We are happy to have a young scholar across the pond to be our guest writer this week. Justin Wu is now doing his PhD with the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. Here’s Justin telling us about his academic background and current research interests:
My interest in academic work started not in the field of history but psychology. When I began my undergraduate study at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA, I was interested in cultural differences, stereotypes, and human motivation. By chance, I enrolled in a modern history course to satisfy a humanities requirement, yet I realized that the study of history actually touched upon these aspects but in a drastically different way. I continued to pursue both disciplines and completed my BS degree, double majoring in psychology and history.
I began my Ph.D. study at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, USA, in 2014, focusing on modern East Asian history. My research interests include nationalism, identity formation, and social movements in Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan, and China in the twentieth century. I completed my MA thesis in 2016. My thesis looked at how a growing sense of Hong Kong identity emerged among the college student population in the late-1960s, with the Cultural Revolution and the 1967 Riots in the background. For my Ph.D. project, I turn to anti-Japanese sentiments in the 1970s. I hope to explore the conception of Chineseness through anti-Japanese rhetoric among the (broadly defined) ethnic Chinese population in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the United States.
Are you also an ECR/postgraduate hoping to let the wider community know about your work on Hong Kong history? If you’re interested in contributing, please write to Vivian Kong (vivian.kong@bristol.ac.uk) for more details!