Claire Chun
Research
visual art and culture; transpacific Asian American studies; queer and feminist theory; critical beauty studies; feminist science studies; disability studies; materiality studies
Contact:
e: claire.chun@berkeley.edu
Bio & Research Interests
Claire Chun is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Ethnic Studies (with a Designated Emphasis in Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies). She received her B.A. in Politics and Social and Cultural Analysis from New York University.
Her research explores how modern conceptualizations of “Korean” and “Asian” beauty, wellness, and aesthetics are shaped by overlapping forces of US militarism, tourism, and humanitarianism.
Claire’s research and writing has been published or is forthcoming in the Asian Diasporic Visual Cultures and the Americas, Journal of Asian American Studies, ABC-CLIO, diaCRITICS, and the Social Science Matrix. She has spoken at both academic and non-academic conferences, including KCON NY, DMZ International Documentary Film Festival, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and the Busan Cinema Center.
Publications
“Monstrous Beauty: Unruly Bodies and Diasporic Plasticity in kate-hers RHEE’s The Multiverse Portraits.” Asian Diasporic Visual Cultures and the Americas 8, 1-2 (2023): 135-164.
“Hate As Desire, Desiring Otherwise: Imagining Asian American Feminist Strategies.” The American Mosaic: The Asian American Experience. ABC-CLIO (2022). Co-authored with Crystal Song.
“Yellow Peril and Techno-orientalism in the Time of Covid-19: Racialized Contagion, Scientific Espionage, and Techno-Economic Warfare.” Journal of Asian American Studies 23, no. 3 (2020): 421-440. Co-authored with Lok Siu.
Interviews
“To live with opacity, to live with uncertainty”: A Conversation with Thuy Linh Nguyen Tu. diaCRITICS. Diasporic Vietnamese Artists Network. April 3, 2024.
K-Beauty in War: A Visual Interview with Claire Chun. UC Berkeley Social Science Matrix. July 22, 2024.