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Jun ZHANG is an assistant professor at the Department of Public and International Affairs at City University of Hong Kong. Her works explore social transformation through urban governance, politics of infrastructure and space, material culture, and class relationship. Her book, ¿"riving toward Modernity: Cars and the Lives of the Middle Class in Contemporary China¿ (Cornell University Press, 2019), takes the entangled rises of an automotive regime and the middle class as a way to examine the transformations under the grand narrative of China in the reform era. She is currently working on three major projects. One is a book manuscript (with Dr. Gonçalo Santos) on the rising philanthropic practices in South China. The second one is the role of technology and science in shaping everyday life experience. And the third is an anthropological and historical project on the emergence of urban governance in China.
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Identification

Personal identification

Full name
Jun Zhang

Citation names

  • Zhang, Jun

Author identifiers

Ciência ID
5D1D-7EB6-E3BC
ORCID iD
0000-0002-4196-8101

Email addresses

  • zhang.jun@cityu.edu.hk (Professional)

Addresses

  • Department of Public and International Affairs, 10000, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China (Professional)

Websites

Knowledge fields

  • Social Sciences - Sociology - Anthropology
  • Social Sciences - Economic and Social Geography - Urban Studies
  • Social Sciences - Other Social Sciences - Social Sciences, Interdisciplinary
  • Social Sciences - Other Social Sciences - Social Sciences, Interdisciplinary

Languages

Language Speaking Reading Writing Listening Peer-review
Chinese (Mother tongue)
English Proficiency (C2) Proficiency (C2) Proficiency (C2) Proficiency (C2) Proficiency (C2)
Education
Degree Classification
2009
Concluded
 PhD (Postgraduate Certificate)
Major in Anthropology
Yale University Department of Anthropology, United States
2003
Concluded
 Master of Law (Postgraduate Certificate)
Major in Law
Sun Yat-Sen University, China
2000
Concluded
 Bachelor of law (Bachelor)
Major in Law
Sun Yat-Sen University, China
Affiliation

Positions / Appointments

Category
Host institution 		Employer
2018/01 - Current Assistant Professor City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China
City University of Hong Kong Department of Asian and International Studies, Hong Kong SAR China
2014/01 - 2018/01 Research Assistant Professor The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China
The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China
(...)
2011/07 - 2014/01 Visiting Assistant Professor Bryn Mawr College, United States
Bryn Mawr College Department of Growth and Development of Cities, United States
2011 - 2011 Teaching Fellow IES Abroad, United States
IES Abroad Beijing Center, United States
2009 - 2010 Research Affiliate Yale University - Department of Anthropology, United States
Projects

Grant

Designation Funders
2019/09/01 - 2023/02/28 Women and Birth in Transition: The Politics of Childbirth Medicalization in Reform Era China
17612719
Principal investigator
City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China
 Research Grants Council, Hong Kong
Ongoing
2020/01/01 - 2022/12/31 Demolishing the walls, Rebuild the city: Infrastructural Transformation and the Emergence of Urban Governance in Republican Canton, China
CityU 21603019
Principal investigator
City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China
 Research Grants Council, Hong Kong
Ongoing
2018/08/01 - 2020/01/30 Mapping the Networks and Impacts of Civic Engagement: Community Actors, Social Capital, and Urban Governance in Hong Kong
N/A
Co-Investigator
City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China
 Hong Kong Baptist University
Concluded
2017/01/01 - 2019/12/31 Old Neighbourhoods, New Spaces: Urban Reconstruction and Governance in China’s Urbanization
CityU 17636016
Principal investigator
City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China

The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China
Research Grants Council, Hong Kong
Concluded
2016/04/01 - 2017/12/31 Driving toward Modernity: The Car and Middle-Class Lives in Contemporary China
N/A
Principal investigator
The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China
 The University of Hong Kong
Concluded
2017/01 - 2017/01 An international workshop: Humanitarianism in Action: Asia-Pacific Ethnographic Perspectives (with Gonçalo Santos and Isaac Gagne)
N/A
Workshop Grant
The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China
 American Council of Learned Societies
Concluded
2014/03/01 - 2016/12/31 From Canton to Guangzhou: Urban Renewal and Spatial Politics in a South China City
N/A
Principal investigator
The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China
 The University of Hong Kong
Concluded
2013/06/01 - 2013/09/01 The Past in the Present: Urban Renewal and the Politics of Aesthetics in South China’s Urbanization (1917-2010)
N/A
Principal investigator
Bryn Mawr College, United States
 American Philosophical Society
Concluded
2006/07/01 - 2007/08/31 Driving towards Modernity: An Ethnography of Automobiles in Post-reform South China
N/A
Principal investigator
Yale University, United States
 Yale University
Concluded
Outputs

Publications

Book
  1. 1. ¿¿. ¿¿¿¿¿: ¿¿¿¿¿¿¿¿¿¿¿¿¿ (Chinese translation of my English book "Driving toward Modernity"). Guangzhou, China: ¿¿¿¿¿¿¿. 2023.
    Published
  2. Zhang, Jun. Driving toward Modernity: Cars and Lives of the Middle Class in Contemporary China. Ithaca, United States: Cornell University Press. 2019.
    Published • 10.7591/9781501738418
Book chapter
  1. Santos, Gonçalo; Rao, Yichen; Xing, Jack L.; Zhang, Jun. "Capitalism, Overwork, and Polanyi's Dialectics of Freedom: Emerging Visions of Work-Life Balance in Contemporary Urban China". In Work, Society, and Self: Chimeras of Freedom in the Neoliberal Era, 132-157. New York: Berghahn Books, 2021.
    Published
  2. Zhang, Jun; Sun, Peidong. "When are you going to get married?: Parental Matchmaking and Middle-Class Women in Contemporary Urban China". In Wives, Husbands, and Lovers: Marriage and Sexuality in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Urban China, edited by Davis, Deborah S.; Freedman, Sara, 118-144. Stanford, CA, United States: Stanford University Press, 2014.
    Published
Book review
  1. Zhang, Jun. "Book Review: Globalizing Automobilism (by Gijs Mom)". Review of Globalizing Automobilism: Exuberance and the Emergence of Layered Mobility, 1900-1980 (by Gijs Mom; New York: Berghahn Books, 2020) 18, 3 (2021): 186-188.
    Published
  2. Zhang, Jun. "Book review: Becoming one(by Chika Watanabe)". Review of Becoming One: Religion, Development, and Environmentalism in a Japanese NGO in Myanmar 45, 1 (2021): 187-188.
    10.1080/10357823.2020.1841598
  3. Zhang, Jun. "Book Review: Shifting Dynamics of Contention in the Digital Age (by Jun Liu)". Review of Shifting Dynamics of Contention in the Digital Age: Mobile Communication and Politics in China ((by Jun Liu; Oxford University Press, 2020) (2021):
    10.1080/00472336.2021.1901133
  4. Zhang, Jun. "Book Review: Unending Capitalism (by Karl Gerth)". Review of Unending Capitalism: How Consumerism Negated China's Communist Revolution (by Karl Gerth; Cambridge University Press, 2020) 62, 1 (2021): 318-319.
    10.1353/tech.2021.0047
  5. Zhang, Jun. "Book Review: Consumption in China". Review of Consumption in China: How China's New Consumer Ideology Is Shaping the Nation (By LiAnne Yu; Polity 2014) 118, 3 (2016): 702-703.
    10.1111/aman.12658
  6. Zhang, Jun. "Book Review: The middle class in neoliberal China". Review of The Middle Class in Neoliberal China: Governing Risk, Life-Building, and Themed Spaces (by Hai Ren; Routledge 2013) 87, 3 (2014): 577-579.
    Published
  7. Zhang, Jun. "Film review: Chaiqian (Demolition)". Review of Chaiqian (Demolition; Directed by J.P. Sniadecki, 2008, 62 minutes) 30, 1 (2014): 74-75. https://scholars.cityu.edu.hk/en/publications/film-review-chaiqian-demolition(e1af4db6-7343-49a1-b636-8aa2ceab45c2).html.
    10.1111/var.12033
Encyclopedia entry
  1. Santos, Gonçalo; Zhang, Jun. "Urbanization in China". In The International Encyclopedia of Anthropology. John Wiley & sons ( https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/book/10.1002/9781118924396), 2021.
    Published • 10.1002/9781118924396.wbiea2470
Journal article
  1. Santos, Gonçalo; Zhang, Jun. Corresponding author: Zhang, Jun. "The Rise in Cesarean Births and the Technocratic Medicalization of Childbirth in Late-Reform China". Modern China (2024):
    Open access • Published
  2. Zhang, Jun. "Afterword: Pandemic governance in China". HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory 13 2 (2023): 321-326. http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/726051.
    Published • 10.1086/726051
  3. Zhang, Jun. "Joyful singing in parks". Antropologia Portuguesa 39 (2022): 103-128. http://dx.doi.org/10.14195/2182-7982_39_5.
    Published • 10.14195/2182-7982_39_5
  4. Zhang, Jun. "What is shared in shared bicycles? Mobility, space, and capital". Mobilities 17 5 (2022): 711-728. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17450101.2022.2099755.
    Published • 10.1080/17450101.2022.2099755
  5. Zhang, Jun. "Hardening National Boundaries in a Globally-Connected World: Technology, Development, and Nationalism in Contemporary Urban China". Journal of Contemporary Asia 52 5 (2022): 783-804.
    Published • 10.1080/00472336.2021.2001841
  6. Zhang, Jun. "Is Mainland China the Source of All of Hong Kong's Problems?". HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory 10 2 (2020): 313-318.
    Published • 10.1086/709525
  7. Marks, Danny; Zhang, Jun. Corresponding author: Zhang, Jun. "Circuits of power: Environmental injustice from Bangkok's shopping malls to Laos’ hydropower dams". Asia Pacific Viewpoint 60 3 (2019): 296-309. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/apv.12242.
    Published • 10.1111/apv.12242
  8. Zhang, Jun. "Materializing a form of urban governance: when street building intersected with city building in Republican Canton (Guangzhou), China". History and Technology 33 2 (2017): 153-174. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07341512.2017.1348440.
    10.1080/07341512.2017.1348440
  9. Zhang, Jun. "(Extended) Family Car, Filial Consumer-Citizens: Becoming Properly Middle Class in Post-Socialist South China". Modern China 43 1 (2017): 36-65. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0097700416645138.
    Published • 10.1177/0097700416645138
  10. ZHANG, JUN. "Taxis, Traffic, and Thoroughfares: The Politics of Transportation Infrastructure in China's Rapid Urbanization in the Reform Era". City & Society 28 3 (2016): 411-436. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/ciso.12099.
    Published • 10.1111/ciso.12099
  11. Zhang, Jun. "The Rise and Fall of Qilou: Metamorphosis of Forms and Meanings of Built Environments in Guangzhou (Canton), China". Traditional Dwellings and Settlements Review 26 2 (2015): 25-40.
    Published
Newsletter article
  1. Zhang, Jun; Sun, Peidong. "Parental Matchmaking in China", Eurics Briefs, 2021
  2. Zhang, Jun. "Divided in a connected world: Reflections on COVID 19 from Hong Kong", City & Society, 2020, https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ciso.12264.
    10.1111/ciso.12264
Online resource
  1. Zhang, Jun. A History of Bicycle Mobility in Urban China: Shared Bikes, Technology, and Infrastructure (Part 2 of 2).. 2022. https://www.eth.mpg.de/molab-inventory/mobility-infrastructure/history-of-bicycle-mobility-in-urban-China-part-two.
    10.48509/MoLab.1288
  2. Zhang, Jun. A History of Bicycle Mobility in Urban China: Infrastructure, Economy, and Urban Planning (Part 1 of 2).. 2022. https://www.eth.mpg.de/molab-inventory/mobility-infrastructure/history-of-bicycle-mobility-in-urban-China-part-one.
    10.48509/MoLab.9267
  3. Zhang, Jun. Chinese techno-nationalism more than mere propaganda. 2022. https://360info.org/chinese-techno-nationalism-more-than-mere-propaganda/.
Thesis / Dissertation
  1. "Driving toward Modernity: An Ethnography of Automobiles in Contemporary South China". PhD, Yale University - Department of Anthropology, 2019.
Activities

Oral presentation

Presentation title Event name
Host (Event location)
2023/12 Mythologies of Wealth in the Platform Economy: The case of Didi in China The East Asian Regional Conference in Alternative Geography-Global Political Economy (EARCAG-GPE) 2023 Conference
The East Asian Regional Conference in Alternative Geography-Global Political Economy (Hong Kong SAR China)
2023/11 How WeChat and Didi became super-sticky: Designs, contingencies, and open-endedness in the infrastructuralization of platforms The 118th Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Associatio
AAA (Toronto, Canada)
2023/10 Automobility, Imagined Modernity, and Urbanization: The Remaking of Canton in Early Twentieth Century China The 2023 Global Mobility Humanities Conference (GMHC) and Annual Conference of the International Association for the History of Transport, Traffic and Mobility (T²M)
International Association for the History of Transport, Traffic and Mobility (T²M) (Seoul, South Korea)
2022/02 Driving toward Modernity: Cars and Lives of the Middle Class in Contemporary China Book talk
University of Macau, Department of Sociology (online) (Macau SAR China)
2021/11/23 The Anthropocene and the Culture of Flushing International Colloquium: Pluralizing the Anthropocene II. Reenvisioning the Future of the Planet in the 21st century
Fundação Serralves (online, Portugal) (Portugal)
2021/07/10 Hardening boundaries in a connected world: Technology, platform economy and nationalism in Contemporary China The 26th World Congress of Political Science: New Nationalism in an Open World
World Congress of Political Science (Lisbon, Portugal)
2021/07/08 Political Ecologies of Human Shit: The Recycling Economy of Night Soil and Human Manure in Early 20th Century China BioSocial Talks
Research Centre for Anthropology and Health (CIAS) (online, Portugal) (Portugal)
2020/07 Technology, Ideology and Economy The 16th EASA biennial conference: New anthropological horizons in and beyond Europe
The European Association of Social Anthropologists (Lisbon, Portugal)
2019/11 What is shared in Shared Bikes?: Mobility, Space, and Capital Ride-Hailing Workshop
(Vancouver, Canada)
2019/11 Caring for the People, Caring like a State: The Politics and Ethics of Non-Governmental Philanthropic Practices in Contemporary China The 118th Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association
American Anthropological Association (Vancouver, Canada)
2019/07 Corruption, Ethics, and Philanthropy: The Case of Lions Clubs in South China International Convention of Asia Scholars 11
International Convention of Asia Scholars (Leiden, Netherlands)
2018/07 Digital Humanitarians: The Politics of Micro-charity in Contemporary China International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences
International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences (Florianópolis, Brazil)
2018/07 From Agricultural Commodities to Domestic Waste Materials: Changing Infrastructures of Human Waste Management in Republican Canton AAS-in-Asia
AAS-in-Asia (Dehli, India)
2017/01 Ethical Labor and the Workings of Non-governmental Humanitarian Care in Contemporary China Humanitarianism in Action: Asia-Pacific Ethnographic Perspectives (Workshop; supported by the American Council of Learned Society)
The University of Hong Kong (Hong Kong SAR China)
2015/08 Materializing a New Form of Governance: When Streets Building Intersected with State Building in the Early Twentieth-century Canton, China Infrastructures: Provocations towards an Inter-disciplinary Dialogue (Workshop)
National University of Singapore, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (Singapore)
2015/03 “‘I give, I’m happy, I mature’: The Making of Humanitarian Middle-class Subjectivities in Contemporary China Annual Conference of the Association for Asian Studies
Association for Asian Studies (Chicago, United States)
2014/09/19 Driving for the Family: Ethical Negotiation in the Making of Middle Class in Urban China Lunchtime Seminar
Chinese University of Hong Kong, Department of Anthropology (Hong Kong SAR China)
2013/11 Singing Red Songs in Parks: Apolitical Engagement in Political Culture in Urban China The 112th Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association
American Anthropological Association (Chicago, United States)
2012/11 From the Exotic to the Traditional: The Qilou Buildings in South China’s Urbanization The 111th Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association
American Anthropological Association (San Francisco, United States)
2010/11 More Taxis, Better Traffic?: Local Governance Debates in Contemporary Guangzhou, South China The 109th Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association
American Anthropological Association (New Orleans, United States)
2009/12 Parade with Cars: Finding a Place in (Post)Socialist Urban China The 108th Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association
American Anthropological Association (Philadelphia, United States)
2009/04/25 Consuming Cars, Driving toward Modernity: A Study of the State, the Market and the Individuals in (Post)Socialist South China Global Socialisms and Postsocialisms (Soyuz Annual Symposium)
Yale University (New Haven, United States)
2009/03 Whose Automobility?: Spatializing Urban South China The Annual Meeting of the Association for Asian Studies
Association for Asian Studies (Chicago, United States)
2008/11 Whose Automobility? The Production of Hierarchical Space in Urban South China The 107th Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association
American Anthropological Association (San Francisco, United States)
2007/01 Automobiles, Autonomy and Family Values The Third Graduate Seminar on China
Chinese University of Hong Kong (Hong Kong SAR China)

Event organisation

Event name
Type of event (Role) 		Institution / Organization
2021 - Current Sci-Tech Asia "Technoviews" Podcast Series (https://scitechasia.org/podcasts/) (2018)
Other (Member of the Organising Committee)

Association member

Society Organization name Role
2014 - Current Hong Kong Anthropological Society Executive member & event organizer
2022/03/14 - 2024/02/29 American Anthropological Association

Committee member

Activity description
Role 		Institution / Organization
2022/04/01 - Current Member for its Greater Bay Area committee, Habitat for Humanity (a nonprofit housing organization working in local communities across all 50 states and in more than 70 countries around the world).
Member
 Habitat for Humanity Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR China
2021/01/01 - Current Member of the International Advisory Board for Palgrave’s series “Studies in the Political Economy of Public Policy”.
Other
 Palgrave Macmillan, Australia
2021/01/01 - Current Member of the editorial board of Journal of Contemporary Asia
Member

Interview (tv / radio show)

Program Topic
2021/01 - Current Technoviews in Sci-Tech Asia & Podcast series on books by Cornell University Press Driving Toward Modernity in China
2020/09/30 - Current BBC Radio 4’s sociology series, “Thinking Allowed” Cars

Mentoring / Tutoring

Topic Student name
2020/09 - Current Chan, Ka Lok Daniel