Yu Li

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

PhD

Linguistics

Peking University

MA

Linguistics

Peking University

BA

Economics

John Brockway Huntington Foundation Fellowship

The Huntington Library (San Marino, CA)

2023-03-07

https://huntington.org/available-fellowships#short

Hagley Exploratory Research Grant

Hagley Museum & Library (Wilmington, DE)

2022-05-04

https://www.hagley.org/exploratory-research-grants

Global China

This course engages students in inquiries into the ever-evolving concept of "Chineseness" in historical and global-local contexts. Rooted in the linguistic and cultural diversity of China and is thus in itself complex, the idea of "what is Chinese" has been shaped and reshaped by global influences since China and the West came into sustained contact in the 13th century. In this interdisciplinary course, students will study a broad range of topics with the main objective to develop their intercultural curiosity and competence, critical thinking skills, and global-local perspectives about China and the world. The course consists of four units: Chinese languages, cultures, and philosophy, China and Europe (13th-20th centuries), China and the Americas (19th-21st centuries), and Chinese diaspora cultures in the globalized world (20th-21st centuries). This course fulfills the Historical Analysis and Perspectives Core requirement.

The Chinese Writing System

This course integrates critical inquiries of the Chinese writing system from a range of disciplinary perspectives: linguistics, information processing, history, sociology, anthropology, gender studies, literature, and visual arts. It starts by introducing students to the Chinese script as a linguistic subject, debunking popular myths with a focus on how and why the script has been used to write four unrelated languages: Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and Vietnamese. With linguistic knowledge as a foundation, students then delve into a range of linked but disciplinarily distinct topics, including script reform and technology, personhood in the Chinese writing system, Women's Script (Nǚshū 女书), Chinese characters as a medium for modern American poetry, and the Chinese writing system in avant-garde art. These inquiries cohere as they offer insight into how the Chinese writing system has represented and shaped cultural identities at the personal and the social level in and beyond Asia. This course fulfills the Interdisciplinary Connections Core requirement.

Chinese Calligraphy

This course offers an interdisciplinary study and practicum of Chinese calligraphy in its artistic, historical, and sociocultural contexts. Students will start by learning about Chinese calligraphy as a traditional art form and then go beyond the classically defined discipline to examine the aesthetic values, intellectual metaphors, and moral criteria that calligraphy embodies in China or East Asia. They will examine calligraphy's role in Confucian education and the Civil Service Examination, in Buddhist practices, as well as in modern political transactions. As well, they will learn about the development of Modernist Calligraphy and contemporary Chinese artists' use of character writing in avant-garde works. Throughout the semester, students will engage in systematic hands-on practice of brush writing in the Standard (kǎishū 楷书) style. Sustained practice will prepare them for the completion of a final art project at the end of the semester. This course fulfills the Creative Experience Core requirement.

The chop suey letterform in historical Los Angeles Chinatowns

Li, Y. (2023).

2023-12-13

https://doi.org/10.1080/10350330.2023.2286443

Cultural authenticity in the linguistic landscape: Developing additional language learners’ critical intercultural understanding

Li, Y. (2022).

2022-07-05

https://doi.org/10.21832/9781788923873-014

Translanguaging as a pedagogical practice in Chinese language and (inter)culture learning

Li, Y. & Liu, J. (2022).

2022-01-21

http://doi.org/10.1075/csl.20006.li