Around the 4th century CE, Buddhism was introduced to the Korean Peninsula. In the second year of King Sosurim’s reign in Goguryeo (corresponding to the second year of Emperor Xiaowu’s reign during the Eastern Jin, Hsien-an period), in the sixth month of summer, the Former Qin ruler Fu Jian sent envoys along with the monk Shundao, delivering Buddhist statues and scriptures. The king dispatched envoys in return to express gratitude and offer tribute. In the spring of the fifth year, the Xiao Men Temple was established to accommodate Shundao. Additionally, the Yifolan Temple was founded to house the monk Adao. These events are considered the earliest recorded evidence of Buddhism’s introduction to Haedong (ancient Korea). Subsequently, activities centered on revering the Buddha and seeking blessings gradually flourished.

The importation of Buddhist scriptures and treatises from Central China to Korea began as early as the Northern and Southern Dynasties period. According to the Samguk Sagi (Historical Records of the Three Kingdoms), Volume 4, Annals of Silla, under King Jinheung’s reign, in the 26th year and ninth month, the Chen dynasty sent the envoy Liu Si and the monk Mingguan to establish diplomatic relations and presented more than 1,700 volumes of Buddhist scriptures and treatises. During the Tang dynasty, the pursuit of Buddhist learning in Tang China became a prevailing trend, accompanied by the large-scale transmission of newly translated Buddhist texts eastward. Alongside these developments, significant transformations occurred in the religious landscape of the Korean Peninsula.

The thesis "A Comparative study of ecological thoughts in children's literature between East and West -- taking China and Germany as examples" mainly explores the heterogeneity and homogeneity of ecological thoughts in children's literature between China and Germany. The thesis is carried out from five aspects: first, it is about the history of Sino-German children's literature exchange and mutual learning; second, it is about the origin, generation and development of Sino-German children's literature ecological thoughts; then, it is about the isomorphism of Sino-German children's literature; and then it is about the heterogeneity and mutual learning elements of Sino-German children's literature ecological thoughts. Finally, it discusses the feasible ways for the future writing of ecological works of Chinese and German children's literature and the cultivation of children's ecological consciousness.

Abstract: The Minnan term cuò (厝), signifying dwelling, home, and homeland, transcends mere physical shelter. This ethnographic study, grounded in fieldwork within Minnan villages, reveals the “cuò” as a vital socio-ritual apparatus for managing the continuum of life and death. Etymologically rooted in Classical Chinese, “cuò” historically encompassed meanings of "placement" and "temporary interment." Villagers conceptualize an ideal “cuò” – termed "hó-sè ê cuò"(好勢的厝, a well-situated/favourable dwelling) – as requiring a specific spatial configuration: a front courtyard (chêⁿ, 埕) for productive activities (farming, animal husbandry) integrated with the residential structure (chhù, 宅), forming a cohesive chhù-chu (厝宅) unit. Within this space, complex thanatological practices unfold. Households enact "chng-pu̍t" (裝佛), enshrining effigies for kin who died unnaturally and thus lack ancestral hall veneration; these deities are affectionately called "a-pu̍t" (阿佛). Rituals for those dying naturally occur in the lineage ancestral hall (chó͘-chhù, 祖厝). Post-mourning, marked by the "ōaⁿ-âng"(換紅, changing to red) ceremony, involves affixing red couplets to the new cuò’s entrance and conducting "sóeⁿ-tûn" (筅塵), a thorough cleansing to expel impurity and welcome renewal. The liminal dead, known as "lâng-kheh"(人客, guest people), are appeased annually during the Pó͘-tō͘ (普渡) festival. Elaborate paper houses ("lâng-kheh-chhù", 人客厝), paper clothing ("lâng-kheh-saⁿ", 人客衫), and feasts are offered to them on the "gō͘-kha-ki"(五腳基), the covered arcade outside the main door. Through these intricate rituals enacted within and around the cuò, villagers negotiate mortality, placate the deceased, and seek blessings for household prosperity and wellbeing. Thus, the cuò emerges as a profoundly "hó-sè" space – a meticulously curated locale for the placement and relational intertwining of life and death.

Dubbed the “Black Venus” of the “Roaring Twenties” and the Jazz Age, American-born black female performer Josephine Baker made her fame as an icon of black cultural production in Paris via the bold presentation of her racialized and sexualized bodily performances such as the banana dance. Although she never gained the equivalent reputation in the United States, Baker’s Parisian career allowed her to subvert Western ideals and stereotypes of Black womanhood by simultaneously embracing, exaggerating, and satirizing the exoticized tropes projected onto her as a Black woman performer. Her self-styled “raced femininity” utilized body, movement, and theatricality to challenge exoticizing narratives, performing the desired “exotic” and “erotic” on the variety stage under the colonial “othering” gaze while showcasing Black female creative autonomy and ingenuity in the context of black transnationalism. Through an analysis of her sensational performances in 1920s and 1930s Paris, this paper explores how Baker deployed her body and stagecraft to challenge racial and gender norms, using her transatlantic celebrity as a platform to critique and redefine conceptions of Black femininity. Positioning Baker’s transnational performances parallel to her peers, vaudeville blueswomen active in 1920s America, where she was denied, this paper contends that Baker’s embodied performance of race and gender in a European setting exemplifies how Black women in the early 20th century used transnational stages to carve out new spaces for agency and self-expression that transcended geographic and social boundaries. Through the strategical use of performance as a means to craft self-determined narratives, Josephine Baker’s transnational performances resonate as dynamic expressions of Black artistic agency, racial identity, and gendered self-fashioning.