The beginning and development of cooperation between

Geography at Liverpool and in China

David Sadler, University of Liverpool

The University of Liverpool: the original red-brick “civic” university

European Capital of Culture 2008

Percy Maude Roxby

• Born 1880; educated in History at Oxford; appointed Lecturer in Regional Geography at Liverpool in 1906; became “lecturer in charge” of new Department of Geography in 1909; appointed John Rankin Professor of Geography in 1917

• Visited China as Albert Kahn Fellow in 1912-13 and in 1921-22 as member of the China Education Commission (3rd visit in 1931)

Roxby…

• Handbooks on China: I Physical geography, history and peoples, II Modern history and administration, III Economic geography, ports and communications (1944-45)

• British Council’s Chief Representative in China, 1944-47; died in Nanking in 1947

Professors Percy Maude Roxby, Lin Chao, and Hou Renzhi

Higher degrees at Liverpool

• Wilfred Smith “The iron and steel industry of China” MA, 1926

• Chang Yin Tang “The economic development and prospects of inner Mongolia” MA, 1929

• Lin Chao “The Nanking-wu-yi Shan: a geographic divide” PhD, 1938

• Wu Chuanjun “The rice economy of China” PhD, 1948

• Hou Renzhi “An historical geography of Peiping”, PhD, 1949

Lin Chao, 1909-91

• Born in Jieyang County, Guangdong Province; educated at Zhongshan University

• Studied the application of physical geography to China’s environmental conservation and rural development

• Rose to become Head of Geography at Peking University

Wu Chuanjun, 1918-2009

• Born in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, educated at Zhongyang University

• Studied the utilisation of land resources and agricultural development

• Selected as a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 1991

Hou Renzhi

• Born in Zaoqiang, Hebei Province, educated at Yanjing University

• Studied historical geography, the origin and development of water resources, and the municipal plan for Beijing

• Selected as a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 1980

• Awarded Honorary Doctor of Science by Liverpool in 1984

… and more recently…

• Lizhong Yu “Environmental applications of mineral magnetic measurement” PhD, 1989

• Yuquan Hu “A magnetic approach to sediment-source linkages in the Lac d’Annecy” PhD, 1997

• Xie Shanju “Magnetic studies of dust in the urban environment” PhD, 2000

• Xia Dunsheng “Magnetic studies of tephra in SE Iceland” PhD, 2003

• Qingnian Yu “Cultivated land protection in China” PhD, 2006• Zhixiong Shen “Improving the chronologies of lake sediments:

Crummock Water” PhD, 2007

The Tribute of Gü

The original text of Gunkungor

“The Tribute of Gü”Dedicated to the ‘China Room’

Department of Geography,University of Liverpool

Presented byChong Gün t’ang & Lin Chao

Written byProfessor Ku Chi-Kay

(The tenth month of the 25th yearof the Chinese Republic)

This scroll hangs on the wallin the Geography Departmentwith the following inscription:

Prof Frank Oldfield and Prof Yu Lizhong in Shanghai

Sediment sampling, Yangtze Estuary

Luochan Loess Section

Transnational family strategies and education

Central Institute of Rural Development, Haikou

… and in the future…

• Xi’an Jiaotong Liverpool University (XJTLU), Suzhou, established 2006

• Liverpool Confucius Institute established 2009, formally opened by Madam Lin Wenyi, Vice Chair of 11th Chinese Peoples Political Consultative Conference, and Professor Wang Jianhua, XJTLU Board Director

• Shanghai Expo 2010: Liverpool the sole UK representative city