The 2nd International Conference of Han-Character Education and Research was held at Yeungnam University in South Korea from October 21 to 23, 2011. The conference was jointly organized by the Korea Association for Han Characters and Classic Written Language Education, the Research Center for Folklore, Classics and Chinese Characters of Beijing Normal University, and the Center for Advancement of Chinese Language Education and Research of the University in Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

Chinese characters have unique positions in different Asian ethnic language families: South Koreans and the Japanese learn Chinese characters in their respective languages, people in Chinese mainland and Singapore learn simplified Chinese characters, and people in Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and China's Taiwan Region learn traditional Chinese characters. This conference aims to provide an exchange platform for scholars, researchers and teachers from various countries to discuss and exchange the basic theory of Han characters and the teaching curriculum, teaching materials, teaching methods and other aspects of the local language families. Nearly 200 experts and scholars from the Chinese mainland, China's Taiwan Region, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Macao Special Administrative Region, Mongolia, Japan, Singapore, the United States, and South Korea participated in the conference to discuss the theory and practice of Han characters and Han-character education, with over 60 papers submitted and discussed at the conference.

Jiang Yan, Associate Professor of the School of Culture and Communication of the China University of Labor Relations, was invited to give a keynote speech at the conference. She discussed the basic laws of Han characters from the perspective of their development history and evolution, and proposed new methods and ideas for Han-character education.

(School of Culture and Communication)