A recent workshop on an extinct and very rarely studied language opened a “brand new door to fresh historical perspectives” for Yale graduate student Yuan Chen.
Chen, who studies medieval Chinese history, participated in the Kitan Language Workshop, which presented her with a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” to learn about the ancient language developed by the Kitan people. The workshop, which took place May 11-19, was organized by Valerie Hansen, professor of history at Yale, and funded by the Council on East Asian Studies in the Whitney and Betty MacMillan Center for International and Area Studies at Yale, and the Edward J. and Dorothy Clarke Kempf Memorial Fund. It was led by Daniel Kane, an Australian sinologist and linguist who has spent more than a decade on the study of the Kitan language and scripts.
Read the full article at Yale News.