Graduate Students

I was born and raised in Florida. I have studied Chinese since high school. From FSU, I have a BS in neuroscience and equivalent coursework for a BA in Chinese language and culture; I pursued a career in the humanities for my M.A. degree, which is in EALC with a focus on Chinese language and culture. I have been an avid reader of science fiction and fantasy since childhood. My academic research interest is in Chinese diasporic literature, with my past work focusing on neuroaesthetic analysis of these works. My notable research thus far has focused on Nieh Hualing’s work Mulberry and Peach.

Yan’s research focuses on the translingual literary and media works that have been gaining prominence in East Asia since the 1990s. In these works, Japanese, Korean, and Chinese languages intermingle; Tokyo, Seoul, Shanghai, and Taipei are juxtaposed; the histories of ancient China, colonial Japan, and the Cold War are revisited; and Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Taiwanese, zainichi (“residents in Japan”), and zanryūkoji (“Japanese orphans left in colonies”) identities are contested. By analyzing these works, Yan’s dissertation traces the contemporary intraregional flows of people, languages, media forms, and cultures capable of changing the parameters of national and linguistic identities. Meanwhile, his analysis examines language not only in its functional meaning but also in its ontological aspect in the East Asian translingual milieu. 

Yan’s academic concerns also include two minor topics: kitsch, visuality, and modernity of Japanese literature in the Taisho period, and Shanghai urbanization and media representations in the 1990s.

Before joining Stanford, Yan received an M.A. in Japanese Culture Studies from Nagoya University and an M.A. in Asian and Middle Eastern Studies from the University of Minnesota at Twin Cities.

Pelin Çılgın is a film critic, curator, and PhD student researching Japanese literature, culture, and film. They currently curate films for several international and local NGOs and organizations with a focus on queer, genre, and East Asian works, and they are a jury member for the KORK International Horror Film Festival, the only horror film festival in Turkey.

Pelin has a BA in Business Chinese from Beijing Language and Culture University, China, and an MA in Film and Television from Istanbul Bilgi University, Turkey. For their BA thesis written and defended in Mandarin Chinese, they did a comparative analysis of Japanese and Chinese manga/manhua and anime/donghua industries in terms of historical development, economic value, and cultural soft power. Then, they pivoted to research body horror and gore in Japanese horror cinema from a queer lens for their MA thesis. They aim to expand this MA topic to include other forms of Japanese horror visual media for their PhD research, and also discover Sinophone horror. Academic research areas include Japan, the Sinosphere, film/media studies, film curation, online cultures, horror studies, and queer feminist readings.

Alumnus of prestigious film professional programs like the Berlinale Talents, Talents Sarajevo, and more. Bylines as a critic include Senses of Cinema, Cineuropa, Zippy Frames, among others. Voting member under the film critic/journalist branch at the European Film Academy.

Anthony Comeau holds a B.A. (Hons) from NYU Shanghai and an A.M. from Harvard University. He is broadly interested in comparative literature and political thought and its history–especially the reception of canonical thinkers in modern China, the West, and the Hispanosphere.

In my dissertation, “Wen and Wu: The Figure of the Soldier and the Limits of Violence in PRC Culture,” I aim to challenge current understandings of PRC political culture, provide an immanent critique of PRC state violence from within the PRC's own premodern and socialist traditions, and reveal potential critical resources for addressing global environmental injustice from a non-western, ecocritical standpoint. To do so, I explore the reception in PRC culture of premodern warrior depictions, including those from frontier poetry, historical accounts, and novels. By putting theories of political theology into conversation with ecocriticism and Neo-Confucianist ideas on the continuity of being in Chinese culture, I contend that the incorporation of such depictions into the figure of the modern soldier reflects a particular PRC mode of modern state violence.

In addition to my dissertation research, I have pursued extensive coursework in second language pedagogy, have taught Mandarin Chinese as a second language at the university and high school levels, and am currently teaching Mandarin Chinese as an Assistant Professor at the United States Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California. 

I am a sociocultural linguist who with research interests in Japanese, gender and sexuality, and identity, sociophonetics, discourse analysis, trans linguistics, and linguistic anthropology. As a trans and queer scholar, my main interests revolve around investigating transnational queer positionalities and how language is used to construct shifting sociopolitical understandings of queerness as it shaped by movement. My PhD research revolves around the construction of prototypically gendered sentence-final particle "wa" and its deployment among trans speakers. 

Coming from an interdisciplinary background, I believe that linguistics is inherently tied to social justice work and aim to dismantle systems of hegemonic powers through the work I do, particularly as a trans Asian-American scholar myself. 

In my spare time I hang out with cats, travel, and boulder!

I am a Chinese-American. Born in Maryland and moved to Hong Kong in 2013, causing my life to be full of straddling cultural boundaries. My main interests are art, history, science fiction, literature and ecology, which I have always been passionate about from a young age. I obtained a B.A. in History and Fine Arts from HKU, a M.A. from UChicago (MAPH) with a heavy focus on science fiction and ecology, and a MPhil in Humanities at HKUST with research into contemporary Chinese exiles. One of my central interests is reimagining the relations between the human and the non-human. It is integral to my PhD research into Chinese environmental literature and cinema which explores human/nonhuman relations, industrialization, globalization, slow violence, ethnic minority cultural beliefs towards nature and social/ecological justice. My research will encompass the works of directors and writers including Li Ruijun, Jia Zhangke, Shen Congwen, Alai, and more. I intend to explore how the ecocritical themes in these works relate to ecocritical themes on an international scale.

Gary Hung is a first-year Ph.D. student in the Chinese Archaeology program at the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at Stanford University. His main research focuses on the past human migration by exploring human-animal relationships and environmental adaptations. He is particularly interested in the Austronesian dispersal and the Tapenkeng Culture that shaped the early Neolithic settlements in Taiwan. By utilizing faunal and human remains, he hopes to integrate interdisciplinary molecular methods to explore the matrix of early migration networks in southeast Asia, and subsequently, define their connection to broader adaptation behaviours and cultural influences. Gary has done fieldworks in Canada, Jordan, United States, Ukraine, and Taiwan. 

Prior to joining Stanford, Gary received his MSt in Archaeology from University of Oxford and a joint BA in Anthropology and Archaeology & Heritage Studies from Wilfrid Laurier University. He then worked as a research assistant between National Cheng Kung University and National Museum of Prehistory in Taiwan.

My broader fields of interest are pragmatics, sociolinguistics, and linguistic anthropology. I investigate into mundane discourse which facilitate hegemonic power structures in a variety of spaces. My study aims at shedding light on such ideological phenomena in various social spaces and to re-think how each individual can empower those who are often marginalized from such hegemonic discourse. I'm looking forward to working with scholars from trans-disciplinary perspectives to eventually make my research accessible to audience from diverse socio-cultural background. In my free time, I do love cooking different types of world's cuisine following YouTube cooking videos. I also enjoy music and singing as well.

Eunkyo Kang (she/her) is a Ph.D. student in Korean Literature and Culture at Stanford University’s Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures. She holds holds a Master of Arts in Women’s Studies from Ewha Womans University and a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy from Yonsei University in Seoul. She has been researching DJUNA’s work for the past several years and co-organized a forum commemorating the 30th anniversary of DJUNA’s literary debut in 2024. While her master’s thesis examined DJUNA’s science fiction through a feminist lens, her current research explores DJUNA’s position within the broader trajectory of Korean literary and cultural history, and situates their works within the context of world science fiction. She has also authored several articles and essays on K-pop fandom and Korean feminist activism. She is co-running Fwd: feminist research webzine (fwdfeminist.com) with her Korean feminist colleagues.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Jingpu Li 李敬朴 is a PhD candidate in Chinese archaeology. His research interests encompass the development of complex societies, the operation of power relations, ritual practices, alcoholic beverages, alchemy, and ceramics. The scientific methods he employs include X-ray analysis, lipidomics, proteomics, and metabolomics. His dissertation will focus on the Central Plains of China from the Late Neolithic to the Early Bronze Age, with an emphasis on ritual activities, drinking practices, and related topics during that period. Before Stanford, he received a B.S. in Chemistry (2019) and an M.S. in Archaeological Science (2022) from the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Sijia Li is a Ph. D. student in medieval Chinese literature and literary culture, focusing on textual production, transmission, and reception. Also interested in premodern Japanese literature, she is curious about cultural exchange across East Asia.

Bingxiao Liu is a Ph.D. student in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at Stanford University. Her research interests include premodern Chinese literature, cultural and intellectual history; gender and sexuality; emotions, literary and political culture. Her research examines how emotions are invoked or invented to constitute interpersonal ties in 3rd - 6th century China. Working with official histories, commentaries, inscriptions, and literary works, her project explores the reconceptualization of identity and community in emotive terms and the signification of emotion as the legitimizing basis for a new social order in medieval China.

Bingxiao received her MA in Chinese Language and Culture from Stanford University. She also holds a BA in Chinese Language and literature, and a BA in Journalism from Fudan University.

My research explores how perceptions, categories, and values surrounding language inform language ideology, and the ways in which language ideology in turn transforms use of language. My work brings together methods in semantics, pragmatics, discourse analysis, and computational linguistics in analyzing texts about language written in late 19th and early 20th centuries Japan, while drawing comparisons with coeval sources in French, German, and English.

I was a 2021-22 Digital Humanities Graduate Fellow, and 2022-23 Senior Graduate Research Fellow with Stanford's Center for Spatial and Textual Analysis. My DH research incorporates methods from natural language processing to examine the occurrence, context, and semantic instability of political neologisms in Japanese diaspora newspapers.

Prior to joining the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at Stanford, I completed a Master’s degree in East Asian Regional Studies at Columbia University. My thesis contextualized representations of foreigners and foreign places in Japanese junior high school textbooks within the broader history of internationalization in the public school system.

Research interests: pragmatics, semantics, sociolinguistics, 役割語 (role language)

Jie Shen 沈劼 is a Ph.D. student in Chinese Archaeology, in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at Stanford University. She mainly focuses on the crafting technology of bone artifacts in ancient China. Using the use-wear analysis, residue analysis, and experimental archaeology, Jie explores the variation and development in bone crafting techniques, and how the crafting industry was involved in social progress such as intriguing social differentiation and forming the early state. Also, she is interested in the religious and political meaning of animal-related artifacts, which are significant for understanding the human-animal relationship. 

Irene Song is a Ph.D. student in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at Stanford University, where her research focuses on modern and contemporary Korean art, material culture, and the intersection of Korean diasporic art and literature. She is particularly interested in how artists and writers from the Korean and larger Asian diaspora engage with themes of colonial biopolitics, mutation/monstrosity and abjection, often through sensory modes such as olfactory landscapes and other visceral, embodied aesthetics. Her work explores how speculative frameworks and abject materialities unsettle dominant social and political structures, offering alternative modes of perception. As a visual artist, Song’s practice is informed by her academic research and often takes the form of large-scale ephemeral installations that incorporate video, graphics, sculpture, writing, and publishing. Song received her B.F.A. from Cornell University and M.A. from Stanford University. Previously, she has worked in curatorial roles at the Queens Museum, New York, Art Sonje Center in Seoul, and the Museum of Modern Art.

Ya-Ting Tsai’s primary research interests lie at Chinese linguistics and culture. She is particularly interested in how socio-political separation between China and Taiwan leads to cultural change, and how this difference is manifested in her mother tongues, Taiwanese and Taiwan Mandarin.

Ruoyang (Murphy) Tu is a Ph.D. student in Chinese Archaeology at the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at Stanford University. His research interests involve urbanism, settlement patterns, and digital archaeology. He seeks to explore different mechanisms of social, political, and economic interactions and the resource landscape that shaped urbanism during Neolithic and Early Bronze Age China through computational techniques and stable isotope analysis. Murphy holds a B.A. in Anthropology and a B.S. in Astrophysics from the University of Chicago, and received his M.A. in Archaeological Studies from Yale University. He worked on the stable isotope analysis and radiocarbon dating of fossil animal enamels from LSA Malawi for his MA thesis.

William Varteresian received a B.A. in International Literary and Cultural Studies from Tufts University and an A.M. in Regional Studies East Asia from Harvard University. He has since pursued a career in Japanese media translation, including novels, film, television, and comics. Following past research into the way Japanese mystery and science fiction engage with imported works and orientalist narratives, his current focus is on the formation and development of the fantasy genre in modern Japanese literature. In addition to original fiction—especially by authors not represented in English translation or scholarship—he seeks to highlight the work and influence of Japanese translators and critics.

Bolong Wang is a PhD student in Chinese archaeology in the Department of East Asia Languages and Cultures at Stanford University. Bolong’s research focuses on pottery typology, ceramic petrography, spatial and social network analysis to investigate socio-spatial dynamics in Early China, particularly during the Shang and the Western Zhou periods. He is also interested in the archaeological contexts of ancient Chinese writing systems, including oracle bone script and bronze inscriptions. Prior to joining Stanford, Bolong earned a Bachelor of History in archaeology at Jilin University and completed master’s degrees in archaeology from the University of Oxford and Jilin University.

My research explores the intersections of performance, politics, and embodiment in post-war Japan. Drawing on the theoretical frameworks of Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Hanada Kiyoteru, as well as my background in literary studies, I examine the evolution of conceptions of subjecthood — from kokutai and nikutai to shintai — and how these shifting corporeal terms found expression both in literature and on stage. My broader interests include the entanglement of theatre and the political upheavals of 1960s Japan, particularly in the experimental angura troupes such as Kara Jūrō’s, as well as Hijikata Tatsumi’s butō, and in the literary explorations of embodiment by figures like Sakaguchi Ango and Abe Kōbō.

My current projects investigate theatrical corporeality and spatiality in the work of Jerzy Grotowski and Suzuki Tadashi, and examine the formation of the sexual self across the I-novel tradition and popular advice columns of the Taishō era. I also explore the affordances of Kang-baek Lee’s allegorical theatre in exposing the strictures of the sayable under Park Chung Hee’s regime, as well as Lee Kun-yong’s attempts to capture the corporeal.

I completed my B.A. in French Literature at Occidental College in 2018, with minors in Philosophy, Critical Theory and Social Justice, and Japanese. My current area of study includes modern and contemporary Japanese literature, poetry, and—occasionally—visual art. In particular, my proposed research topic looks at the relationship between the arts and disaster (both natural and human provoked), making reference to new materialist, feminist, environmental, and ecocritical thought. The arts—and particularly literature—in contemporary Japan suggest paths forward from the myriad aporiae implicit in the ‘wicked problem’ of climate change and climate disaster—my project pursues these paths, situating the literature of writers such as Kawakami Hiromi, Kawakami Mieko, Matsuda Aoko, Murata Sayaka, Kobayashi Erika, Tawada Yōkō, Ōyamada Hiroko, and Tsushima Yūko at the center of a literary nexus in which the delicate balance of environment, disaster, disease, capitalist exploitation, phenomenological orientation, religion, gender and feminism have reached a tipping point. That tipping point, I believe, may be the critical juncture beyond which we move towards overcoming the pessimisms of capitalist eco-modernity and into a more just, and sustainable relationship between human beings and the world.

Yue Wu, from Hangzhou, China, is a Knight-Hennessy Scholar and PhD in Chinese Literature and Culture. Yue received a master’s degree in regional studies–East Asia at Harvard (the Fletcher Award for Outstanding Thesis) and a bachelor’s degree in art history from New York University (magna cum laude, Presidential Honor Scholar). Her academic interests lie in avant-garde movements of the 1960s and art demonstrations in public spaces. 

Yue is an independent art curator who believes deeply in the socially transformative power of art and artists. She created a digital exhibition at China’s largest public contemporary art museum, the Power Station of Art, in Shanghai. She also coordinated the first overseas retrospective show of artist Xu Bing at Museum MACAN, the first in Indonesia to collect contemporary art. She was selected for a digital residency at Pro Helvetia Swiss Arts Council, and was recognized with the Emerging Curator Award in China. 

She is currently working with Seen Health, a culturally-focused, tech-empowered healthcare start-up, in providing senior care to Chinese immigrants in California.

Shuwen Yang received her B.A. in Comparative Literature and German from the University of Hong Kong and M.A. in East Asian Studies from UCLA. Her master's thesis focuses on Chinese Science Fiction and participatory culture. Her current research focuses on post-human, media ecology, and Chinese cultural industry. She has published book reviews and articles on Comparative Literature & World Literature, Global Storytelling, and Novel Review (小說評論).

I received my B.A. in East Asian Studies from the University of Toronto and M.A in Japanese from Stanford University. My research interests include modern East Asian fiction, cross-gender writing, translingual readership, and critical animal studies. For doctoral research, I intend to investigate human beings’ interpretive mechanisms towards non-humans, other human beings, and artistic expression. My recent publication includes a book chapter in essay collection Reading Desire in a New Generation of Japanese Women Writers.

I am currently researching the interplay between the operations of the imperial-colonial regime during the Asia-Pacific War and the formation of the colonized populace within the former Japanese Empire. My academic background includes residing in both Korea and Japan, earning a dual bachelor's degree in Japanese literature and philosophy from Korea University, and obtaining a master’s degree from the same institution. My dissertation, "Construction and Literary Testimony of Colonized Bodies in Wartime Period: Focusing on Cases of Addiction, Disability, and Defilement", argues that such literary representations could be the testimony of the subaltern exposing the power of crisis and anticipation. My primary interests lie in a methodology for apprehending the potential dynamics of the ungovernable and unpredictable ‘alive being’. This includes exploring representations of failure and discord, senses of extermination and catastrophe, and how the concepts of “health” and “illness” can be read or written inside and outside of doctrines such as “growth” and “achievement” as integrated into neoliberalism. In this regard, my research pursues two objectives. First, I will analyze the categorization of “overseas territories” within the Total Mobilization system in relation to culturalism and racism, exploring the potential for contextualizing colonialism in East Asia. Second, I will investigate the genealogy of armed resistance movements in East Asia up to the 1980s to develop a framework that questions the legitimacy of mourning imposed by state power. This study aims to explore the circumstances under which the writings of “subversive” entities, which disrupt hegemonic representation, can emerge as valid utterance.

Hanqi Zhou is a Ph.D. student in Chinese literature at Stanford University’s Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, where she also earned her M.A. She received her B.A. in Chinese Language and Literature from Fudan University. Hanqi’s research focuses on premodern Chinese literatures, especially ci-poetry詞 and anecdotal writings from the Song dynasty. She is particularly interested in questions of gender, authorship, and vernacular culture, with a current focus on the representation of female entertainers in male-authored texts. Drawing from sources such as Yijian zhi 夷堅志and ci-poetry, her work explores how literary forms reflected and shaped gender roles, emotional expressions, and social relationships in medieval China.

Zhixin Zhou’s research interests include grammaticalization, syntax, and teaching Chinese as a foreign language. Before starting her Ph.D., Zhixin received her B.A. in Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language from Beijing Foreign Studies University and her M.A. in East Asian Languages and Cultures from Columbia University. Her master's thesis focuses on the differences between the grammaticalization of yào and xiǎng in Mandarin and their pedagogical implications.

Helen Bovi is a second-year M.A. student in Pre-modern Chinese Literature in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at Stanford University. Originally from Milan, Italy, she earned her B.A. in Philosophy and Chinese Studies from the University of Pittsburgh, David C. Frederick Honors College.Her research interests include Chinese philosophy and religion, and comparative philosophy between East and West. Her current work examines intersections between Zhuangzi, Mengzi, and Nietzsche, exploring questions of selfhood and utility, ethics, the value of truth, the limits of language, and the importance of pretending and illusion. 

Josh Eyre is a Masters student in Japanese Literature and Culture. He was born and raised in southern California and spent two years living in southern Japan. After returning to the US he received his BA in Japanese from Brigham Young University, with a minor in history. His primary research interest is modern Japanese Literature, particularly that of the early to mid 20th century. Topics of specific interest include WWII, literary censorship, translation, and the works of Dazai Osamu.

I spent my undergrad at the University of Southern California majoring in EALC and minoring in Linguistics. I am interested broadly in Japanese linguistics & literature, and especially hope to study pre-modern Japanese language, poetry, translation, and philology. I also have a deep personal interest in Tolkienian Linguistics and Tolkien Studies in general.

Prior to studying at Stanford, Lyn received her Bachelor’s degree in Chinese Language and Literature from Peking University. Her research interests include Contemporary Chinese Literature, Internet Literature and popular culture, cultural studies of gender and sexuality, media studies, and digital humanities.

Watermelon Song Yuanfeng is a native of Beijing, China who also spent time growing up in Syracuse, NY and Wales, UK. An independent filmmaker since the age of eight, he has entered international film festivals. Watermelon majored in Asian Studies (Chinese track) and minored in Cinema & Media Arts at Vanderbilt University. At Stanford, he hopes to explore the purely aesthetic value of post-Sixth Generation Chinese films like Better Days (2019), Her Story (2024) and Ne Zha (2025) in conjunction with their political significance. Watermelon is also interested in recent Asian representations and Black-Asian solidarity portrayed in Hollywood genre films and mini-series such as Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022), Beef (2023), Mickey 17, and Sinners (2025). In his free time, he enjoys playing squash, tennis, badminton, basketball, gourd flute, guitar, singing, and hiking.

Hello, my name is Shauna Stewart. I am from Atlanta, Georgia. I am interested in questions of commodification, gaze and agency as they relate to K-Pop and K-Pop idols. I am also very interested in media representation, particularly in the space of animated content. I am looking forward to meeting and learning from other scholars in my field. My hobbies include watching dramas, listening to music, and going to live music shows.

I received my B.A. in Chinese Linguistics from Peking University. My research focuses on syntax, language contact, and fieldwork on Sinitic varieties. I am particularly interested in how contact-driven change shapes function words and aspect marking. I have conducted fieldwork on several Chinese dialects, including the Jiujang dialect in Foshan (Guangdong), Tong-Tai Mandarin in Nantong (Jiangsu), and the Xinan dialect in Zhangping (Fujian), as well as on the Naxi language in Sanba Township (Yunnan).

Hi! I’m interested in Sinophone cinemas and the transnational dynamics of East Asian cinemas.Before coming to Stanford, I earned a bachelor's degree in Philosophy from Sun Yat-sen University and an MA in Film Studies from University College London.I love films, music, video games, swimming, and tennis (strictly as a spectator—I’ll leave the playing to the pros).I also spent two years working as a director. If you have a film idea or just want to chat about films, feel free to reach out!

I received my B.A. in Philosophy from Tongji University. My research mainly focuses on the Spring and Autumn Annals and Mahayana Buddhism. I also have great interests in German philosophy and Phenomenology. I enjoy cycling and playing video games in my spare time.

I received my B.A. in Anthropology and Psychology at the University of California, Davis. My research interests have been shaped by my fascination with the rich culture and history of ancient China dynasties, particularly the Shang Dynasty. I want to focus my current research on bronze ware, bones, and cultural remains. I am looking forward to getting more opportunities in field archeology at Stanford. In my spare time, I take pleasure in cooking and traveling.

My study revolves around modern and contemporary film, literature, and popular culture in China. Currently, I am interested in mass media and visual culture in the context of Communist China, with a particular focus on Beijing culture and science fiction during this period. I am passionate about exploring comparative studies between China and the rest of the world. Through my work, I hope to shed light on the intricate dynamics of Chinese society and its global interactions through the lens of media, film, and literature. Beyond my studies, I have a keen interest in traveling, photography, and language learning.

Background: Beijing Normal University (BA) / University of Cambridge (MPhil).