Article http://dx.doi.org/10.26855/tfll.2025.08.016

Five Significant Breakthroughs in Overseas Sinology During the Past Two Centuries

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Lauren F. Pfister

1Hong Kong Baptist University, Hongkong 999077, China.

2Hephzibah Mountain Aster Academy, Mountain Aster, CO 80422, USA.

*Corresponding author: Lauren F. Pfister

Published: July 28,2025

Abstract

Over the past two centuries, overseas sinology outside East Asia has experienced transformative shifts driven by missionary-scholars, large-scale translation and indexing projects, multi-volume studies of Chinese literature, bio-bibliographic encyclopedias, and landmark handbooks that have redefined the global understanding of Chinese intellectual and spiritual traditions. Rooted in the early cross-cultural endeavors of missionary translators in Hong Kong and sustained by interdisciplinary research and international collaborations, these breakthroughs collectively demonstrate how overseas sinology has both shaped and been reshaped by dynamic exchanges between Chinese and non-Chinese academic communities, stimulating new scholarship that continues to impact China and the world today.

Keywords

Sinology; Translation; Chinese works

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How to cite this paper

Five Significant Breakthroughs in Overseas Sinology During the Past Two Centuries

How to cite this paper: Lauren F. Pfister. (2025). Five Significant Breakthroughs in Overseas Sinology During the Past Two Centuries. Translation and Foreign Language Learning, 1(1), 94-103.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.26855/tfll.2025.08.016