On August 10, 2026, at the 13th International Congress of Mongolists in Ulaanbaatar, Professor Wang Hao, a doctoral supervisor in the Department of Asian-African Languages and Literatures at Peking University’s School of Foreign Languages, was awarded the Order of the Polar Star by President Ukhnaagiin Khürelsükh of Mongolia. The award recognizes her outstanding contributions to Mongolian studies and to dialogue and mutual learning between Chinese and Mongolian civilizations.

Professor Wang was the first person at Peking University to earn a PhD in Mongolian language and culture within the discipline of Asian and African Languages and Literatures, and the first in China to earn a PhD specializing in modern literature of Mongolia. She has long been devoted to Mongolian studies and research on Mongolia, and has made important contributions to translating Chinese and Mongolian classical texts into each other’s languages. Her monograph, Enlightenment and Construction: A Study of Ts. Damdinsuren’s Mongolian Literature, received second prize in the Eighth Outstanding Research Achievement Awards for Higher Education Institutions (Humanities and Social Sciences), presented by China’s Ministry of Education, and first prize in the monograph category of the Fourth China Awards for Outstanding Research in Less Commonly Taught Foreign Languages. In 2008, she received the Tsendiin Damdinsüren Medal from the Mongolian government, becoming the first Chinese scholar to receive the honor.

The Order of the Polar Star is Mongolia’s highest state honor, conferred on Mongolian citizens and foreign nationals who have made outstanding contributions to the country’s social development, cultural prosperity, academic advancement, and friendly international cooperation. At the ceremony, the President presented Professor Wang with the order and a certificate in recognition of her longstanding work to preserve and study Mongolian scholarly heritage.

The award recognizes Professor Wang’s decades of scholarship, as well as the achievements of Peking University’s Mongolian language program and the wider field of Mongolian studies in China. It also reflects the School of Foreign Languages’ longstanding strengths in country and area studies, the development of less commonly taught language programs, and intercultural exchange. Her recognition will further deepen mutual understanding and traditional friendship between the peoples of China and Mongolia.

Translated by Gao Yanshu