President’s Award for Outstanding Performance in Scholarly Work

Professor Zhang Hongsheng
Department of Chinese Language and Literature

Professor Zhang Hongsheng is one of the leading scholars of classical Chinese literature, especially in the areas of Song literature, Ming-Qing literature and Ci poetry.  He has published an enormous corpus of work including 14 books and 98 journal papers, most of which appeared in tier-one journals.  He obtained a General Research Fund grant from the Research Grants Council in 2011 for a project on Ming-Qing Ci poetry, a success hard to achieve in the literature field. 

Professor Zhang’s research work in Qing Ci poetry is believed to have boosted the development of a new domain of scholarship.  He presided over the compilation of Quan Qingci (全清詞) in a prominent State Humanity and Social Science Project, and edited the series Qingci Zhenben Congkan (清詞珍本叢刊), providing valuable groundwork for the study of classical Chinese literary history.  His studies on the School of Jianghu (江湖詩派) have also broadened and deepened research into Song Dynasty poetry. 

Professor Zhang’s outstanding scholarship has earned him numerous honours and awards, including a First Class Award of the Xia Chengtao Ci-poetry Research Award (夏承燾詞學獎一等獎) in 2012 and a First Class Award of the Excellent Academic Works Prize presented at the 8th Conference of University Presses in East China Region (華東地區大學出版社第八屆學術著作一等獎) in 2009.  His research efforts have also received internal recognition, as evident from the Faculty Award for Outstanding Performance in Scholarly Work presented to him in 2011. 

As a recognized expert in his field, Professor Zhang actively participates in a variety of international academic activities.  He was the first Chinese scholar to be the keynote speaker in the Hsiang Lectures in Chinese Poetry at McGill University of Canada in 2001.  He serves as Vice-President of the Ming Literature Studies Council of China and Ci Poetry Association of China, as well as Director of Song Literature Studies Council of China.  He also receives frequent invitations to sit on editorial boards of respected journals in the classical Chinese literature field. 

The Selection Committee finds Professor Zhang’s influential and meticulous research work on classical Chinese literature and poetry vastly admirable and agrees that he is a deserving recipient of the President’s Award for Outstanding Performance in Scholarly Work.