SOAS University of London

SOAS China Institute

SOAS China Institute Academic Staff

SCI Staff
Institute Director  Professor Steve Tsang
Deputy Director Dr Jieyu Liu
Professorial Fellow Professor Robert Ash
Senior Teaching Fellow Dr Di Wu
SCI Executive Officer Li-Sa Whittington

Centres & Programmes Office
  • Manager, Jane Savory
  • Executive Officer, Yasmin Jayesimi

Anthropology and Sociology

Jakob Klein
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Jakob Klein
China (South); anthropology of food; consumption; regional cuisines; local speciality foods; urban society and the urban/rural divide; food commodity chains; borderlands; food and environment; food safety and risk; meat-eating and vegetarianism; ethnicity and local identities; socialist and postsocialist societies.
  • Tel: 020 7898 4428
  • Email: jk2@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 564
  • Office Hours: On sabbatical: Term 1 2017/18
Kevin Latham
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Kevin Latham
China: Hong Kong and Guangdong Province (PRC) Chinese media, newspapers, television, journalism, popular culture, Internet and telecommunications, theatre, anthropological knowledge, practice and performance
  • Tel: +44 (0)20 7898 4423
  • Email: kl1@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 565
  • Office Hours: Tuesdays 11.30am-1pm

Development Studies

Tim Pringle
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Staff Silhouette

East Asia, labour relations in China and Vietnam, trade union reform in China and Vietnam, labour and social movements in China, labour migration in China.

  • Tel: 020 7898 4678
  • Email: tp21@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 260a
  • Office Hours: Tuesday 4 - 6pm
Frauke Urban
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Frauke Urban
Research: Climate change and development, climate change mitigation, low carbon development and energy policy, with a regional focus on Asia.

Economics

Robert F Ash
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Bob Ash
China’s economic development in the 20th and 21st centuries (especially agricultural and rural change, demographic and employment issues, consumption and living standards); evolution of ‘Greater China’; economic development of Taiwan and cross-Strait economic relations
  • Tel: 020 7898 4525
  • Email: ra2@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 267
  • Office Hours: By appointment
Chris Bramall
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Chris Bramall

Economic growth, income inequality, famine and agricultural development in modern China, the political economy of Maoism, The development of the contemporary Chinese empire

  • Tel: +44(0) 207 898 4616
  • Email: cb81@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 228
  • Office Hours: By Appointment Only
Dic Lo
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Dic Lo
China and globalisation; industrialisation; Soviet-type economic system and transformation; East Asian economic institutions and development; comparative political economy. China.
  • Tel: +44 (0)20 7898 4532
  • Email: dl1@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 271
  • Office Hours: Mondays: 15:00 to 17:00 (Term 1 only)
Ulrich Volz
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Ulrich Volz

International Finance, Open Economy Macroeconomics, Financial Market Development and Stability, Development and Transition Economics, Global Economic Governance, East Asian Financial Markets

  • Tel: +44(0) 207 898 4721
  • Email: uv1@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 285
  • Office Hours: By appointment

Financial & Management Studies

Hong Bo
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Hong Bo

Firm investment decisions under uncertainty; capital market imperfections; corporate finance; corporate governance; financial economics; China.

  • Tel: 020 7898 4528
  • Email: hb22@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 543
  • Office Hours: Monday 1 - 2
Eunsuk Hong
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Eunsuk Hong

Foreign Direct Investment, Emerging-Market Multinationals, Applied spatial econometrics, Chinese management/economy

Gerhard Kling
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Gerhard Kling

Mergers & Acquisitions, International Business, Corporate Finance, Corporate Governance, Mathematical & Statistical Modelling

  • Tel: 020 7898 4821
  • Email: gk17@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 529
  • Office Hours: Tuesday 2 - 4
Gary Schwarz
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Gary Schwarz

Public management, leadership, performance, innovation, strategy

Damian Tobin
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Damian Tobin

Hong Kong's financial system; Renminbi internationalisation and banking reform; Economic modernisation and the State; China's management reforms, especially in the oil sector

  • Tel: 020 7898 4058
  • Email: dt29@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 555
  • Office Hours: Monday 2 - 4

History

Andrea Janku
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Andrea Janku

China, Social and Cultural History; The Early Press and the History of Communication; Environmental History

  • Tel: +44 (0)20 7898 4636
  • Email: aj7@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 316
  • Office Hours: Wednesdays 10-12am and by appointment
Lars Laamann
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Lars Laamann

Popular religions in early modern China (16th-20th cc); Christianity in china (18th-20th cc); Opium and other narcotics (18th-20th cc); Manchu history (16th-20th cc)

  • Tel: 020 7898 4634
  • Email: ll10@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 323
  • Office Hours: Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday 10am-12pm
George Lane
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
George Lane
Current research concerns the presence of Persians in Yuan (Mongol) China. Teaching concentrates on Mediaeval Persia. Involved in IFCELS with the Lord Chancellor's programme for Chinese Lawyers since the early 90s as well as pre-sessionals and ELAS.
  • Tel: 020 7898 4285
  • Email: gl1@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 303
  • Office Hours: Mondays 1.30-4pm or by email appointment

History of Art & Archaeology

Shane McCausland
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Shane McCausland

Pictorial arts of China - especially painting and calligraphy; East Asian narrative art; canons, collecting and connoisseurship; Chinese art and modernity

  • Tel: 020 7898 4705
  • Email: sm80@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: B304
  • Office Hours: Term 3- by appointment only
Stacey Pierson
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Stacey Pierson

History and production of Chinese ceramics; history and theory of collecting; Museum Studies.

  • Tel: 020 7898 4441
  • Email: sp17@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: B308
  • Office Hours: Tuesdays 1-2.30pm
Louise Tythacott
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Louise Tythacott

Chinese and Buddhist art in museums; history of Yuanmingyuan (or ‘Summer Palace’) collections; museology; colonialism and material culture; post-colonial critiques of museum representations; history and theory of collecting; art and anthropology.

  • Tel: 020 7898 4159
  • Email: lt15@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: B320
  • Office Hours: Louise will be on Research Leave: term 1, 2017-18

Language Pedagogy

Yan Cui
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Cui Yan - CIA IMG 485 186 56
Chinese language teaching, styles of modern Chinese literary language, Chinese rhetoric
  • Tel: +44(0) 20 7898 4237
  • Email: yc2@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 382
  • Office Hours: Monday 11:10-12:10; Thursday 11:10-12:10
Wanli Gao
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Staff Silhouette
Chinese language teaching
  • Tel: +44(0) 20 7898 4234
  • Email: wg@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 382
  • Office Hours: Tuesday 12-1pm(V322)/Wednesday 2-3pm(382)
Zhaoxia Pang
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Zhaoxia Pang
  • Tel: 020 7898 4257
  • Email: zp1@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 480
  • Office Hours: Monday 16:00-17:00 / Thursday 11:00-12:00
Song Lianyi
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Lianyi Song
Modern Chinese language and language pedagogy
  • Tel: 020 7898 4226
  • Email: ls2@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 367
  • Office Hours: Monday 2-3pm/Tuesday 2-3pm
Lik Suen
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Staff Silhouette
Modern Chinese languages; language pedagogy
  • Tel: +44(0) 20 7898 4264
  • Email: lx@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 361
  • Office Hours: Mondays 12-1pm & Wednesdays 11:30am-1pm

Law

Ernest Caldwell
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Ernest Caldwell

Laws of China and Taiwan; Comparative Constitutional Law; Human Rights in Asia; Law and Visual Culture; Legal History

  • Tel: +44 (0)207 898 4645
  • Email: ec24@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: S327
  • Office Hours: Friday 11:00-13:00
Carol G. S. Tan
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Carol Tan

Contract, legal history, British overseas rule and the law especially in relation to the leased territory of Weihaiwei and to ethnic Chinese communities in Hong Kong and South East Asia, law and society in South East Asia, traditional Chinese law

Sanzhu Zhu
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Sanzhu Zhu

Chinese law; comparative commercial and corporate law with reference to China; legal aspects of Chinese financial and futures markets; civil procedure and dispute resolution in China, particularly securities disputes.

  • Tel: +44 (0)20 7898 4667
  • Email: sz8@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: S328
  • Office Hours: Wednesday 11:00 - 13:00

Library & Information Services

Linguistics

Nathan W. Hill
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Nathan Hill

Tibetan language from Old Tibetan to Modern Standard Tibetan; Tibetan historical and biographical literature; historical, descriptive and corpus linguistics, in particular with reference to Tibetan or other Tibeto-Burman/Sino-Tibetan languages; Chinese minorities; Mongolian

Justin Watkins
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Justin Watkins

Burmese languages and Burmese linguistics; language policy in Burma; experimental and acoustic phonetics; computer lexicography; minority languages of South East Asia; Mon-Khmer and Tibeto Burman languages; tone languages. Sign languages in Burma and South East Asia.

  • Tel: 020 7898 4254
  • Email: jw2@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 462
  • Office Hours: email for an appointment
  • On Sabbatical:On leave, Term 2 (2016-17)

Literary and Cultural Studies

Cosima Bruno
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Cosima Bruno

Contemporary Chinese poetry; translation studies; Chinese language art; Sinophone literatures

  • Tel: +44(0) 20 7898 4421
  • Email: cb65@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 456
  • Office Hours: Term 1: Wednesdays 2-3pm
  • On Sabbatical:Term 2, 2017/18
Rossella Ferrari
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Ferrari Rossella - CIA IMG 485 186 56
Chinese-language theatres; Chinese-language cinemas; intercultural performance; theories and practices of the avant-garde
  • Tel: +44(0) 20 7898 4047
  • Email: rf24@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 399a
  • On Sabbatical:Term 1, 2017/18
Bernhard Fuehrer
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Bernhard Fuehrer
Classical Chinese philology, rhetoric, philosophy and literature; the history of Sinology in Europe; reception of the canon with specific reference to the Analects
  • Tel: +44(0) 20 7898 4218
  • Email: bf3@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 398
  • Office Hours: Tuesdays 12-1pm
Andrew H-B Lo
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Andrew Lo
Chinese language (Cantonese and Mandarin); fiction and prose from the Ming-Qing periods; cultural activities of Ming and Qing scholars, especially games; export paintings; traditional horticulture
Xiaoning Lu
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Xiaoning Lu

Chinese film history and criticism; modern Chinese popular culture; visual culture and media technology; cultural governance; socialist modernity

  • Tel: +44(0) 20 7898 4670
  • Email: xl1@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 453
  • Office Hours: Fridays 2-3pm
Tian Yuan Tan 陳靝沅
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Tian Yuan Tan
Pre-modern Chinese literature, with emphasis on drama, fiction, and poetry in the later dynasties; Chinese literary history and historiography; court theatre and performance; cross-cultural interactions between China and other countries
  • Tel: +44(0)20 7898 4570
  • Email: tt26@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 396
  • Office Hours: Tuesdays 4-5pm(Term Time), or by email appointment

Media & Film

Elisa Oreglia
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Elisa Oreglia

China and Southeast Asia, particularly Myanmar; Information and Communication Technologies and Development (ICTD); Information Society and digital divides; localized information sharing practices and media production; intermediation in digital media use; rural markets and new media.

Music

Guangtian Ha
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Guangtian Ha
  • Tel: 020 7898 4399
  • Email: hg8@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: T402
  • Office Hours: By Email Appointment
Rachel Harris
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Rachel Harris
Ethnomusicology; musics of China and Central Asia, especially Uyghur; recorded music; music and ritual; music, identity and politics
Hwee-San Tan
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Staff Silhouette

Ethnomusicology, Buddhist music in China, Taiwan, diaspora studies, intangible cultural heritage preservation, music in Singapore and Malaysia.

Politics & International Studies

Dafydd Fell
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Dafydd Fell
Contemporary Taiwanese Politics: Elections, Parties, Democratization
  • Tel: 020 7898 4206
  • Email: df2@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 209
  • Office Hours: Wednesdays 2- 4
Enze Han
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Enze Han

International Relations of East Asia, Chinese Politics, Ethnic Politics, Nationalism, Southeast Asia

  • Tel: +44(0) 207 898 4364
  • Email: eh22@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 252
  • On Sabbatical:2016/17
Yuka Kobayashi
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Yuka Kobayashi

Human Rights, WTO, Environment, with reference to China and East Asia

  • Tel: +44(0) 20 7898 4736
  • Email: yk37@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 4425
  • Office Hours: Wednesdays 1pm - 3pm, Terms 1 & 2
  • On Sabbatical:Term 1, 2017/18
Tat Yan Kong
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Tat Yan Kong
Comparative Political Economy (East Asia): varieties of capitalism; socialist to market transitions; Security on the Korean Peninsula, Development Theory
  • Tel: +44(0) 20 7898 4743
  • Email: yk2@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 206
  • Office Hours: Term 1: Thursdays 1 - 3
  • On Sabbatical:Term 2 2016/17
Julia C Strauss
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Julia Strauss

State and society in China and Taiwan; Comparative Political Sociology; theatrical and performative dimensions of politics, interpretive methods, China-Africa, China-Latin America

  • Tel: 020 7898 4746
  • Email: js11@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 207
  • Office Hours: Tuesdays 3-4pm, Wednesdays 1-2pm
Steve Tsang
IMG - Steve Tsang

Twentieth-century Chinese history; Chinese foreign policy; China's 'peaceful rise' strategy; China's rising military might; China's soft power; China-UK relations; China-EU relations; China-US relations; China-Taiwan relations; China-Asia relations; Chinese politics; nature of political system in China; the Chinese Communist Party and democracy; human rights in China; Taiwan politics; Taiwan's external relations; Taiwan's democratisation; Taiwan's security; US-Taiwan relations; Hong Kong politics; Hong Kong's relations with mainland China; colonial history of Hong Kong.

Sociology and Gender Studies

Jieyu Liu
Deputy Director, SOAS China Institute
Jieyu Liu

Women and gender in China; gender and work; sexuality and organizations; migration; gender and intergenerational relations; ageing and family transitions; unemployment; social policy and welfare reforms in China.

  • Tel: +44 (0)20 7898 4899
  • Email: jl92@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: M109
  • Office Hours: On research leave 2016-2020

Study of Religions

T H Barrett
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
T H Barrett
History of Chinese religion, notably Taoism and Buddhism; pre-modern Chinese history, especially the Tang period
Ulrich Pagel
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Ulrich Pagel

History of Buddhism in Tibet, Mahāyāna Buddhism, Kanjur Studies, Vinaya, Religions of Central Asia, Tibetan, Sanskrit. 

  • Tel: 020 7898 4782
  • Email: up1@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: Room 338
  • Office Hours: Mondays 4-5.30pm
Antonello Palumbo
Academic Staff, SOAS China Institute
Staff Silhouette

Ideological history of pre-modern China; Chinese religions, notably Taoism and Buddhism; history of the Buddhist canon in China; Manichaeism and Iranian influences in medieval China; Chinese cultural relations with Central Asia

  • Tel: 020 7898 4768
  • Email: ap47@soas.ac.uk
  • Room: 345
  • Office Hours: Fridays 2-4pm

Senior Teaching Fellows

Senior Fellow

Post-doctoral Research Associate

Yung-Chen Yuan
Post-doctoral Research Associate, SOAS China Institute
Yung-Chen Yuan

She received her PhD in Sociology from University of Bristol. Her research interests in migration, nationalism, ethnicity, and national and ethnical identity. Her research is specifically on how the ordinary people reproduce and practice identity in their everyday lives.

Professorial Research Associates

R.G. Tiedemann
Professorial Research Associate
R.G. Tiedemann

History of the Boxer War in China and its consequences, 1900-1902

Michael J E Palmer
Professorial Research Associate
Michael Palmer

Alternative Dispute Resolution, Arbitration and Civil Procedure; Chinese Law (traditional and modern); Conflict of Laws; Comparative Family Law; Consumer Protection

Chao Xi
Professorial Research Associate
Chao Xi

Chinese law; comparative corporate law and governance; comparative securities regulation, law and political economy

Research Associates

Jonathan Fenby
Research Associate, SOAS China Institute
Jonathan Fenby

History of modern China: end of the 19th century up to the present day.

Frances Wood
Research Associate
Frances Wood

Dunhuang studies, Chinese export paintings, Chinese domestic architecture, Chinese history, Chinese bibliography.

Visiting Scholars

Zifen Li
Li Zifen

Modern Chinese literature, gender study

Dates of appointment: September 2016 - August 2017

Yoshikawa Tatsuo
Visiting Scholar, SOAS China Institute
YOSHIKAWA Tatsuo

Chinese Films from 1930s-1950s and Chinese modern literature.

Date of Appointment:  March 2017 - March 2018

Yan Yu
Visiting Scholar, SOAS China Institute
Yu Yan

Material culture: Cultural heritage and museum anthropology; gender theory and embodiment.