Teaching Experience

        Pre-GMU

• First-Year and Second -Year Chinese (Lecturer, Department of East Asian Studies, University of Arizona, Tucson, 1998-1999).
• Intensive First-Year Chinese (Visiting Instructor, Summer Language Program at Monterey Institute of International Studies, CA, 1998).
• First-Year Modern Chinese (Stanford, TA for Zeng Hong, Fall 1997).
• Beginning Conversational Chinese (Stanford, Teaching Fellow, Fall, Winter, Spring 1997-1998).
• Program for Advanced Language Maintenance, Chinese (Stanford, Program Leader, 1997-1998).
• Business Chinese (Stanford, Summer Course for Business School Students, 1997).
• Chinese Civilization (Stanford, TA for Haun Saussy, Fall, 1997).
• The Impact of the European Poetry on Modern Chinese Poetry (Free University Berlin, Germany, Lehr-beauftragter, Spring 1988).
• First-Year German (Department of German Studies, Stanford University, Teaching Fellow, 1990-1991 and 1992-1994).

        At GMU (1999-2002, Visiting Assistant Professor, 2002-Present, Assistant Professor).

• CHIN 101 Elementary Chinese I.
• CHIN 102 Elementary Chinese II.
• CHIN 201 Intermediate Chinese I
• CHIN 202 Intermediate Chinese II.
• CHIN 300 Advanced Reading Development.
• CHIN 301 Advanced Syntax and Grammar.
• CHIN 310 Survey of Traditional Chinese Literature.
• CHIN 318 Introduction to Literary Chinese.
• FRLN 330 Foreign Literatures in Translation.

         I have taught thirty-two courses in my first five years at GMU for which the course evaluations are available now. The student  rankings of        these courses (Question 6 "The Overall Rating of this Course) are provided as below:

•  1990-2000   4.95, 4.95, 4.75, 4.67, 4.67, 4.90, 5.00
•  2000-2001   4.82, 4.55, 5.00, 4.92, 4.92, 5.00, 4.86, 4.67
•  2001-2002   4.73, 5.00, 4.76, 5.00, 5.00, 4.63
• 2002-2003   4.95, 4.63, 4.84,  4.86, 4.93
• 2003-2004    4.81, 4.67, 4.69, 4.94, 5.00, 5.00 

      (Lowest 4.55, more than two third are are equal to or > than 4.75, average 4.85)

Research Experience

• 1985-1986 Assistant Research Fellow, Institute of Chinese Literature, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing, China.
  Research project: East-West literary relations.
• 1994-1996 Associate Research Fellow, the same Institute, Research project: Cultural Studies.
• 1996-1999 Completing Dissertation at Stanford.
• 1999-present Please see my statement and the publication list below.

• 1994-1996 Acting Director of the Comparative Literature Program, Research Institute of Chinese Literature, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing, China.
• 1998-1999 Coordinator of the Basic Chinese Language Program, Department of East Asian Studies, University of Arizona, Tucson.
• 1999-Present Head of Chinese Program in the Department of Modern and Classical Languages, George Mason University.

Education

• 1978-1985 Fudan University, Shanghai, majoring in German and Comparative Literature.
• Bachelor in1982, bachelor thesis on German and Chinese ballads.
• Master in 1985, master thesis on Goethe's and Li Po's poems.
• 1986-1987 University of Marburg, Germany, majoring in German and comparative literature, sponsored by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation.
• 1987-1988 Free University, Berlin, majoring in Comparative Literature and Classics, sponsored by the same Foundation.
• 1988-1989 Ph.D. student at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, majoring in Comparative Literature, supported by the UMASS China Scholar Fellowship.
• 1989-1991 Ph.D. student at Stanford University, majoring in German Studies and Special Humanities Program, supported by the Stanford University Fellowship. Qualifying Exam passed in June, 1990.
• 1991-1992 As an exchange student between Stanford and Tuebingen University, spent another year in Germany, funded by the Tuebingen University Fellowship.
• 1992-1994 Ph.D. candidate in German Studies and Special Humanities Program at Stanford, University Oral passed in May, 1994.
• 1994-1996 Academic leave from Stanford, teaching and research in Beijing.
• June 1999 A joint Ph.D. in German and Special Humanities Program awarded from Stanford University.
• Dissertation on German cultural influence on the major modern Chinese poet Feng Zhi (1904-1992) who happened to be my mentor in Beijing.

Languages

•  Chinese: native (Aside from standard Mandarin also speak Sichuan, Shangdong and Shanghai dialects)  
•  German: fluent.
•   French: passed graduate reading examinations given by both the French and German Departments at Stanford.
•   Japanese: summer intensive course (first year) taken at Stanford. Jordan's first book finished.
•   Ancient Greek: two years of devoted work in Germany. Translation work from Greek into German posted on my page.

Training pertinent to teaching languages

• Teaching Chinese course taken at Stanford in winter 1996.
• Teaching German course taken at Stanford in fall 1990 and audited The Learning and Acquisition of Second Languages by Elizabeth Bernhardt at Stanford in fall 1997.
• Trained as a Chinese Speaking Test Rater

Publications: 

• A dozen of essays in Chinese in the fields of Chinese poetry, German poetry, East-West literary relations and Cultural Studies in the major Chinese magazines.

• One essay in English entitled "The Predicament of Postcolonial Criticism in Contemporary China " in Chinese Thought in a Global Context, edited by Karl-Heinz Pohl, Brill, 1999, 58-73. A selection of papers from the international symposium organized by Prof. Karl-Heinz Pohl of Trier University, Germany sponsored by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, held at Trier in April 12-14, 1997.

• For my (important) role in the contemporary cultural debate in mainland China please see Geremie R. Barmie's review essay "Orientalism," in New Asia Pacific Review, no. 2 (1997) 84-85.

A Selective Publication List (Articles are posted on my page)

 I.    Academic Writings

• “Yu Dafu and German Literature,” Fudan University Academic Journal, Humanities Edition, Issue 3, 1984, Shanghai (89-94).

• “A Tentative Discuss on the European Influences and Chinese Poetic Tradition in Fengzhi’s Poetry,” Literary Review, Issue  4, 1984, Beijing (74-88). The essay was quoted by Professors Wolfgang Kubin, Marian Galik, Andria Hsia, Goatkate Lantan in their studies on the literary relations between European and Chinese literatures.

•   “A Comparative Study on Li Po and Goethe’s Poetry,” Selected Essays of Fudan University Graduate Students, Shanghai, 1985 (120-131). The essay derives from a chapter of my master thesis and was republished in the “Dictionary of Literary Research,” Shanghai, 1992 (216-225).

•   “The Art of Translation: A Review of the Current Three Chinese Faust Translations,” Beijing Review of Books, Issue 11, 1983 (72-75).   

•  “Comparative Literature in China—History and Current Situation,” References for Literary Research, Issue 10, 1985, Beijing (12-18).

•   Contributed to Feng Zhi, The Sonneteer, edited by Wolfgang Kubin, Bonn: Internationes 1987 (Bilingual in Chinese and German, with introduction and translation of Feng’s 26 sonnets into German).

•   “Chinese Studies in Europe--History and Current Situation,” References for Literary Research, Issue 10, 1987, Beijing (20-24).

•   “The Non-European Otherness--From Orientalism to Occidentalism,” Beijing Review of Books, Issue 9, 1993 (3-9). Frontline essay, caused debate not only in China, but also in the West. Beijing Review of Books is the Chinese equivalent of The New York Review of Books, therefore quite reputable and influential. 

•   “The Trap of Freud’s Psychoanalysis, A Reading of De Leuze and Guttari’ Anti-Oedipus,” Beijing Review of Books, Issue 10, 1993 (78-86). The essay also discusses the possible application of the Freud’s theory in analyzing traditional Chinese “inner chamber poetry.”

•   “The Undermining of the Canon—A Report on the ‘Great Debate’ in the American Higher Education and its Relevance to the Chinese Cultural Reconstruction,” Beijing Review of Books, Issue 1, 1994 (117-124).

•   “Introduction to New Historicism,” Beijing Review of Books, Issue 9, 1994 (106-113). This introduction became a must-read assigned by their advisors for many graduate students in humanities in China. 

•   “Postcolonial Criticism Reconsidered,” Beijing Review of Books, Issue 10, 1994 (8-15). A response to the debate the first essay has initialized. This well-balanced frontline essay earned me quite some name and I was invited, as the only “graduate scholar” to Trier University, Germany in spring 1996 to give a talk on the transition of China images in the West at a symposium attended by the first ranking European and American China scholars (The Volkswagen Foundation paid everything for a very selective group of participants).     

•   “Backlash—The Antifeminist Thinking in Contemporary America,” frontline essay, Beijing Review of Books, Issue 8, 1995 (3-10). A timely publication when World Women Congress convened in in Beijing that very month. Just by chance, I served as interpreter for a media interview with American feminist Betty Friedan. 

•   “The Feminist ‘Fascist’—A Reading of Paglia’s Sexual Personae,” Beijing Review of Books, Issue 6, 1996 (29-37).

•   “The Feminist Turn,” Orient, Beijing, Issue 3, 1995 (40-46).

•   “Notes to Feminist Criticism,” Foreign Literature Review, Beijing, Issue 4, 1995 (34-41).

•   “The Probability of Cultural Colonialism,” an expanded version of “Postcolonial Criticism Reconsidered,” Tianya, Haikou, Issue 4, 1996 (43-58). 

•   “The Predicament of Postcolonial Criticism in China” in Chinese Thought in a Global Context--A Dialogue Between Chinese & Western Philosophical Approaches, ed. by Karl Heinz Pohl, Leiden. Boston. Koeln: Brill, 1999, pp. 58-72.

•  “Houzimin piping de diaogu”, a revised edition of the article above in Chinese, Shanghai, Wanxiang, 02/00, pp.112-118. 

•   “Linking Chinese Heritage School and the College Chinese Teachings in America,” in Essays on Chinese Education in the United, selected proceedings of the Third National Conference of Chinese School Association in the United States, FacificCom, 2000, pp.98-101.

II. Creative Writings

• Around twenty lyrical poems, ballads and literary essays in Chinese.

III. Translations

• Around 200 thousand words translated from German and English into Chinese in the fields of literary theories and cultural studies.

IV. Citations

 ( My name appears and my former works cited in the following U.S. magazines and books I happened to have read recently) 

• Comparative Literature, Summer 2001, in Gerald Gillespie’s review on Rilke und Weltliteratur, mention of my dissertation.
• Representations, Fall 2001, in Dai Jinhua’s essay “Behind Global Spectacle and the National Image Making.” 161-187. 
• Positions, Spring 2001. in Xu Ben’s essay on the Chinese Post-Scholarship, p. 185.
• New Left Review, No 237, October/November 1999, in Zhang Xudong’s essay “Chinese Modernism in the Era of Reform: Postmodernism and Postcolonial Society.”
• New Left Review, November/December 2000. In the interview with Dr. Wang Hui, the chief editor of Dushu, the Chinese equivalent of the New York Review of Books, about the response of my essays published in his magazine in the  middle Nineties, p. 85.
• Boundary 2, Fall 1997, in Arif Dirlik’s essay on Chinese Postcolonial Studies,  p.14.
• Haun  Saussy, Great Walls of Discourse and Other Adventures in Cultural China, Harvard University Press, 2001. Chapter 6, Postmodernism in China: A Sketch and Some Queries, p.127.
• Zhang Longxi, Mighty Opposites: From Dichotomies to Differences in the Contemporary Studies of China, Stanford University Press, 1998, p. 192. 

   

The first three presentations listed here were given at international conferences. For the conference in Beijing (workshop and conference of the International Association of Comparative Literature) I served as a panel chair; for the conference in Shangdong I served as the general secretary and interpreter for the international speakers. 

• "Reconsider Orientalism in Chinese Studies," Summer 1995, Beijing University and Spring 1996, Trier University.
• "The Dreams in the Dream in Red Mansion," Summer 1992, Bonn University.
• "Feminist Criticism in Chinese Studies," Summer 1995, Shandong University, Jinan, China.
•  “Linking Chinese Heritage School and the College Chinese Teaching in  America,” a presentation given at the Third National Conference of the Chinese School Association in the United States, Washington D. C., December 3-5, 1999, invited.
• “The Predicament of Postcolonial Criticism in China,” invited, CAPEC Faculty Lecture Series, George Mason University, 02/10/00.

• “The Problem of Chinese Sonnet,” invited by the Greater Washington D.C.  Chinese Literature Research Society, Twinbrooks Library, Rockville, MD, 10/21/00. The talk derives from a chapter of my dissertation which explores the similarity and likely connection between the classical Chinese poetry as represented by Li Po’s Fourteen-line Archaic Verse, the Arabic Poetry and the early Italian sonnet.

• “The Reception of Chinese Literature in the West and the Controversy of Nobel Literature Prize this Year,” invited, Chinese Cultural Forum, Library of Congress, 11/16/00. An overview of the reception of Chinese literature in the West and an introduction of the works by Gao Xingjian, the 2000 Nobel Literature Prize recipient.

• Title same as above, a talk given at the Northern Virginia Chinese Literature Reading Group, Fairfax City Library, 11/27/00.

• Discussant of the Panel: Women, Culture and Intellectuals of the Chinese Archives Conference “Framing History in the Metropolis: Shanghai Archives and Shanghai Studies”, May 5-6, 2001, Saturday and Sunday at National Archives II, College Park, Maryland.

• Guest Speaker of COMM 306, “Issues In the Intercultural Communication,” presented the Chinese understanding of “Education.”  Invited by Prof. Teresa Wray, 04-02-01.

• Guest Speaker of COMM 305, “Foundations of the Intercultural Communication,” presented the Chinese view of the Spy Airplane Incident. Invited by Prof. Teresa Wray, 4-25-01.

• “The German School of Modern Chinese Writers,” invited by the Greater Washington D.C.  Chinese Literature Research Society (The society decided to invite me to give a talk again this year for it’s Speaker’s Series, based on my good performance last year). Twinbrooks Library, Rockville, MD, 10/13/01.

•   02-18-02, Johnson Center, lecture on the significance of the lunar calendar and presenting the local dance academy for the Year of the Horse Celebration Event, sponsored by the University Life, CAPEC and Association of Asian American Faculty and Staff at Mason. 

• Guest Speaker of Anthropology 303, 4-26-02, invited by Professor David Haines who was enrolled in my Chin 101 that semester. 

• "Love, Romance and Marriage as Represented in the Traditional Chinese Poetry," lecture for the Teaching East Asia Workshop for High School Teachers of Prince William County, MD, 3/15/03, Saturday, UMD.

• Guest Speaker of Anthropology 303, 04-21-03, invited by Professor David Haines, representing China.

• International Poetry Reading Participant, in celebration of International Education Week, Sponsored by the Office of the Provost, Wed. Nov. 20, 2002.

• The Representation of Chinese Culture in the West and the Response of Modern Chinese Authors, Twinbrooks,  Library, Rockville, 10/20/03, organized by the Greater Washington D.C. Chinese Literature Research Society. 

• "Gender Disguise in the Western and Chinese Literatures," invited talk by the Greater Washington D.C.  Chinese Literature Research Society since my talk last year was extremely well received. 

• "Nowhere You Can Find Shangri-la," paper presented at the 2004 Southeast Conference of the Association of  Association of Asian Studies.

• "Reflection on the Role of the Faculty Director for an American Summer Program in China," proposed for the Princeton Conference on Teaching Chinese in April 2004.

• "Adding Chinese to a Traditional Modern Languages Department in America ," proposed for the First Conference of the International Chinese Teachers Association, Beijing, July 2005.

• "Teaching Chinese Numbers," proposed for the Conference of American Chinese Teachers Association, Rockville, Maryland, November 2005.  

 Services

      I. Departmental

•  Chinese Program Head. Coordinating and developing the Chinese Language Program. 
• Creating and maintaining the website of Chinese Program, all course materials published online every semester.
• Japanese Part-time Position Search Committee Coordinator in summer 2001. 
• Chinese Term Position Search Committee Chair, 2002.
• Chinese Term Position Search Committee Chair, 2003.
• German Term  Position Search Committee Member, 2003.
• German Tenure Track Position Search Committee Member, 2004. 
•   Capstone Committee Member, 2002-2003.
•   Budget Committee Member, 2001-2004.
• Committee on Languages Without Full-time Faculty, 2000-2003.
• Library liaison, 1999-2003.  

   

      II. College

• Committee of Other Language (COOL). A task force appointed by Dean Daniele Struppa to explore opportunities to offer less-commonly taught Languages.

• Literature Festival Preparation Committee, 2001. Suggested interesting books and guest speakers for the festival.

• Participated twice each year  in the university open house for the prospective student since I came to GMU.

• Student Appeals Committee, 2002-2005. 

      III. University

• Working with Dr. Lukacs of the Center for Global Education on establishing summer language program in China. In summer 2002 I lead the group to Xi'an Jiaotong University.  Program for 2003 was canceled due to SARS. In summer 2004 I brought students to Zhejiang University at Hangzhou. Summer 2005 we plan to go to Beijing Normal University. 

• Executive member of CAPEC, serving as curriculum coordinator of the Title VI Grant to develop Asian-related courses on campus.

• Marshal  for Commencements 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003.

• Occasionally serving as consultant for the Office of the Provost on China related matters.

• Faculty member of Phi Beta Delta of GMU branch since January 2002, thanks to Dr. Julie Christensen who inducted me in.

• Help organize Chinese fashion show and Chinese folkdance performance for GMU International Festival 2002.

     IV.  Professional Service in Community

•  Hope Chinese Heritage School, teacher 7-9 grades, 1999-2001, dean 2001-2002. Coordinated a working group in the Greater Washington Area, finishing two sets of SAT-II Chinese Mock Test to be used for Chinese Heritage Schools in  the country. This was a project of the American Chinese Heritage School Association and I was responsible for the Reading sections and final proof-reading of the tests. 
• Taught an elementary Tai-chi course for the Fairfax County Sport and Park Authority, winter 2000.
• Judge for  the Chinese Speech Contest of the Greater D.C. Area’s Chinese Heritage Schools, April 26, 03, at UMD.
• Judge for  the Chinese Speech Contest of the American College Students in the Mid Atlantic Region, May 11, 03, UMD.

   

• Committee of the Chinese Standard Test, eastern region, since June 2004.
• Consultant and proofreader of the Roseta Stone's Mandarin version of the Traveler software.

• Help the Greater D.C. American families adopting baby girls from China with the medical records translation. Volunteer job. I do the coordinating and editing for free, a GMU student does the translation, nominal fee paid to the student.

Work Eligibility

• Naturalized American citizen since September 2004.