Dates: Friday - Saturday, April 10-11, 2026
Location: UC Berkeley
Sponsor(s): Center for Chinese Studies, UC Berkeley; Center for East Asian Studies, Stanford University
This conference is supported with generous funding from the
Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange.
Introduction
Initiated in 2010, the annual Berkeley-Stanford Graduate Student Conference in Modern Chinese Humanities brings together current graduate students from across the U.S. and around the world to present innovative research on any aspect of modern Chinese cultural production in the humanistic disciplines.
The conference provides a window into current research in Chinese studies, and serves as a platform for fostering interaction among budding scholars of geographically disparate institutions, facilitating their exchange of ideas and interests. Specifically, the organizing committee hopes that this conference will encourage interdisciplinary scholarship within and between literary and cultural studies, cultural history, art history, film and media studies, musicology and sound studies, as well as the interpretative social sciences.
Each year the conference also features a keynote address from a prominent Chinese studies scholar and alumni scholar, chosen by the student organizing committee.
Keynote Speaker:
Ying Qian, Associate Professor, Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, Columbia University
Alumni Keynote:
Julia Keblinska, Assistant Professor, Modern and Medieval Languages and Linguistics, University of Cambridge
Organizing Committee:
Weihong Bao, Associate Professor, Film and Media & East Asian Languages and Cultures, UC Berkeley
Ziwei Chen, Graduate Student, Film and Media Studies, UC Berkeley
Andrew Jones, Louis B. Agassiz Professor of Chinese, Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, University of California, U.C. Berkeley
Haiyan Lee, Professor, East Asian Languages and Cultures & Comparative Literature, Stanford
Ban Wang, Professor, East Asian Languages and Cultures, Stanford
Shuwen Yang, Graduate Student, East Asian Languages and Cultures, Stanford
Mayshu (Meixu) Zhan, Graduate Student, Modern Thought and Literature
Tianyue Zhang, Graduate Student, East Asian Languages and Cultures, UC Berkeley
Call for Proposals
Currently enrolled graduate students are invited to submit paper proposals for the Berkeley-Stanford Graduate Student Conference in Modern Chinese Humanities, to be held April 10-11, 2026 at UC Berkeley. Conference registration is free. Presenters will be provided with shared lodging, Friday dinner, and Saturday lunch. There is limited partial funding assistance for those who cannot find their own funding.
Proposals/bios due: Friday November 7, 2025, 11:59 pm PT
Application Instructions:
To apply, please submit your abstract (up to 250 words) and a short bio (up to 100 words, including current institutional affiliation), and include the following information in the application: Author Name, Author Bio, Paper Title, Subtitle (optional), Keywords, and Abstract. Please follow the link to apply:
https://app.smartsheet.com/b/form/a315258c58bb4c6f8511dc3a25350de3
The annual Berkeley-Stanford Graduate Student Conference in Modern Chinese Humanities brings together current graduate students from across the U.S. and around the world to present innovative research on any aspect of modern Chinese cultural production in the humanistic disciplines. The conference provides a window into current research in Chinese studies, and serves as a platform for fostering interaction among budding scholars of geographically disparate institutions, facilitating their exchange of ideas and interests. The conference hopes to encourage interdisciplinary scholarship within and between literary and cultural studies, cultural history, art history, film and media studies, musicology and sound studies, as well as the interpretative social sciences. For a list of past presenters, please see the archived conference schedules.
The 2026 keynote speaker is Ying Qian, East Languages and Cultures, Columbia University, and the conference alumni speaker is Julia Keblinska, Film & Screen Studies, University of Cambridge.
Notification of acceptance: Early January 2026
Final paper submission deadline (if accepted): Friday March 27, 2026, 11:59 pm PT
Contact Information:
UC Berkeley Center for Chinese Studies, ccs@berkeley.edu
Conference Schedule
FRIDAY, APRIL 10
2:00PM | OPENING REMARKS
2:15 - 3:45PM | NONHUMAN
Yidan Wang, Cornell University
Affective Species: Envisioning Heterobiota by “Tidal Atlas”
Susie Yue Wu, University of California, Santa Barbara
Feline Temples: The Cute, the Sacred, and the Tentacular: Xiyuan as a Case Study
Kaiwen Lin, Ocean University of China
Gifts and Reciprocity: Ecological-Economic Ethics in Chinese Maritime Folktales
Discussants:
Haiyan Lee, Professor, Stanford University
Shuwen Yang, Stanford University
3:45 - 4:00PM | BREAK
4:00 - 5:30PM | KEYNOTE
Ying Qian, Associate Professor, Columbia University
Socialist Chronopolitics: Cine-Ethnography and Stagism at China’s Borders, 1956-1965
SATURDAY, APRIL 11
9:00AM | BREAKFAST
9:30 - 10:45AM | SOCIALIST THOUGHT AND INFRASTRUCTURES OF CULTURE
Mei Mingxue Nan, Harvard University
The Socialist Media Mix: Nuclear Optics and Mao Zedong Thought in Cold War China
Alissa Elegant, Ohio State University
Making Culture Work Union Work: Creating an Intellectual Basis for Socialist Workers Artistic Practice in the PRC
Discussants:
Ban Wang, Professor, Stanford University
Mayshu (Meixu) Zhan, Stanford University
10:45 - 11:00AM | BREAK
11:00 - 12:30PM | KEYNOTE
Julia Keblinska, Assistant Professor, University of Cambridge
Revisiting Cold War Aesthetics
12:30 - 1:30PM | LUNCH
1:30 - 3:00PM| INFRASTRUCTURE
Wilson Wang, Harvard University
物流 wuliu & its (Global) China or (Global) China & its 物流 wuliu
Stella Lin, University of Southern California
Unruly Flows: Desires and Politics of Connectivity in China’s Reform Era
Yinan Zhang, Harvard University
Listening Underground: Voice Infrastructures in China's Metro System
Discussants:
Weihong Bao, Associate Professor, University of California, Berkeley
Tianyue Zhang, University of California, Berkeley SATURDAY , APRIL 11
3:00 - 3:15PM | BREAK
3:15 - 4:45PM | SPATIAL ORDERS
Huichao Luo, Shanghai Jiao Tong University
Institutions, Streets, and the Making of Urban Order: Disciplinary Space in the Shanghai French Concession, 1843–1937
Zengxin Wen, Tongji University
Winning Time: Transnational Architecture and the Production of Speed in 1980s Shanghai.
Huirong Ye, Harvard University
"Mediarology" of Territory: Television, Weather Forecast, and the Imagined Community in 1980s China
Discussants:
Andrew Jones, Professor, University of California, Berkeley
Ziwei Chen, University of California, Berkeley
4:45PM | CLOSING REMARKS
Directions
The Center for Chinese Studies is located on the fifth floor of 2111 Bancroft Way. The building is one block from BART and also has a public parking garage which is accessed off Bancroft Way.
Parking
There are various public parking lots and facilities near campus and in downtown Berkeley. More information is available on the UC Berkeley Parking and Transportation page.