Student summer research presentations

Each semester, APSI organizes several events under the banner of our Asia-Pacific Forum. These informal sessions are opportunities for students, faculty, and members of our community to gather and discuss topics of interest, including research projects and opportunities.

At this event, four students will share findings from their summer research: Mingyu Joo; Jiaer Liu; and Hieu Nguyen.

Lunch will be provided to registered participants.

Presenters + Abstracts

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Mingyu Joo—“The ‘Others’ of Itaewon: Navigating Militarism and Authority in Marginalized Communities”

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This talk examines Itaewon as a liminal site where multiple marginalized communities have negotiated survival under U.S.–Korean militarism and social control. From the postwar camptown system that institutionalized female sex labor for U.S. soldiers to the district’s emergence as South Korea’s largest queer enclave, Itaewon’s history reveals continuities in how ‘othered’ bodies react to, resist and utilize militarized, heteropatriarchal control. Expanding the definition of “queer” beyond sexual identity, I trace survival strategies of contemporary LGBTQ+ communities—one of the most continually marginalized and silenced groups through discourses of ‘national security’ in a precarious, militaristic state—that challenge dominant norms while navigating a precarious sense of safety. The history of camptown women in Itaewon and throughout Korea are mentioned to provide a background on their parallel survival strategies of spatial occupation, coded communication, and affective networks. Drawing on archival materials, oral histories, and visual culture, I analyze how present-day queer residents of Itaewon reinterpret this inherited resistance, from movements in queer art to public health advocacy. In doing so, I attempt to reframe queerness as both a lived identity and a method of resistance that reveal the deep entanglement of sexuality, empire, and marginalized survival in modern Korea.

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Jiaer Liu—“Dancing on the Edge: Heels Dance, ‘Cabian,’ and the Making of Chinese Women’s Subjectivities”

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This research takes as its point of departure the Chinese Internet slang “cabian,” loosely translated as “playing on the edge.” In practice, the term is often used to describe––and typically to criticize––online content that frequently features women’s bodies and is potentially imbued with sexual innuendo. Given the absence of a clear and consistent definition of “cabian,” this study takes heels dance, a dance form that is popular among young Chinese women and is often labeled as “cabian” across the digital sphere, as a focused case through which to examine how this relatively bounded practice illuminates the ways in which the otherwise ambiguous term operates in contemporary discourse. Drawing on online interviews and participant observation in a dance studio in Shanghai, this study aims to explore how the processes of Chinese women’s subjectivation are manifested in their negotiations over “cabian” and their participation in heels dance.

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Hieu Nguyen—“Autocratic use of Information Technology and Impact on Democratic Institutions”

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Autocratic regimes continue to deepen their control even as information technology – once celebrated as a force for liberation – becomes more widespread. Existing literature suggests that democratic‐looking institutions in these regimes, such as national assemblies, party networks and elections, serve as channels for gathering grassroots information on non‐sensitive issues. The rise of digital tools raises new questions about whether traditional participatory mechanisms are being displaced by systems powered by big data and advanced processing capabilities. My fieldwork focuses on conducting expert interviews to build a theory of upward information flow in single‐party regimes and to document the impact of information technology on those mechanisms. Through snowball sampling, I carried out 11 expert interviews in Ha Noi, Hai Phong, Ho Chi Minh City and Can Tho with several high‐ranking state officials, policy consultants, faculty and researchers at public institutes. These semi-structured discussions allowed me to triangulate diverse perspectives on how information moves from the grassroots to the leadership. One major challenge at the outset was gaining access. My initial framing around “information technology and democratic institutions” provoked wariness among potential interlocutors. After reframing the project more explicitly as an exploration of “digitalization in government work” and “policy decision‐making,” people became more willing to introduce me to relevant stakeholder. As a result, I find that institutional channels such as assemblies, parties and elections still function as information‐gathering mechanisms. However, information technology does not simply replace them; rather, it augments some while contributing to the gradual erosion of others. I plan to refine my theoretical framework by clearly mapping the range of mechanisms through which autocratic governments solicit information for policymaking and evaluating how digital tools interact with each of those channels.