From April 18 to 20, 2019, the "Austrian Cultural Day" held by the College came to a successful conclusion. Experts and scholars from the University of Vienna, the University of Graz, and the Austrian Ministry of Science and Culture brought information-rich but interesting professional lectures. Teachers and students of the German Department of the college participated in the lectures. The "Austrian Cultural Day" was previously held in Beijing, Xi'an, Chongqing, Shanghai, and other places. This is the first time it has been held in Chengdu.

Professor Nikolaus Reisinger, from the History Department of Graz University, talked about Austria started from the initial history, such as the situation of the national unity of Austria, especially the great role played by the Hobbesian Dynasty and the Empress Theresia, to the development history of the later period of Austria. His presentation focused on the influence of the cultural atmosphere in Austria, especially Vienna at the end of the century.

Professor Stefan Krammer, from the Department of Germanic Language and Literature of the University of Vienna, presented on the cross-media expression forms of Austrian modern and contemporary works of literature, including songs, films, plays, and other adaptations.  His other presentation focused on Vienna as a literary stage and discussed modern and contemporary Austrian literary works with Vienna as the story site and plot background.

Gertrude Zhao-Heissenberger, Commissioner of the Austrian Ministry of Science and Culture brought two presentations: One focused on multilingual German and introduced the differences in pronunciation, vocabulary, and grammar of German, Austrian German and Swiss German with various examples; The other presentation was from the perspective of history and culture, introduced the coffee house culture of Vienna, a famous historical and cultural city, and its historical background, origin, and development, as well as its indissoluble bound with German writers.

On the afternoon of April 20, a series of activities of "Austrian Cultural Day" was held in the Foreign Language Salon of the college. Jimmy Brainless and Elias Hirschl, a combination of writers and musicians from Vienna, brought us a new reading activity with musical elements. The two artists cooperated guitar performance and works reading, showing the possibility of integrating national culture into literary works, cross-media adaptation of literary works, and thoughts about relevant teaching methods, which injected interest and vitality into the difficult German learning in the eyes of ordinary people.

 (From German Department)