Building DLB, Room 810
Tel. +852-34115339 (direct)
Email: breitung[at]gmail.com 

  INTERNATIONAL EXCHANGE
  

   Institutional collaboration

2004-2013 Initiated and facilitated the exchange of students and staff, joint research efforts, and formal institutional relations with several overseas universities on behalf of Sun Yatsen University (School of Geography and Planning and School of Tourism Management). Successful institutional relations were established with partner departments at University of Cologne, University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt, FH Westküste in Heide/Holstein, FH Stralsund (all Germany), MCI in Innsbruck (Austria) and the University of Basel (Switzerland). 

   International summer schools

Summer 2014 & Summer 2015 Organised two Sino-German-Japanese summer schools on "Transformation of Urban Landscapes" for the Department of Urban Planning and Design of Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University in collaboration with Ruhruniversität Bochum, Tongji University in Shanghai and Tsukuba University in Japan. Both summer schools comprised one session in Germany (Ruhr Region) and one session in China (Greater Shanghai Region) - each approximately ten days. Both summer schools were attended and co-organised by staff and students from all four universities.
 Programme Summer School 2014
Programme Summer School 2015

   Overseas fieldtrips

2002-2008 Organised four and co-organised two overseas fieldtrip for the Department of Geography of The University of Hong Kong - mostly to border regions in Europe (German/French/Swiss and German/Czech/Polish border regions). These trips are a compulsory part of the geography undergraduate curriculum at the Department. Three of them were conducted as joint activities of The University of Hong Kong and Sun Yatsen University in Guangzhou with students from both sides. The 2005 trip to the German-Polish border was financially supported by the German Academic Exchange Agency (DAAD) for the mainland Chinese participants.
Additionally to the fieldtrips from Hong Kong and China to Europe, several trips for groups from Germany, Switzerland, the Netherlands and the USA to the Pearl River Delta were also (co-)organised.
 

   Joint student supervision

Since 2002 In collaboration with overseas colleagues, seven Master students from Germany (Cologne, Mannheim, Kiel, Berlin), Switzerland (Bern) and the Netherlands (Utrecht, Nijmegen) were co-supervised in Guangzhou and Hong Kong, and one Chinese Master student was co-supervised in Eichstätt (Germany). In several cases, these exchanges were supported by the German Academic Exchange Agency (DAAD). Since 2011, two Chinese PhD students were co-supervised at University of Kiel (Germany) and University of Utrecht (Netherlands). These two projects were supported by the German Research Foundation (DFG), the China Scholarship Council (CSC) and the Research Development Fund of Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University.
 

   International research projects

2006-2014 As leader of three consecutive projects within the Priority Programme "Mega Cities, Mega Challenge - Informal Dynamics of Global Change" (SPP 1233) of the German Research Foundation (DFG), I was involved in a multi-year international and interdisciplinary research effort on various aspects of mega urban developments. The two study areas of the SPP were Dhaka (Bangladesh) and the Chinese Pearl River Delta. The local basis of the SPP in China was the School of Geography and Planning at Sun Yatsen University in Guangzhou. Regular meetings and workshops were held several times a year in Germany, Dhaka and Guangzhou. I have within the SPP collaborated closely with a team from Australian National University (Canberra) and several German partners.  
  Website of the Priority Programme

   Sino-German meetings and alumni network

Since 2009 Built up a network of Chinese scholars in (human) geography and urban planning, who have studied or worked in Germany. Many contacts among this group have been established or deepened during a first conference at Sun Yatsen University in Guangzhou in 2009 (funded and supported by the DAAD) and in several formal and informal follow-up meetings. An important event in this context was a Sino-German Seminar on Regional and Spatial Planning, organised in 2012 in Assmannshausen (Germany) with the Sino-German Centre for Research Promotion and the Department of Geography at Cologne University.
  see also Conferences and Workshops page

   Academic invitations overseas

Since 2006 Invited as visiting scholar (teaching and research collaboration) for one semester in 2008 at the Department of Geography of FU Berlin, and for one semester in 2011 at the Department of Geography of University of Heidelberg. The scholarship in Heidelberg was supported by the German Academic Exchange Agency (DAAD).  
Apart from these longer stays, I have also taught courses or course modules as guest professor at the University of Basel (2006), at TU Berlin (2008) and at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (2010-2012), and have been invited to give seminar lectures at numerous universities and other academic institutions in Germany, Austria, China, Korea and Japan.