[4] Dyserinck demanded critical research of mutually existing (ideological) auto-images and hetero-images current in "national literatures" like the French and the German that influenced each other.
[12] When Fang returned to China in 2006, Professor Wolfgang Kubin saw "a good scholar" leaving the country (i.e., Germany) and regretted this very much.
[13] Subsequent to his return to his native country in 2006, Fang soon became a professor at the School of Chinese Language and Literature of Beijing Normal University, and a researcher at the Center for Literary and Art Studies.
When this book appeared in print in 2011, it was discussed in the journal China Reading Weekly (Chine lecture hebdomadaire).
[19] In China, the journalist Guo Enqiang published an article in the Chinese Social Science Journal that referred explicitly to the ideas and hypotheses regarding the history of concepts that were expressed by Fang in the book reviewed by Leutner and Kubin.
[20] In addition to the books he wrote or edited and his scholarly articles, Fang also organized several international scholarly conferences at Beijing Normal University (BNU) in recent years under the general heading "Ideas and methods" (Sixiang yu fangfa); thus for instance a conference focused on the dialogue between the East and the West that was announced under the heading: Sixiang yu Fangfa: Quanqiuhua Shidai Zhongxi Duihua de Keneng / Idées et méthodes: Possibilités d'un dialogue sino-occidental à l'ère de la mondialisation (Ideas and methods: Possibilities of a Chinese-Western Dialogue in the Era of Globalization).
Their contributions were published in 2018 by Palgrave Macmillan in the book Tensions in World Literature : Between the Local and the Universal, edited and with a long introduction by Weigui Fang that reveals his dedication to an approach inspired by conceptual history as well as his universalist commitment to the dialogue between nations.
Subsequent to the above-mentioned conference on world literature organized by Fang in 2015, two other conferences have been organized by him at BNU: - Sixiang yu fangfa: Lishi Zhongguo de Nei yu Wai / Ideas and Methods: Changing Order, Interlaced Civilizations: Inside and Outside of the historical China.
As Prof. Wang (Academia Sinica, Taipei) noted, Fang discusses in this book "the paradigm shift and conceptual changes surrounding the wenming concept in the intellectual history of modern China.
[26] The Swiss newspaper Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ) and the German weekly news magazine Der Spiegel referred to Fang as a literary theorist, while the Chinese daily Renmin Ribao (人民日報) introduced him to its readers as a scholar, a translator of German literature, and a "distinguished professor" at Beijing Normal University, who specializes in literary theory and the history of concepts.
Thus he called him a "highly talented sinologist" when he reviewed Fang's translation of 155 poems by the Classical Chinese poet Bai Juyi).
[29] The German sinologist Karl-Heinz Pohl, professor emeritus of the University of Trier, also praised Fang on several occasions.
ISSN 0044-8699), published by the Oriental Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences praised his article "Yi, yang, xi, wai and other terms: The Transition from Barbarian to Foreigner in Late Imperial China" by stating : "This study is an excellent example of the role of lexicology" if it is practiced with "such competence.
[34] Fang's research on the evolution (or changing history) of the image of China in German literature found wide reception among colleagues in East Asia and in the West.
[35] Fang Weigui was awarded the title of a Distinguished Professor by Beijing Normal University and he is a Changjiang Scholar.