I am a Ph.D. candidate specializing in the history of the United States in the Pacific world. My Ph.D. dissertation, titled “The Pan-Pacific Territory: Hawai‘i at the Border of China and the U.S. Empire, 1900s to 1950s,” examines the trans-Pacific endeavors of Chinese Hawaiians, Asian intellectuals, diplomats, anti-imperialists, and athletes in shaping Pan-Pacific internationalism throughout the twentieth century, up until Hawaiian statehood. 

My journal article, "Shifting 'Uncle Toms': Trans-Pacific Interactions and the Myth of Black-Asian Solidarity in the Twentieth Century," received the Louis Pelzer Memorial Award from the Organization of American Historians (OAH) in 2026 and is forthcoming in the Journal of American History. My second article on Chinese citizen diplomacy and Pan-Pacific internationalism in Hawai‘i has been accepted for publication in History: The Journal of the Historical Association. My book reviews have appeared in the Journal of American Ethnic History, Western Historical Quarterly, and the Journal of Military History, among others. 

My research has been supported by fellowships and travel grants from the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations, Institute of International Education, American Historical Association, Rockefeller Archive Center, American Heritage Center at the University of Wyoming, Einaudi Center at Cornell University, among others. I have participated in Columbia University's “Archives as Data” NEH-funded Institute in the Digital Humanities for Historians, Wilson Center's Cold War Archives Research (CWAR) Institute, the SHAFR Summer Institute on "Strategic Cultures," and the UT Austin Clements Center’s Summer Seminar in History and Statecraft. 

In 2025, I received the Lodieska Stockbridge Vaughn Fellowship ($16,750), Rice's highest special endowed fellowship awarded annually to five graduate students (one in the School of Humanities and Arts) whose records show outstanding achievement and promise.

At Rice University, I am currently a Graduate Fellow at the Center for Teaching Excellence, where I design and facilitate the Pedagogy Workshop Series for graduate students. I have served as a mentor for the School of Humanities’ Moody Undergraduate Research Fellowship, worked as an editorial assistant for the Journal of Southern History, and served as a teaching assistant in the Department of History, the Department of Transnational Asian Studies, and the Medical Humanities Program. I will be teaching a First-year Writing Seminar on Hawai‘i and the U.S. Pacific Empire in Fall 2026 and an undergraduate-level history course on Modern China in Spring 2027.

Before joining Rice, I received a BA in History from Tsinghua University, an MSt in U.S. History from the University of Oxford, and an MA in International Relations from the University of Chicago. 

I was born in Shenyang, Liaoning Province, and raised in Beijing. I enjoy visiting UNESCO World Heritage Sites, performing Pingshu (a traditional Chinese storytelling art), and listening to Peking Opera.