significant in this respect is the fact that the first section of the conference materials is entirely devoted to understanding the essence and main trends of foreign sinological research, the interpretation of the subject and terms-definitions of Sinological research by Chinese and foreign scientists, as well as their evolution in the historical perspective [International Sinological..., 2012, pp. 1-28].

At the final session, the forum's organizers, represented by KAON and other academic institutions of the People's Republic of China, informed that the successful experience of the first such large-scale international meeting of Sinologists in Beijing made it possible to decide to hold such conferences on a regular, if possible annual, basis.

list of literature

Dmitriev S. V. International "Round table "" Theory of knowledge of Chinese studies: the perspective of oral history "(Prague, June 23-25, 2011). 2012. No. 2. pp. 148-157.

International Sinological Forum "China Studies in an International Perspective: Past and Present". Beijing, October 31, November 1, 2011 / / Collection of materials " KAON Forum (2011. Chinese studies abroad)". Beijing, 2011. 284 p.

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