On June 25th, the Italian Embassy in China held a grand ceremony for the awarding of Order of Merit of the Republic of Italy. On behalf of the Italian government, Fang Lanyi, the Italian ambassador to China, awarded the Knight of the Order of the Star of Italy and a certificate of honour issued by the President of Italy to Associate Professor Yang Lin, Dean of the Italian Department of the College of Foreign Languages of Nankai University, for her contribution to the promotion of Italian studies in China, Italian language and culture teaching and Sino-Italian cultural exchanges and cooperation. Professor Yan Guodong, Dean of the College of Foreign Languages, and Shi Dou and Le Xiaoyue, teachers of the Italian Department, were invited to attend the ceremony with Yang Lin.
The award ceremony speech says, Professor Yang Lin has a profound academic background in Italian studies, has been active in the field of international academic research, and has written numerous books. As the head of the Italian Department of Nankai University, a well-known Chinese university, she has more than ten years of teaching experience of Italian language and culture in the university, and has served in a number of academic authorities of Chinese government. She is currently one of the most active Italian research experts in China. For many years, she has devoted herself to teaching Italian and has made great contributions to the spread and development of Italian studies in the Chinese university system. In addition to academic research and teaching, Professor Yang Lin has been focusing on promoting plenty of cultural cooperation and exchange projects between Italy and China for many years, and has worked with the Italian Embassy in China, its Cultural Center, the Italian Embassy in the area where she has lived and worked to facilitate communications between the two countries.
Yang Lin is a PhD from the University of Chicago, Dean of the Italian Department of the College of Foreign Languages of Nankai University, Deputy Dean of the Research Center for region and country studies of Nankai University, and a member of the Non-Universal Language Subcommittee of the Teaching Guidance Committee for Foreign Languages and Literature of the Ministry of Education. Since she worked in Nankai University in 2017, Yang Lin has made efforts to construct the Italian major, which lays a solid foundation for the development of the first Italian major for undergraduates in a key comprehensive university in China. Yang Lin is active in the field of cultural exchanges between China and Italy and is committed to building a bridge between the two countries. In 2019, Yang Lin published an article Friendship is the result of like-minded people in the People's Daily, which opened a new column Writing stories about New China; In 2020, she presided over the Joint Research Project between Chinese and Italian universities called The Influence of China-Italy Civil Aviation Cooperation on the Development of Cultural Tourism in the Two Countries under the Background of the Belt and Road Initiative, which has promoted international exchanges under the epidemic. Yang Lin organized the collaboration between our university and the Italian embassy, universities and institutions, and has yielded fruitful results. That Yang Lin won the “Order of the Star of Italy” is of great significance to strengthen friendly communications between our university, Tianjin and Italy.
It is reported that the Order of the Star of Italy is issued by the President of Italy and is an order granted by the government of the Republic of Italy to foreign citizens for their remarkable contributions to promoting friendship and collaboration between Italy and their countries.
