UK-China Humanities Alliance (UKCHA)
The UK-China Humanities Alliance (UKCHA) is a grouping of some of the best universities in the UK and China, focusing on developing research and connections in the Humanities.
In our present era of globalisation, the humanities have an increasingly important role to play in enhancing mutual understanding and trust, and shared goals underpinned by research excellence. Universities have the responsibility to foster globally-engaged research, provide high-quality education, and prepare future leaders with a comprehensive understanding of the complex issues that define this age; these objectives are best achieved in an international context.
In 2016 UKCHA was founded as a cross-institutional structure to facilitate collaboration in humanities research and education.
The University of Exeter is currently the lead UK institution in UKCHA, with responsibility for liaising with the Secretariat based at Tsinghua University and helping to coordinate UKCHA activity in the UK. The consortium enjoys strong relations with the British Council in Beijing and benefits from past and present British Council funding.
The UK-China Humanities Alliance brings together scholars from leading universities in China and the UK in mutually respectful dialogue and intellectual exchange. The arts and humanities are right at the heart of our education and research activities at Exeter and so much of what we do is enriched by working with our wonderful partners all over the world.
Friendships and connections built through the UKCHA can endure for many years, leading to exciting joint research and new opportunities.
Read more from Prof Lisa Roberts
Prof Lisa Roberts
Vice Chancellor University of Exeter
About us
The contemporary era of economic globalisation, as another phase of the longue durée of modern world history, has been changing and will continue to change the human geographies of the world across all nations and regions, involving no less than a reproduction of humanity and social life itself on an unprecedented scale in human history. It has often been remarked that we live in a time of superfast, hyper-transformative technological innovation and economic growth, when lived histories and intellectual legacy of human beings have been rendered insignificant.
Meanwhile, the deepening sense of uncertainty in social belonging and the ground-gaining of cultural parochialism in various forms have become a world-wide phenomenon, raising questions about the meaning of the economic achievement that have brought dramatic growth of wealth and opportunities to the world. Amidst such sea change, humanities education centred on cross-cultural knowledge production and cultural exchange and fusion has taken on ever greater historical significance. However new the globalised technology becomes, however huge the wealth accumulates, it is the ways in which they are articulated with the formation of the individual human beings, communities, nations and countries of all kinds that ultimately matter, bringing tremendous and long-lasting consequence to the present and future, as it did in world history.
In the spirit of such a recognition, Tsinghua University proposed the initiative of establishing an Association for the Humanities in Higher Education (China-UK), as a cross-institutional mechanism for cross-cultural, transnational, and global dialogues, conversations and collaborations in the humanities and humanities education.
The UK-China Humanities Alliance (UKCHA) is an international grouping for humanities in higher education initiated by Tsinghua University, with a membership of seven Chinese and ten UK leading universities. Members share the common recognition that humanities exchange in international relations has ever-increasing importance in enhancing mutual understanding and trust and in promoting the progress of human civilization, and that universities have the ability to provide high-quality education, lead the humanities exchange, and prepare future leaders with a comprehensive understanding of the complex issues that define this age.
UKCHA projects have been supported by British Council funding. In 2021, the Alliance successfully obtained an Enabling Grant from the British Council to strengthen UK-China institutional partnerships through academic collaboration. The project, (Re-)connecting Research in China, promotes shared understanding, joint research, and networking opportunities for scholars of UK and Chinese institutions, including through supporting Fellowships for Chinese humanities scholars to undertake research activity with UKCHA partners in the UK, and other forms of research collaboration.
Organisation
The Alliance has established an Executive Council and Secretariat. Prof YANG Bin, Vice President of Tsinghua University, serves as the Chair of the Alliance. The Executive Council is composed of delegates from UKCHA member institutions. The Secretariat is housed at the Institute for World Literatures and Cultures (IWLC), Tsinghua University; the Dean of IWLC, Prof YAN Haiping, serves as the Director of the Executive Council and the Secretary-General. The Secretariat acts on the recommendations of the Executive Council and the Alliance and manages UKCHA affairs.
Since December 2020, the University of Exeter serves as the UK-based coordinator of UKCHA, facilitating the delivery of activities among UKCHA member institutions in the UK and the communication and coordination with the Secretariat. Prof Li Li, Associate Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Global Engagement, sits on the UKCHA Secretariat as Deputy Secretary-General and coordinates the work for the Alliance among the member universities in the UK.
Our Members
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Established in 2016, the Alliance comprises 17 leading colleges and universities from China and the UK. Initiated by Tsinghua University and co-founded by the members, its Secretariat is housed in Institute for World Literatures and Culture (IWLC), Tsinghua University.
To see the full membership list, please click here.