【Chinese Culture Colloquium】The Aesthetics of "Symphonic Structure" in Language and Literature

January 16, 2026 Upcoming

Topic: The Aesthetics of "Symphonic Structure" in Language and Literature

Speaker: Prof. Shengli Feng

Date: Friday, January 16, 2026

Time: 4:00 p.m. -5:30 p.m.

Venue: SIN Wai Kin International Conference Centre (W201), Administration Building

Language: Chinese

Abstract:

Formal elements in language—such as tone, rhythm, and syntax—resonate like a symphony to create a unified aesthetic whole. This serves as the aesthetic foundation for antithetical parallelism in classical poetry and the alternation of parallel and loose styles in prose, both of which are deeply rooted in the prosodic structure of the Chinese language. Thus, beauty is fundamentally structural. It manifests as both the rhythmic harmony of direct perception (sensuous beauty) and the appreciation of internal formal logic (intellectual beauty). The convergence of sensory experience and rational insight at the structural level defines the rich and profound aesthetic of the "Symphonic Structure."

Speaker Profile:

Prof. Shengli Feng is currently Professor, PhD Supervisor, and Director of the University Academic Committee at Beijing Language and Culture University (BLCU), where he also serves as Director of the Zhang-Huang Institute for Academic Theory at the School of Linguistics and Language Resources. He is currently Co-editor in Chief of the Journal of Chinese Languages (JCL, SSCI Index). He received his Master’s degree in Chinese Language and Literature from Beijing Normal University in 1982 and his PhD in Linguistics from the University of Pennsylvania (UPenn) in 1995. His past appointments include Changjiang Scholar Chair Professor (2005), Associate Professor at the University of Kansas, and Professor of Chinese Language Practice and Director of the Chinese Language Program at the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations (EALC), Harvard University. He currently holds concurrent positions as: Chief Professor at the Center for Language Science, Tianjin University; Chair Professor at the School of Humanities and Arts, Southwestern University of Finance and Economics; Distinguished Professor at the School of Chinese Language and Literature, Beijing Normal University; Visiting Professor at the Department of Chinese Language and Literature, Hong Kong Shue Yan University; Emeritus Professor at The Chinese University of Hong Kong.

His research interests include Qian-Jia "Logical Certainty" and Zhang-Huang academic theory, Exegetics, Prosodic Grammar, Register Grammar, diachronic syntax of Chinese, the history of Chinese prosodic literature, and TCSOL (Teaching Chinese to Speakers of Other Languages) and acquisition. He has published 10 Chinese academic monographs (including 2 English monographs, with 4 Chinese monographs translated into English and Korean), 6 co-authored academic monographs, and has edited or co-edited 10 academic works. He has also published more than 200 academic papers in both Chinese and English.