Join us for the CHIME Conference at Sydney in 2026.

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29th CHIME CONFERENCE: Ecological Dimensions of Chinese Music

Submission deadline: 28 February 2026

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Submit your title and abstract here

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CHIME, founded in Europe in 1990, is a worldwide platform for scholars and students of Chinese music. This conference is sponsored by the China Studies Centre and hosted by the Sydney Conservatorium of Music at the University of Sydney.

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Chinese music has had a long-standing and highly significant role in environmental awareness within Chinese cultural worlds, especially as a crucial means for recording and transmitting cultural knowledge in ways that integrate physical experience and philosophical conceptualisations. These dimensions of Chinese music are particularly worthy of attention in this time of climate crisis, as our understandings of the role that cultural practices play in safeguarding biodiversity, enhancing environmental awareness, and promoting activities that reduce our ecological footprint are growing. Moreover, China’s important role as an emerging world leader in renewable energy has seen incredible investment in clean energy, and coupled with work towards overcoming other environmental challenges (such as establishing the 2022 Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework) indicates that Chinese attention to ecology and environment now extends well beyond the cultural sphere.

This conference theme therefore offers a timely platform for exploring the diverse forms and dimensions of the connections between Chinese music, environment and ecology in both contemporary and historical eras, as well as acknowledging the vital importance of understanding and appreciating our natural world in an era of global environmental crisis.

We welcome proposals for papers on this theme, considering (but not limited to) one or more of the following issues:

• Transmission of biocultural and environmental knowledge through Chinese musics

• Critical perspectives on tropes or idealism of the environment in Chinese musical genres·

• The impact of the environment in changing Chinese musical practices – from song lyrics, instrument materials and production processes, to the incorporation of renewable energy

• How local ecologies have shaped musical practice, and how musical practice intertwines with local ecology

• Chinese musical, sacred and ritual performances that connect with the environment

• Philosophical ideas of nature and their musical connections

• Environmental education and awareness through traditional Chinese music

• Exploring how the metaphor of nature is expressed musically – including sonic mimesis, tone painting and other approaches

• Chinese music and its connections with the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): for example, SDG12 “Responsible Consumption and Production: Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns” and SDG15 “Life on Land: Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss”

• The role of the environment in staged musical/theatrical performance and cultural sustainability and tourism – including site-specific musical productions

 

Presentation types:

1. Individual Papers: 20 minutes Presentation & 10 minutes Q & A

2. Panel Presentation: 90 minutes pre group, including Q & A

3. Alternative Formats (e.g., roundtables, performance-based presentations, films, etc.): 90 minutes per group

 

Conference Format: In-person only

Enquiry: yanping.zhang@sydney.edu.au

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Submit your title and abstract here

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Visit the conference webpage