• Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer

  • ABOUT
    • Greetings from the Department Chair
    • Department History
    • News
    • Affiliates
    • Support
    • Contact EALAC
  • PEOPLE
    • Faculty
    • Administration
    • Graduate Students
    • Recent Alumni
  • PROGRAMS
    • Undergraduate
    • Graduate
    • Language Programs
    • Academic Year 2025-2026 Courses
  • EVENTS
  • SUPPORT

Faculty-Discipline

Lening Liu

Lening Liu

Professor of East Asian Languages and Cultures, Coordinator of Classical Chinese

Office: 626 Kent Hall
Office Hours: T/R 1PM-2:30PM
Phone: (212) 854-7036
Email: ll172@columbia.edu

Educational Background

PhD: Linguistics, University of Florida (1996)
MA: History of Chinese Language, Shaanxi Normal University (1985)
BA: Chinese Language and Literature, Shaanxi Normal University (1982)

Classes Taught

CHNS GU4516 Fifth Year Chinese I
CHNS GU4518 Fifth Year Chinese II
CHNS GU4301 Intro to Classical Chinese
CHNS GU4302 Introduction to Classical Chinese II
CHNS GR5001 Chinese Linguistic and Pedagogy

Research Interests

Linguistics
Historical Syntax
Discourse Grammar
Chinese Language Pedagogy

Lening Liu was born and raised in Xi’an, China. In 1977, right after the Cultural Revolution, he entered college as part of an extremely select group of students to finally end years of disruption of higher learning in China. He came to the United States in 1990 and studied linguistics at the University of Florida. He joined Columbia’s faculty in 1995 and received his Ph.D. in 1996. He has published a number of articles on the evolution of Chinese conjunctive adverbs, the rhetorical structures of Chinese, the history and innovation of Chinese pedagogy, etc. Courses he has taught include Introduction to Classical Chinese, Readings in Classical Chinese, History of Chinese Language, Educational Chinese Linguistics, Chinese Language Pedagogy and all levels of Modern Chinese. Currently, Liu is Professor of East Asian Languages and Cultures. He also directs the Chinese Language Program and serves as the co-director of the Certificate Program of Teaching Chinese to Speakers of Other Languages.

Publications

Handbook for Chinese Teachers Beijing Language University Press, 2017; co-author)
Proceeding of the First International Conference on Modern Linguistics and Chinese Education (Beijing Language and Culture University Press, 2016; co-author)
Studying in China (Peking University Press, 2014; co-author)
Approaching China (Peking University Press, 2015; co-author)
A Course on Intercultural Communication (Higher Education Press, 2013; co-author)
Experiencing China (Peking University Press, 2013; co-author)
Contemporary Chinese Reader (Peking University Press, 2011; co-author)
International Standards for Teaching Chinese to Speakers of Other Languages (Foreign Language Study and Teaching Publisher, 2007; co-author)
Everyday Chinese (Thompson Publications, 2006; co-author)
Pedagogical Chinese Grammar (Beijing Language University Press, 2017)
Legal Chinese (Beijing, Foreign Language Study and Teaching Publisher, 2007; co-author)
A Primer of Classical Chinese (Columbia University Press; co-author)
A Primer of Chinese (Columbia University Press, 2003; co-author)
The Grammaticalization of Chinese Conjunctive Adverbs (The University of Michigan Press, 1996)
A Concise Dictionary of Chinese Traditional Linguistics (Shaanxi People’s Press, 1990; co-author).
A Study of Zhuoan Yunwu (Zhonghua Book House, 1988; co-author)

Tuo Li

Tuo Li

Adjunct Associate Research Scholar

Email: tl2258@columbia.edu

 

Tuo Li is a writer and critic from mainland China. He has written fiction and scripts for films and authored numerous essays on Chinese literature, cinema and art. He is the editor of several major Chinese literature anthologies, especially of experimental literature. His editorial responsibilities include influential literary journals Beijing Literature in the 1980s, Shijie (Horizons) in the 1990s-2000s, and currently Jintian (Today).

 

Yahui Anita Huang

Yahui Anita Huang

Associate Research Scholar

E-mail: yah2109@columbia.edu

Anita Huang was born in Taipei, Taiwan. She received her PhD in Linguistics from the University of Texas at Austin in 2010. Her principal academic specializations include Chinese linguistics, pragmatics, philosophy of language, second language pedagogy, and language for specific purposes. She has ten years of experience in building college Chinese programs and in teaching Chinese language, culture, and general linguistics courses. She also works as an interpreter and translator. Her current research interests lie in politeness in historical and contemporary Chinese and qi in Chinese culture. She speaks German, English, Mandarin, and Southern Min.

Dissertation
“On the Form and Meaning of Chinese Bare Conditionals: Not Just Whatever”

Selected Publications

“Chinese politeness and notion of face: the case of buhaoyisi,” Proceedings of the 19th Meeting of the Texas Linguistics Society, pp. 1-16, 2020. https://tls.ling.utexas.edu/2020tls/TLS19_Conference_Proceedings.pdf

“On the Practice of Cultivating Body-and-Mind: The Religious Significance of Zhu Xi’s Confucian Hermeneutics,” by Peng Guoxiang, translated by Daniel Coyle and Yahui Anita Huang, in Zhu Xi Now, New York: SUNY, 2015.

“Teaching Business Chinese: The Importance and Methodology of Building Pragmatic Competence and the Case of Buhaoyisi,” Scholarship and Teaching on Languages for Specific Purposes, pp. 110-121, 2013.

Courses Taught
Elementary Chinese
Intermediate Chinese
Chinese for the Workplace (Business Chinese)
Chinese for the Professions (Medical Chinese)
Reading Chinese Media
Conversation Chinese
Explorations of Qi “Life-energy” (in English)
How Language Works (in English)

  • « Go to Previous Page
  • Go to page 1
  • Interim pages omitted …
  • Go to page 12
  • Go to page 13
  • Go to page 14
  • Go to page 15
  • Go to page 16
  • Interim pages omitted …
  • Go to page 21
  • Go to Next Page »

Before Footer

EALAC – Columbia University
407 Kent Hall 1140 Amsterdam Ave.
MC 3907  New York, NY 10027
tel:212.854.5027

Footer

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Twitter
  • ABOUT
  • PEOPLE
  • PROGRAMS
  • EVENTS
  • SUPPORT

Copyright © 2025 · Columbia University Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures

Copyright © 2025 · EALAC on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in