Sijia Yao

Sijia Yao, PhD

Faculty - Undergraduate
Headshot of Sijia Yao
Assistant Professor of Chinese Language and Culture
Email
syao@soka.edu
Phone
949-269-5567
  • Ph. D. Comparative Literature, Purdue University
  • CORE 100: Enduring Questions of Humanity
  • CHI 101: First-year Chinese I
  • CHI 202: Second-year Chinese II
  • CHI 306: Intermediate Chinese Conversation
  • CHI 310: Advanced Chinese Conversation
  • CHI 390: Chinese Love
  • CHI 401: Cultural History of China
  • CHI 410: Chinese Literature and Film
  • CHI 415: Contemporary Issues in China
  • Learning Cluster 200: Sinophone Cinema
  • Comparative and Sinophone literature and media studies
  • Love and affect studies
  • Critical theory
  • World literature
  • Post-socialism
  • Chinese as a Foreign Language
     

Book

Yao, Sijia. Cosmopolitan Love: Utopian Vision in D. H. Lawrence and Eileen Chang. University of Michigan Press, 2023.

Finalist: 2024 Southern Atlantic Modern Language Association (SAMLA) Book Award Finalist | 05/21/2024
Watch: Book Talk at the University of Hong Kong’s Department of Comparative Literature with Alvin K. Wong | 05/16/2024
Watch: Modern China Lecture Series at California State University San Bernardino with Jeremy Murray | 10/17/2024

Reviews:
Yang, Renren (University of British Columbia). Review of Cosmopolitan Love: Utopian Vision in D. H. Lawrence and Eileen Chang by Sijia Yao. Rocky Mountain Review 78.2 (2024): 266-269. https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/143/article/965341/pdf

Thornber, L. Karen (Harvard University). Review of Cosmopolitan Love: Utopian Vision in D.H. Lawrence and Eileen Chang, by Sijia Yao. Chinese Literature: Essays, Articles, Reviews 46 (2024): 275-278.

Moolla, F. Fiona (University of the Western Cape). Review of Cosmopolitan Love: Utopian Vision in D.H. Lawrence and Eileen Chang, by Sijia Yao. The Comparatist 48 (2024): 371-373. https://dx.doi.org/10.1353/com.2024.a940128.

Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles (Chinese Literature, Film, and Culture)

  1. Yao, Sijia. “Postsocialist Chinese Love and Pain in Teeth of Love.” South Atlantic Review, vol. 90, no. 3, Fall 2025, pp. 91–111.
  2. Yao, Sijia. “The Worldmaking of Chinese and Western Canonical Works.” Chinese Language Globalization Studies, vol. 16, 2025, pp. 1–11.
  3. Yao, Sijia. “Third Term Comparison.” Telos, no. 199, 2022, pp. 11–19.
  4. Yao, Sijia. “Teresa Teng in Diaspora: Affective Replacement in Chinese World-Making.” Comparative Literature Studies, vol. 57, no. 3, 2020, pp. 520–29.
  5. Yao, Sijia. “Pessimistic Chinese Cosmopolitanism and Jia Zhangke’s The World.” The Comparatist, vol. 43, 2019, pp. 147–58.
  6. Yao, Sijia. “Female Desire: Defiant Text and Intercultural Context.” Rocky Mountain Review of Language and Literature, vol. 71, no. 2, 2017, pp. 195–212.
  7. Yao, Sijia. “Nostalgia for the Future: Home Landscape in the Films of Jia Zhangke.” Tamkang Review: A Quarterly of Literary and Cultural Studies, vol. 47, no. 2, 2017, pp. 83–96. DOI: 10.6184/TKR201706-6.
  8. Yao, Sijia. “The American Reception of Chinese Films in 2016.” Movie Review (电影评介), no. 10, 2017, pp. 6–11. DOI: 10.16583/j.cnki.52-1014/j.2017.10.002.
  9. Yao, Sijia. “The Politics of Literary Fame: Tracing Eileen Chang’s Reception in China and the United States.” Forum for World Literature Studies, vol. 8, no. 2, 2016, pp. 291–307.
  10. Yao, Sijia. “Feminization and the Global Voice of Chinese Cinema.” Movie Review (电影评介), no. 21, 2016, pp. 12–15. DOI: 10.16583/j.cnki.52-1014/j.2016.21.003.

Book Chapters

  1. Yao, Sijia. “Love and Negative Feeling in An Dun’s and Zeng Nianping’s Longing for a Feeling of True Love.” Routledge History of Love in World Literature and Culture, edited by Fatima Moolla and Megan Moore, Routledge, forthcoming.
  2. Yao, Sijia. “Cyborg Lovers in Chinese Science Fiction.” Ecocriticism and Speculative Fiction in East Asia: Rethinking the Human, edited by Xinmin Liu and Hua Li, Palgrave Macmillan, forthcoming.
  3. Yao, Sijia. “The Place-Based Gaze in a Taiwanese Eco-Documentary.” Embodied Memories, Embedded Healing: New Ecological Perspectives from East Asia, edited by Xinmin Liu and Peter I-min Huang, Lexington Books, 2021, pp. 167–80. 

Scholarly Entry 

Yao, Sijia. “Zang Di.” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Chinese Poets Since 1949, edited by Christopher Lupke and Thomas Moran, vol. 387, Gale, 2021, pp. 291–97.

Other Publications

  1. Yao, Sijia. “Global Impact: The Case of Film.” China Initiative of the Telos-Paul Piccone Institute, 24 Apr. 2025.
  2. Yao, Sijia. “The Telos Press Podcast: Sijia Yao on Third Term Comparisons.” Telos Press, 19 Sept. 2022.

Book Reviews

  1. Yao, Sijia. Review of Zhang Yimou: Globalization and the Subject of Culture, by Wendy Larson. The Journal of Asian Studies, vol. 77, no. 2, 2018, pp. 515–16. DOI: 10.1017/S002191181800013X.
  2. Yao, Sijia. Review of Transpacific Attachments: Sex Work, Media Networks, and Affective Histories of Chineseness, by Lily Wong. Modern Chinese Literature and Culture, June 2018.

Creative Writing

Yao, Sijia. “Ziwei.” Lights and Shadows: Art and Literary Magazine, vol. 53, no. 1, 2010, pp. 116–17.

Language and Pedagogy

  1. Yao, Sijia. “Re-Motivating Chinese Language Learning.” Studies in Chinese Learning and Teaching, no. 9, Mar. 2025, pp. 100–112.
  2. Yao, Sijia, Bailu Li, and Wei Hong. “Teaching and Learning Chinese at a Distance: Content Development and Assessment of Beginning Chinese.” Handbook of Research on Foreign Language Education in the Digital Age, edited by Penny Wang and Lisa Winstead, IGI Global, 2016, pp. 104–42.
  3. Yao, Sijia, and Wei Hong. “Assessing Student Performance of On-line Elementary Chinese—Challenges and Solutions.” 国际汉语教学与中华文化: 第十三届国际汉语教学研讨会论文集, Inner Mongolia University Press, 2015, pp. 201–06.

Translations

  1. Yao, Sijia. “Father in His Old Age.” Lights and Shadows, vol. 53, no. 1, 2010, p. 96.
  2. Yao, Sijia. “Mother: That Era.” Lights and Shadows, vol. 53, no. 1, 2010, p. 32.

Invited Talks

  1. “Bodily Pain in Contemporary Chinese Love Cinema.” Dec. 2025. CCS China Studies Seminar Series, Center for China Studies, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong.
  2. “Divided Loyalties: Love and Nation in Eileen Chang.” Feb. 2025. Russian and East Asian Languages and Cultures, Emory University, GA. on zoom.
  3. “Incest Prohibition in Eileen Chang’s ‘The Heart Sutra’ and D. H. Lawrence’s Sons and Lovers.” October 2024. Modern China Lecture Series, California State University San Bernardino, CA.
  4. “Romantic Love and Chinese Nationalism in Lust, Caution.” September 2024. East Asian Languages and Cultural Studies, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA. on zoom.
  5. “Incest Prohibition in Eileen Chang’s “The Heart Sutra” and D. H. Lawrence’s Sons and Lovers.” June 2024. Shanghai Jiaotong University, Shanghai, China. on zoom.
  6. “Redefining Translation and World-Making at the Turning Point of Artificial Intelligence.” Keynote Speaker. May 2024, Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing, China.
  7. “Cosmopolitan Love and Utopian Freedom in Zhang Ailing’s ‘The Heart Sutra.’” May 2024. Fudan University, Shanghai, China.
  8. “Third Term Comparison: Love and Utopia in Early Twentieth-Century China and England.” May 2024. Minzu University of China, Beijing, China.
  9. “Affective Cosmopolitanism: Comparison Methodology and a Case Study.” May 2024. University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China.
  10. “Inside Out: Body, Love, and Nation in Eileen Chang’s Lust, Caution.” Feb. 2024. University of California, Irvine, CA.
  11. “The Idea of Love in China and the West.” Feb. 2024. University of Nebraska, Lincoln, NE. on zoom.
  12. “Love as the Third Term in Comparison and World-Making.” December 2023. Xiamen University, Xiamen, China.
  13. “Affect as Engagement in China and the West.” Oct. 2023. Chinese Studies Colloquium. Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN.
  14. “Challenges and Solutions to the Post-pandemic Chinese L2 Classroom.” December 2022. Roundtable speaker in China-U.S. International Forum on the Research and Teaching of Chinese Language and Culture at the College Level, Purdue University and Xiamen University, virtual.
  15. “Motivating Chinese Language Learning.” December 2022. China-U.S. International Forum on the Research and Teaching of Chinese Language and Culture at the College Level, Purdue University and Xiamen University, virtual.
  16. “The World in the City of Beijing: The Imaginaries and Realities of a World City.” Sep. 2018. Asian Studies Colloquium, Department of Modern Languages and Literatures, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, NE.

Research Conferences

  1. “AI and Love in Chinese Speculative Fiction.” Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association (RMMLA) Convention, Oct. 2025, Spokane, WA.
  2. “Encountering Strangers in D. H. Lawrence’s The Virgin and the Gipsy.” Modern Language Association (MLA) Convention, January 2025, New Orleans, LA.
  3. “Eileen Chang as World Literature in Comparison.” Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association (RMMLA) Convention, Oct. 2024, Las Vegas, NV.
  4. “Postsocialist Chinese Love and Pain in Teeth of Love.” The Association of Chinese and Comparative Literature (ACCL), June 2024, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong, China.
  5. “Carl Rogers and L2 Chinese Pedagogical Reform.” The First Forum on the Research and Teaching of Chinese Language and Culture, June 2024, Xiamen University, Xiamen, China.
  6. “Methodology of Comparative Literature for a Multicultural World.” States of Comparison Seminar, ACLA Board-sponsored seminar. American Comparative Literature Association (ACLA) Convention, March 2024, Montreal, Canada.
  7. “Sexual Love in Zhang Ailing’s Lust, Caution.” Modern Language Association (MLA) Convention, January 2024, Philadelphia, PA.
  8. “Eco-Poetry, Disabled Body, and Media in Yu Xiuhua.” Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association (RMMLA) Convention, Oct. 2023, Denver, CO.
  9. “Love and Pain in Postsocialist Chinese Cinema.” American Comparative Literature Association (ACLA) Convention, March 2023, Chicago, IL.
  10. “Comparing National Traditions: Incest Prohibition in Eileen Chang and D. H. Lawrence.” Modern Language Association (MLA) Convention, January 2023, San Francisco, CA.
  11. “Comparing China and the West on the Basis of Shared Purposes.” Telos-Paul Piccone Institute Conference: Civilizational States and Liberal Empire – Bound to Collide? Apr. 2022, New York, NY.
  12. “Oedipal Index and Post-Migration in Sinophone Cinema.” International Conference on Cultural Migrations, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China, Oct. 2021, online.
  13. “Politics and Poetics of Cosmopolitan Love in Modern China and the West.” Colloquium on China and the West, Departments of East Asian Studies & European Languages and Studies, College of Humanities, University of California, Irvine, CA. May 19, 2021, on zoom.
  14. “Eileen Chang as World Literature.” Modern Language Association (MLA) Convention, Jan. 2021, Toronto, Canada, online.
  15. “Teresa Teng in Diaspora: Affective Replacement in Chinese World-Making.” The Eighth Sino-American Comparative and World Literature Symposium, Sep. 2019, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA.
  16. “Meta-Narratives: Marginalized Contemporary Chinese Poets in Documentaries.” The Association of Chinese and Comparative Literature (ACCL), July 2019, Hunan Normal University, Changsha, China.
  17. “Filial (Dis)Junction in China’s Pessimistic Cinema.” Modern Language Association (MLA) Convention, Jan. 2019, Chicago, IL.
  18. “The Paradox of Aerial Documentaries: Eco-Gaze and National Vision.” Taiwan Studies Workshop (sponsored by Harvard University and the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation), Oct. 2018, University of California, Davis, CA.
  19. “Zang Di: The Self and Poetic Existence.” Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association (RMMLA) Convention, Oct. 2018, Cheyenne, WY.
  20. Session organizer and presenter, “The Politics and Poetics of Nostalgia in Modern Chinese Literature and Culture.” Modern Language Association (MLA) Convention, Jan. 2018, New York City, NY.
  21. Session chair and presenter, “Aesthetics in Chinese Poetry.” Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association (RMMLA) Convention, Oct. 2017, Spokane, WA.
  22. “Changing Paradigms in Transnational Chinese Cinema.” 2017 Reception Study Society (RSS), Sept. 2017, St. Catherine University, Minneapolis, MN.
  23. “Social Defiance: The Virgin and the Gypsy and ‘Lust, Caution.’” Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association (RMMLA) Convention, Oct. 2016, Salt Lake City, UT.
  24. “Yang Guifei(s) in Cinema: The Nostalgic Motif of Decline.” World Literature and Cinema Colloquium, July 11, 2016, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA.
  25. “Oedipal Love or Filial Piety?” British Modernities Group (BMG) Conference: “‘Feeling Real’: Affect, Literature, and Reimagined Realities,” May 2016, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, IL.
  26. “Developing Hanzi Writing in Online Courses: Initiatives and Challenges.” 2015 The American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) Annual Convention and World Languages Expo, Nov. 2015, San Diego, CA.
  27. “Inside Out: From the Public Service to the Private Intimacy in Post-Socialist Chinese Cinema.” The 2015 Film & History Conference, Nov. 2015, Madison, WI.
  28. “Modern Chinese Literature and Eileen Chang (Zhang Ailing).” 2015 American Comparative Literature Association (ACLA) Annual Meeting, Mar. 2015, Seattle, WA.
  29. Lead Presenter, “On-line Beginning Chinese—Development and Assessment.” 2014 The American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) Annual Convention and World Languages Expo, Nov. 2014, San Antonio, TX.
  30. “To Integrate Chinese Language and Culture in Classroom.” Chinese Language Teachers Association (CLTA) International Symposium, Oct. 2014, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN.
  31. “Eileen Chang’s Literary Reception History.” Interdisciplinary Graduate Student Research Reception. Apr. 2014, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN.
  32. “Native Speaker: A Journey of Seeking the American Identity.” 2013 Reception Study Society (RSS), Sept. 2013, Marquette University, Milwaukee, WI.
  33. “Gender, Sexuality, and Socio-political Context in Corregidora and The Woman Warrior.” The 13th Graduate Symposium, Mar. 2013, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN.
  34. “Eraserhead’s Crude Gothic.” Alabama Regional Graduate Conference in English: Going Gothic, Oct. 2010, University of North Alabama, Florence, AL.

Ongoing Book Project

My second book manuscript is on nostalgia in the Sinophone world. I was awarded with a Pacific Basin Research Center faculty fellowship from Soka in 2025 that supported my library visit at University of Hong Kong to carry out research on one of the book chapters.

  • Assistant Professor of Chinese Language and Culture (tenure-track), Soka University of America, 2022-Present
  • Associate Professor of Practice (non-tenure track), Chinese Studies, Department of Modern Languages and Literatures, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, 2022
  • Coordinator of Chinese Studies Program
  • Assistant Professor of Practice (non-tenure track), Chinese Studies, Department of Modern Languages and Literatures, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, 2016-2022
  • PBRC Faculty Fellowship AY 2025-2026, The Pacific Basin Research Center (PBRC), Soka University of America, Awarded in May 2025.
  • RATE Teaching Fellowship, RATE Career Readiness Program, Soka University of America, Spring 2025. Awarded in December 2024.
  • Book Award Finalist, 2024 Southern Atlantic Modern Language Association (SAMLA), May 2024.
  • Group Research Grant, RMB 200, 000. Collaborative Research Project “Chinese Language Education in the United States in Post-Pandemic Time.” The International Society for Chinese Language Teaching (ISCLT) and the Center for Language Education and Cooperation (CLEC) of the Chinese Ministry of Education, Beijing, China, Jan. 2023-Dec. 2024.
  • Research Impact and Engagement Grant (College level), College of Arts and Sciences, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, April 2022.
  • 2020-21 Family & Friends Recognition Award, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, February 2021.
  • Summer Curriculum Grant, Department of Modern Languages and Literatures, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, May 2020.
  • Conference Travel Grant, Department of Comparative Literature, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, Sep. 2019.
  • Workshop Travel Grant, Harvard University and the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation (CCKF), Oct. 2018.
  • Research Travel Grant, the Consortium of Humanities Centers and Institutes (CHCI) and the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation (CCKF), June 2018.
  • Parents’ Recognition Teaching Award, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Jan. 2017, 2018, 2019.
  • Spencer Fellowship, course development, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, summer 2017.
  • Promise Award, College of Liberal Arts Research Grant, Purdue University, May 2016.
  • The PRF (Purdue Research Foundation) Research Grant, Purdue University, June-July, 2015.
  • 2014-2015 University Award: Online Innovation Award, Purdue University, May 2015.
  • Excellence in Teaching Award, School of Languages and Cultures, Purdue University, 2015.
  • American Comparative Literature Association (ACLA) Travel Grant, Mar. 2015.
  • The Lynn Research Fellowship, Purdue University, 2011-2012.
  • Member of the Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi, Nov. 2010