The Centre for Culture, Communication and Society (CCCS) is a research hub with activities spanning the arts, humanities, and social sciences. At the same time, the Centre works in partnership and dialogue with scientific and technological research.
We foster research that is interdisciplinary, international in outlook, intercultural in content, and impactful on the wider community of Suzhou.
Our main activities are collaborative research and intellectual exchange within our research groups and through a fellowship programme of international scholars. Hosting up to 10 visiting fellows each year, CCCS research groups address the complex challenges facing the world today through a range of disciplines.
Working with the XIPU Institution (XJTLU’s think tank), we promote public-facing research and creative activities (with particular pertinence to Suzhou and the wider Yangtze Delta region), prioritise socio-culturally relevant scholarship, and ensure that our outputs are relevant to policy-making.
Moreover, as a University Research Centre devoted to scholarship across questions of culture, communication and society, and as a vital intellectual contributor to a city that is both global in outlook and possessed of a rich heritage, we also seek to host intercultural research. We bring Chinese experience and context to bear on world issues and vice versa.
Our central mission is to work towards a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts.
In addition to research group meetings and seminars, CCCS also oversees the following activities:
Comprising scholarly talks, films, and creative workshops, the proposed XJTLU Arts and Culture Festival will connect the University’s educational activities with creative practitioners and intellectuals in Suzhou, as well as broader audiences. It will span a spectrum of Eastern and Western perspectives, and serve as a bridge between Suzhou’s ancient heritage and its new and vibrant role as an international city.
The Festival will reach out to audiences in the city, giving them access to expert knowledge on issues close to the hearts of residents of Suzhou and Jiangsu more widely. It will also connect with and help to grow Suzhou’s local creative and cultural industries, regenerating Suzhou as an urban space. Moreover, it will be a living example of successful cultural policy for Suzhou city.
The XJTLU-CCCS visiting/virtual fellowship programme is one of the Centre’s major initiatives. Every year, CCCS invites mid-career and senior scholars whose research records and current plans fall within the purview of one of the CCCS research groups.
Over the course of the visiting (or, if appropriate, virtual) fellowship, fellows shall: give research seminars and expert workshops; contribute to and collaborate with research groups; work with research groups on collaborative projects with a view to applying for external funding; and produce research outputs as appropriate. Fellowship application calls will be advertised here and more widely through jobs and fellowship websites.
