Exhibition: Three Hundred Years of Chinese in Germany

Vernissage: Exhibition on Chinese Language by Confucius Institute at Freie Universität Berlin, Foyer of the Silberlaube, October 20, 2015. "Three Hundred Years of Chinese Language in Germany - Approaching a Distant Country" is the subject of a poster exhibition that will be on display from October 21 to November 1, 2015, in the foyer of the Silberlaube at Freie Universität. The display traces Germany's historic experience with the Chinese language. It begins in the 17th century with the acquisition of Chinese texts under the Great Elector Friedrich Wilhelm von Brandenburg, describes the professionalization of Chinese as a "living" language at the Department of Oriental Languages at the University of Berlin in 1887, and portrays the development of teaching Chinese at first as an "exotic" subject and finally as a subject taught as part of the official language program at secondary schools. The vernissage will be on October 20, 2015, in the foyer in front of the Lecture Hall 1a in the Silberlaube at Freie Universität. The exhibition focuses on the history of Chinese writing and language in Germany. It begins with the first attempts that German scholars made to acquire Chinese texts under the Great Elector, Friedrich Wilhelm von Brandenburg.