Online Intercultural Exchange Program between SJTU and The University of Warwick Successfully Held Again

From early October 2022, the School of Humanities of Shanghai Jiao Tong University held an online intercultural exchange program with the University of Warwick, one of the leading universities in UK. The program lasted for 8 weeks. SJTU master students majoring in international Chinese language education and Chinese language learners from the University of Warwick participated in this program.

The program was coordinated by associate professor Guo Zhiyan from the School of Modern Languages and Cultures, University of Warwick and associate professor Tan Xuhu from the Centre for International Chinese Language Education at the School of Humanities, SJTU. 

This program aims to help students from both universities develop their cross-cultural understanding and empathy. Other transferable skills such as language ability, digital literacy, problem solving, communication, teamwork are also expected to be cultivated. 

In early December, program participants presented their bilingual final projects on a variety of themes, including festivals, movies, traveling, high education, Chinese classic literature, stereotype etc. The final projects presentation showed program participants’ detailed exploration of cultural differences as well as their passion and understanding for different language and culture.

This is the second year of cooperation between the School of Humanities, SJTU and the University of Warwick. Students from both universities said that they had benefited greatly from this online exchange program in terms of language and intercultural awareness, and looked forward to having more opportunities to participate in similar activities in the future.

Both universities agree to make this project regular and offline in the near future.

Written and Photo by Tan Xuhu

Edited by Zhang Yihan