Cultural Series Donated to Help Sino-U.S. Relations

In order to help strengthen the relationship between the United States and China, China International Publishing Group (CIPG) donated the Culture and Civilization of China book series to the U.S. Embassy in Beijing Friday.

U.S. Ambassador Jon Huntsman and CIPG Vice President Huang Youyi attended a ceremony for the donation.

The series program, which started in the 1990s, is jointly published by CIPG and Yale University. The books, printed in different languages, consist of three branches illustrated studies, Chinese literary classics and Chinese philosophical works.

During the ceremony, Ambassador Huntsman carefully held the book Three Thousand Years of Chinese Painting and read it with great interest.

"Today, I feel very happy to receive these books," he said. "Through them, like the book in my hand or the book Chinese Architecture, you can have an easier understanding of Chinese history. You can feel the beauty of its culture."

He praised the work of American and Chinese scholars as a "critically important and difficult task." The books cover different aspects of Chinese history, such as art, silk and pottery.

He said these bilingual books are easy for readers to study.

"The books lay out many details for people to better understand, and I will put them into the Embassy's library so that more people can share with me," he said.

CIPG Vice President Huang Youyi said that the academic value, the mode of cooperation and the achievements of the project have attracted attention among government and academic circles in China and the U.S.

Huang said, "The project has created a new mode of co-publishing. Yale's partnership with CIPG is an important element of our long-standing relationship with U.S."

In April 2006, Chinese President Hu Jintao visited the U.S. and presented Yale University with some Chinese books, including this series.

Huang said, "That the fruit of our cooperation has played an important role in the friendly exchange between our two countries is the best reward for our hard work over all these years."

Huang said CIPG will publish another two books -- Chinese Ceramics and Chinese Textiles -- in the next few years.

In recent years, with the rapid development of this ancient country, learning Chinese has become popular all over the world. China's Confucius Institute Headquarters predicated that the number of people learning Chinese around the globe will soar to 100 million this year.

"There are also many American people who are learning Chinese, and they are very interested in the Chinese culture," Huntsman said. "I'm glad to see that people from both sides have a strong wish to know each other; this is helpful to our -- U.S. and China -- relationship.

"You must understand your roots in your history in order to understand your future," he said.

To date, CIPG has published seven books under the Culture and Civilization of China series: Three Thousand Years of Chinese Painting, Chinese Architecture, Key Concepts in Chinese Philosophy, Balanced Discourses, The Formation of Chinese Civilization: an Archaeological Perspective, Chinese Calligraphy and Chinese Sculpture.

CIPG is China's largest professional organization dedicated to foreign language publications, and it is affiliated with a number of publishing and magazine agencies. In 2006 CIPG exported China's largest volume of copyrighted material. Yale, as a world-renowned university, also enjoys a solid reputation in the field of language-related publications.

(China.org.cn July 24, 2010)