Aiming to strengthen the students’ understanding of Australian modern literature and promote the academic communication between Australia and China, recently, the 24^thMaster Forum of the School of Foreign Languages was held in Room 846, No.1 Main Building on South Campus and famous Australian poet and writer Glen Phillips was invited to give an academic lecture entitledOverview Australian Modern Literaturethere.

Before the lecture, Vice President Zhao Hong met the Phillips accompanied by Xi Zhaohui, the Director of Department of International Cooperation and Exchanges.

Now living in Perth, Western Australia, Mr. Phillips was born in 1936 and he is the honorary professor of the Edith Cowan University, director of the International Natural Landscape and Languages Center, former chairman of Australian Writers Association and its lifelong honorary member, the founder and lifelong honorary member of Catherine, Susanna and Phillips Foundation, member of Australian English Teachers Association, chairman of International PEN (Perth), member of Western Australian Writer Council, and executive member of Peter Cowen Writer Center and Children’'s Books Council. As the author of the collections of poems includingShanghai Suite(2009),Singing Granites(2008),Contrary Rhetoric(2008),Spring Burning: Poems(1999) and so on, he is an important figure in Australia modern literature.

The lecture was chaired by associate dean of the School of Foreign Languages Guo Hong and the teachers from the English Department and Foreign Language Teaching Department as well as the senior students and postgraduates of the school attended the lecture.

In the lecture, Professor Phillips specified the current status of Australian literature, analysed the works by many Australian poets and writers as well as himself, and he concluded his lecture by the practical examples of Chinese language and culture teaching in Australian schools and the Chinese language and culture teaching through the cooperation between the Australian and Chinese schools. The wonderful lecture won rounds of applause from the audience from time to time.

After the report, many teachers and students still didn't want to leave, going on to exchange ideas on the issues they were interested in. (Photo by Yang Jianrui)