Research in Biological Sciences and Its Social Impact

This course will tackle the topic of embodiment in Chinatown from the design-oriented perspectives of city planning, public art, cultural and cinema studies. The focus will be on how racialized bodies have been imagined and represented in colonial and post-colonial discourses since the 19th century during the emergence of mass global migration, often motivated by the search for work. The narrative of the Chinese in America will serve as case study during the transition from the commerce of enslaved bodies to the commerce of contracted bodies.

More than forty years after the normalization of relations between the United States and China, the relationship faces new and fundamental challenges with global implications. Designed as a policy task force, taught in coordination with a similar course to be taught at Tsinghua University in Beijing, this course will introduce students to the most pressing issues in U.S.-China relations –– including security, trade, climate, tech competition, and human rights. Each student will be required to complete a policy paper on some aspect of U.S.-China relations.

At the end of the course, students will travel to China to meet in-person with their Chinese counterparts at Tsinghua University, and to present their policy papers and recommendations to relevant interested Chinese audiences in Beijing and Shanghai. Travel to China will take place Wednesday, May 14 – Sunday, May 25, 2025.