Dr. Shu specializes in contemporary American literature and comparative literature with an emphasis on transpacific American literature, post 9/11 American literature, postmodern American literature, Vietnam War literature, and Asian American literature. His research interest includes transpacific American studies and globalization theory, technology and discourse, as well as critical and comparative race studies.

Combined Ph. D in English and American Studies, Indiana University at Bloomington

Honors and Awards

Research

Texas Tech Humanities Center Alumni College Grant ($3000), Feb. 2022.

Texas Tech University College of Arts and Sciences Mid-Career Grant ($10,000), Dec. 2021.

U.S. Department of State--U.S. Embassy in Singapore Public Affairs Section--Small Grant Program ($24,000) October 2017- September 2018.

The Core Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program Award—researching and teaching at the National University of Singapore, Singapore, August 2017 to January 2018.

Texas Tech University's Scholarship Catalyst Program Grant in the Humanities for 2018 ($4000) and for 2017 ($2500).

Harvard University's Harvard-Yenching Library Travel Grant ($600), February 2017.

Texas Tech University's Integrated Scholar for 2017.

Annual Convention of China's Association for the Study of Literature in English, Keynote Speaker, June 2013 and July 2016.

Dartmouth College's “Futures of American Studies Summer Institute,” Plenary Speaker, June 2014 and June 2016.

Texas Tech University's Global Vision Award on Faculty International Scholarship, April 2016.

Stanford University's Digital Humanities Project on “the Chinese Railroad Workers in North America,” Participant, Sept. 2012-Apr. 2016.

Texas Tech University Creative Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences Grant ($14,900), Sept. 2012.

Henry Luce Foundation Special Initiative Grant ($27,000), Feb. 2012.

U.S. Department of Education Fulbright-Hays Group Studies Abroad Grant, Nov. 2003.

Big 12 Faculty Fellowship ($2,500), Texas Tech University and University of Colorado, Oct. 2002.

Teaching

The NEH Summer Institute Fellowship ($2,025), June 2023 

Texas Tech University Lawrence Schovanec Teaching Development Grant ($1500), Dec. 2020.

Teaching Academy Member, Inducted in Spring 2020.

The MLA Humanities Innovation Course Development Grant ($3000), Nov. 2019.

Texas Tech University's Teaching, Learning, and Professional Development Center, Teacher Mentoring through Peer Observation Fellow ($500), Aug. - Dec. 2018.

Texas Tech University's Teaching, Learning, and Professional Development Center, Service Learning Faculty Fellow ($1,500), Aug. 2015 - May 2016.

Service

Founding President of the TTU Chinese Faculty and Staff Association, 2009-2011.

Texas Tech University President's Excellence in Diversity and Equity Award, April 2011.

Texas Tech University Inclusive Excellence Award, April 2011.

Director of Comparative Literature Program, 2006-2010.

Books, Edited Volumes, and Special Journal Issues 

Yuan Shu and Selina Lai-Henderson (associate managing editor of the journal), eds. “Teaching and Theorizing Transnational American Studies around the Globe,” a special forum of The Journal of Transnational American Studies 13.2 (December 2022).

Yuan Shu and Sharmani Patricia Gabriel, eds. “Reading Transpacific American Literature: Empire, Space, and Representation,” a special issue of SARE: Southeast Asian Review of English. 58.2 (December 2021).

Yuan Shu, "World Orders and the Geopolitics of the Transpacific," a special issue of Verge: Studies in Global Asias. 7.1, (March 2021).

Yuan Shu, Otto Heim, and Kendall Johnson, eds. Oceanic Archives, Indigenous Epistemologies, and Transpacific American Studies. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2019.

Yuan Shu and Donald E. Pease, eds. American Studies as Transnational Practice: Turning toward the Transpacific, Hanover, NH: Dartmouth College Press. 2015.

Yuan Shu, Empire and Cosmo-politics: Technology, Race, and Transpacific Chinese American Writing. Under revision.

Book Chapters and Journal Articles

“Rereading Ha Jin's Novels in a Transpacific Context: Human Rights and Human Wrongs,” Modern Fiction Studies 69.1 (2023): 118-142.

Yuan Shu and Selina Lai-Henderson. “Introduction: Teaching and Theorizing Transnational American Studies around the Globe,” a special issue of The Journal of Transnational American Studies 13.2 (December 2022): 5-11. 
 
“Teaching and Theorizing American Studies in Singapore and Southeast Asia in the Post-American Era,” a special issue of The Journal of Transnational American Studies 13.2 (December 2022): 44-57. 

Yuan Shu and Sharmani Gabriel, “Reading Transpacific American Literature: Empire, Space, and Representation,” SARE: Southeast Asian Review of English. 58.2 (December 2021): 1-13.

“Rereading Empire, Rethinking History: Rehabilitation of the Vietcong in Lan Cao's Monkey Bridge,” SARE: Southeast Asian Review of English. 58.2 (December 2021): 78-94.

“Introduction: World Orders and the Geopolitics of the Transpacific,” Verge: Studies in Global Asias. 7.1 (2021): 1-4. 

“Imagining the Third World War: Geopolitics, Technology, and the Representation of Chinese and Chinese Americans in Singer and Cole's Ghost Fleet,” Verge: Studies in Global Asias. 7.1 (2021): 13-20.

"Representing Chinese Railroad Workers in North America: Chinese Historiography and Literature, 1949-2015," The Chinese and the Iron Road: Building the Transcontinental Railroad in North America. Eds. Gordon H. Chang and Shelley Fisher Fishkin. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2019. 246-262. Notes 425-431.

"Introduction: Oceanic Archives, Indigenous Epistemologies, and Transpacific American Studies," Oceanic Archives, Indigenous Epistemologies, and Transpacific American Studies. Eds. Yuan Shu, Otto Heim, and Kendall Johnson. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2019. 1-21.

"Maxine Hong Kingston's Transpacific Imagination: from the Talk Story of the "No-Name Woman" to the Articulation of Peace," Oceanic Archives, Indigenous Epistemologies, and Transpacific American Studies. Eds. Yuan Shu, Otto Heim, and Kendall Johnson. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2019. 172-187.

"Archives, Epistemology, and the Eco-Poetics of the Transpacific," Literature and Eco-criticism in English Studies in China. Eds. Ning Mei and Zhou Jie. Nanjing, China: Nanjing University Press, 2017. 283-302.

Yuan Shu and Donald E. Pease. “Introduction: Transnational American Studies and the Transpacific Imaginary,” American Studies as Transnational Practice, Hanover, NH: Dartmouth College Press, 2015. 1-35.

“Transnationalism, Planetary Consciousness, and American Studies,” American Studies as Transnational Practice, Hanover, NH: Dartmouth College Press. 2015. 84-105.

“Negotiating the Technological Empire: Cosmopolitics, Colonial Modernity, and Early Chinese American Autobiographical Writing,” American Studies as Transnational Practice, Hanover, NH: Dartmouth College Press. 2015. 365-388.

“Virtual Communities and the Cultural Imaginary of Chinese Americans,” Asian America: Forming New Communities, Expanding Boundaries. Ed. H. Ling. New Brunswick: Rutgers UP, 2009. 179-197.

“Globalization and ‘Asian Values': Teaching and Theorizing Asian American Literature,” College Literature 32:1 (2005): 86-102.

“Reading the Kung Fu Film in an American Context: from Bruce Lee to Jackie Chan,” The Journal of Popular Film and Television 31:2 (2003): 50-59.

"Re-imagine the Community: Digital Technology and Web-based Chinese Language Networks in North America," AsianAmerica.Net: Ethnicity, Nationalism, and Cyberspace. Ed. by Rachel Lee and Sau-ling Wong. New York: Routledge, 2003. 139-157.

“Cultural Politics and Chinese American Female Subjectivity: Rethinking Maxine Hong Kingston's Woman Warrior,” MELUS 26:2 (2001): 199-223.

“Information Technologies, the U.S. Nation-State, and Asian American Subjectivities,” Cultural Critique 40 (1998): 145-66. A special issue on “The Futures of American Studies.”

Encyclopedia Entries

“Lan Cao,” Asian Americans: An Encyclopedia of Social, Cultural, Economic, and Political History, eds. Xiaojian Zhao and Edward J.W. Park, Greenwood Press, 2013.

“Iris Chang,” Asian Americans: An Encyclopedia of Social, Cultural, Economic, and Political History, eds. Xiaojian Zhao and Edward J.W. Park, Greenwood Press, 2013.

“Le Ly Hayslip,” Asian Americans: An Encyclopedia of Social, Cultural, Economic, and Political History, eds. Xiaojian Zhao and Edward J.W. Park, Greenwood Press, 2013.

“Yan Phou Lee,” Asian Americans: An Encyclopedia of Social, Cultural, Economic, and Political History, eds. Xiaojian Zhao and Edward J.W. Park, Greenwood Press, 2013.

“Karen Tei Yamashita,” Asian Americans: An Encyclopedia of Social, Cultural, Economic, and Political History, eds. Xiaojian Zhao and Edward J.W. Park, Greenwood Press, 2013.

“Amy Tan,” Encyclopedia of Twentieth Century American Fiction, ed. Patrick O'Donnell, Blackwell Publishers, 2011.

Book Reviews

“Review of Mubarak Altwaiji's Ground Zero Narratives: Islam and Muslims in Post-9/11 American Narratives and Arab American Counter-narratives.” Choice 61.8 (April 2024). 

“Review of Sheng-mei Ma's The Tao of S: America's Chinee and the Chinese Century in Literature and Film. Choice 61:1 (September 2023).

“Review of Da Zheng's Shih-I Hsiung: A Glorious Showman.” Journal of Chinese Overseas 19.1 (April 2023): 186-190.

“Review of Hanshaw's Re-membering and Surviving: African American fiction of the Vietnam War,” Choice 59:1 (September 2021).

“Review of Colleen G. Eils's The Politics of Privacy in Contemporary Native, Latinx, and Asian American Metafictions,” Choice 58:9 (May 2021).

“Review of Keith Camacho's Sacred Men: Law, Torture, and Retribution in Guam,” Choice 57: 9 (May 2020).

“Review of Michelle Burnham's Transoceanic America: Risk, Writing, and Revolution in the Global Pacific,” Choice 57:5 (January 2020).

Review of John Okada: the life & rediscovered work of the author of No-no Boy, ed. by Frank Abe et al. 56:10 (June 2019).

Review of Cynthia Wu's Sticky Rice: a Politics of Intraracial Desire, Choice 56:7 (March 2019): 2218.

"Review of Karen Tei Yamashita: fictions of magic and memory, ed. by A. Robert Lee," Choice 56:3 (November 2018): 2050.

"Review of Richard Jean So's Transpacific Community: America, China, and the Rise and Fall of a Cultural Network," Journal of American Studies 52.3 (August 2018): E35.

"Review of "Thinking Literature across Continents" by Ranjan Ghosh and J. Hillis Miller," Choice 54:10 (June 2017): 1350.

“Review of King-Kok Cheung's Chinese American Literature without Borders,” Amerasia Journal 43:2 (2017): 195-197.

“Review of Heidi Kim's Invisible Subjects: Asian America in Postwar Literature,” Choice 54:3 (November 2016): 918.

“Review of Drawing New Color Lines: Transnational Asian American Graphic Narratives,” Choice 53:11 (July 2016): 1560.

“Review of The Cambridge Companion to Asian American Literature,” Choice 53:6 (February 2016): 878.

“Review of Jennifer Ho's Racial Ambiguity in Asian American Literature," Choice, 53:3 (December 2015): 2068.

“Review of Asian American Literature and the Environment, Choice 52:10 (June 2015): 1652.

“Review of Xiaojing Zhou's City of Others: Reimagining Urban Spaces in Asian American Literature,” Choice 52:8 (April 2015): 1316.

“Review of Global Perspectives on Asian American Literature,” Journal of Asian American Studies 12:3 (2009):366-368.

"Review of Y. Huang's Transpacific Imaginations," American Studies Journal 49:3 (2008): 274-275.

“Review of X.H. Yin's Chinese American Literature since the 1850s,” Amerasia Journal 27:2 (2001): 200-203.

Public Lectures and Presentations

“Technology, Life Writing, and Transpacific American Studies,” American Studies Institute, Doshisha University, Kyoto, Japan, June 6, 2023. 
 
“Negotiating the Technological Empire: Technology, Racial Formation, and Transpacific Chinese American Life Writing,” Life Writing Center, Oxford University, the United Kingdom, May 16, 2023. 
 
“Transnationalism and the Future of American Studies,” a public lecture at Xiaozhuang Institute, Nanjing, China, October 22, 2019. 
 
“Technology, Race, and Asian American Writing,” a public lecture at Yonsei University, Seoul, South Korea, October 14, 2019. 
 
“The Changing Representation of Chinese and Chinese Americans in the United States: from ‘Cheap Labor' to ‘High-Tech Spies,'” a public lecture at the United States Studies Center, the University of Sydney, Australia, May 22, 2019. 
 
“Rereading Maxine Hong Kingston's Woman Warrior as Transpacific American Literature,” a class lecture at the English Department, the University of Sydney, Australia, May 21, 2019.   
  
“Opportunities and Challenges in American Studies,” a public lecture at the Maranatha Christian University in Bandung, Indonesia, March 13, 2019.  
 
“Maxine Hong Kingston and Transpacific American Studies,” a public lecture at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, March 11, 2019. 
 
“Eco-criticism and Transpacific American Studies in the Twenty-first Century,” a public lecture at the Department of Comparative Literature, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, Thailand, December 18, 2017.  
 
“Challenges and Opportunities in American Studies,” a public lecture at the School of Global and American Studies, the University of Indonesia-Salemba (Jakarta), Indonesia, November 16, 2017 
 
“Eco-criticism and Asian American Studies,” a public lecture at the English Department, the National University of Singapore, Singapore, November 1, 2017 
 
“Empire, Ecology, and Transpacific American Studies,” a public lecture at the Department of English, the University of the Philippines at Diliman (Manila), the Philippines, October 18, 2017. 
 
“New Trends in American Literary Studies,” a public lecture at Southeast University, Nanjing, China, September 27, 2017. 
 
“Globalization and Literary Studies,” a public lecture at School of Foreign Studies, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing, China, November 2015. 
 
“Reading and Framing Post-9/11 American Literature,” a public lecture at the School of Foreign Studies, Nanjing University, Nanjing, China, June 2015.  
 
“Reading Jack London's The Call of the Wild,” a public lecture at the Johns Hopkins-Nanjing Center of American Studies, Nanjing University, Nanjing, China, June 2015. 
 
“Transnational American Studies Revisited,” an invited lecture at the School of Foreign Studies, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China, May 2015. 
 
“Human Rights and Human Wrongs in Ha Jin's Two Novels,” an invited lecture at the School of Foreign Studies, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China, June 2013. 
 
“Transnational American Studies and Asian American Studies,” an invited lecture at Institute of Asian American Studies, Beijing Foreign Studies University, Beijing, China, June 2013. 
 
“Theory and Praxis of English Studies,” a public lecture at the School of the Humanities and Social Sciences, Nanjing Forestry University, Nanjing, China, June 2009 
 
“Critical Theory and the Future of English Studies,” a public lecture at the School of Foreign Studies, Nanjing University, Nanjing, China, June 2007. 

Director of Comparative Literature Program and Asian Studies Program
American Literature and Comparative Literature

Email: yuan.shu@ttu.edu
Office: HUMA 465
Phone: (806) 834-8810