Dr Diana Yeh
Contact details
About
Overview
Diana Yeh is Senior Lecturer in Sociology, Culture and the Creative Industries in the Department of Sociology and Associate Dean of the School of Arts and Social Sciences at City, University of London.
Research
Research interests
Diana Yeh works on race and racisms, migration, cultural politics and activism, with a particular focus on East and Southeast Asian communities.
Her current research explores community and creative responses to anti-Asian racial violence and racial inequalities in the creative and cultural industries.
She is Principal Investigator of the project, ‘Responding to COVID-19 Anti-Asian Racial Violence through Community Care, Solidarity and Resistance’ funded by Resourcing Racial Justice and the SCC Higher Education Innovation Fund.
As part of this project, she founded ESEA Online Community Hub (https://www.eseahub.co.uk), which seeks to empower individual and community capacity to respond to racial violence by holding space – and acting as a hub – for networks of community creativity, care, resistance and solidarity.
This work develops her recent research on constructions and contestations of British Chinese and East and Southeast Asian identities. She was Principal Investigator of the British Academy/Leverhulme funded project, ‘Becoming East and Southeast Asian: Race, Ethnicity and Youth Politics of Belonging in Britain’ with Tamsin Barber at Oxford Brookes University.
Recent articles and editorials include: 'Racialization and Racisms in and beyond Covid, Colour and the Global South', ‘Becoming “British East Asian and Southeast Asian”: Anti-racism, Chineseness, and Political Love in the Creative and Cultural Industries’; ‘COVID-19, Anti-Asian Racial Violence and The Borders of Chineseness’; and ‘#BLM and the city’.
Her books include The Happy Hsiungs: Performing China and the Struggle for Modernity (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2014) and Contesting British Chinese Culture (2018).
In previous work, Diana conducted multi-sited fieldwork on the politics of identity and belonging among Chinese migrant artists in light of their translocal histories across Britain, South Africa, Italy, China and Taiwan.
Committed to working beyond academia, Diana regularly presents her research on UK and international television, radio and press, at institutions such as the Wellcome Trust, National Portrait Gallery and Tate Britain, and at the International Bookworm Festival in China. She has also acted as a consultant for the Royal Geographical Society and worked on a Knowledge Exchange Partnership for Bristol University with Penguin Books.
Publications
Publications by category
Books (2)
- Yeh, D. and Thorpe, A. (Eds.), (2018). Contesting British Chinese Culture. London: Palgrave.
- Yeh, D. (2014). The Happy Hsiungs Performing China and the Struggle for Modernity. Hong Kong University Press. ISBN 9789888208173.
Chapters (11)
- Yeh, D. and Barber, T. (2024). Reframing focus groups as deep collective and (sometimes) collaborative conversations: biographical vulnerabilities, anti-racist East and Southeast Asian solidarities and protective silences. In Nurse, L., O'Neill, M. and Moran, L. (Eds.), Biographical Research and New Social Architectures Challenges and Opportunities for Creative Applications across Europe (pp. 141-161). Bristol, UK: Policy Press. ISBN 9781447368908.
- Yeh, D. (2022). Chiang Yee and the Hsiungs: Solidarity, Conviviality and the Economy of Racial Representation. In Bevan, P., Witchard, A. and Zheng, D. (Eds.), Chiang Yee and His Circle: Chinese Artistic and Intellectual Life in Britain, 1930–1950 Hong Kong, China: Hong Kong University Press. ISBN 9789888754137.
- Yeh, D. and Barber, T. (2021). A new post-diasporic moment of organising: Crafting ‘East and Southeast Asian diaspora. In Kwan, A. and Joanna, W. (Eds.), Asia-Art-Activism: Experiments in Care and Collective Disobedience (pp. 44-51).
- In Thorpe, A. and Yeh, D. (Eds.), (2018). Contesting British Chinese Culture. In Springer International Publishing. ISBN 9783319711584.
- Yeh, D. and Thorpe, A. (2018). Introduction: Contesting British Chinese Culture. In Yeh, D. and Thorpe, A. (Eds.), Contesting British Chinese Culture (pp. 1-29). London: Palgrave.
- Yeh, D. (2015). Utopia beyond Cosmopolitanism: A Translocal View of Li Yuan-chia’. Viewpoint: A Retrospective of Li Yuan-chia (pp. 15-69). Taipei: Taipei Fine Arts Museum.
- Yeh, D. (2015). Staging China, Excising the Chinese: Lady Precious Stream and the Darker Side of Chinoiserie. In Witchard, A. (Ed.), British Modernism and Chinoiserie Edinburgh University Press.
- Yeh, D. (2014). Under the Spectre of Orientalism and Nation: Translocal Crossings and Discrepant Modernities. In Huang, M. (Ed.), The Reception of Chinese Art across Cultures (pp. 228-254). Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing. ISBN 9781443859097.
- In Veale, A. and Donà, G. (Eds.), (2014). Child and Youth Migration. In Palgrave Macmillan UK. ISBN 9781349447831.
- Yeh, D. (2008). Contested Belongings: The Politics and Poetics of Making a Home in Britain. In Lee, A.R. (Ed.), China Fictions/English Language: Essays in Diaspora, Memory, Story (pp. 299-325). Amsterdam/New York: Rodopi.
- Yeh, D. and Barber, T. A new post-diasporic moment of organising: Crafting ‘East and Southeast Asian' diaspora.
Journal articles (9)
- Yeh, D. (2022). Racialization and Racisms in and beyond Covid, Colour and the Global South. New Diversities, 24(1), pp. 91-101
- Yeh, D. (2021). Becoming British East Asian and Southeast Asian: Anti-racism, Chineseness, and Political Love in the Cultural and Creative Industries. British Journal of Chinese Studies, 11, pp. 53-70
- Mbaye, J. and Yeh, D. (2020). #BLM and the city. City, Culture and Society, 23, pp. 100373-100373. doi:10.1016/j.ccs.2021.100373
- Yeh, D. (2020). Covid-19, Anti-Asian Racial Violence, and The Borders of Chineseness. British Journal of Chinese Studies, 10. doi:10.51661/bjocs.v10i0.117
- Yeh, D. (2014). Contesting the ‘model minority’: racialization, youth culture and ‘British Chinese’/‘Oriental’ nights. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 37(7), pp. 1197-1210. doi:10.1080/01419870.2014.859288
- Yeh, D. (2012). Book Review: The Chinese in Britain, 1800–Present: Economy, Transnationalism, Identity. The Sociological Review, 60(2), pp. 380-383. doi:10.1111/j.1467-954x.2012.02083.x
- Yeh, D. (2010). Pot Luck: Food and Art. The Senses and Society, 5(3), pp. 412-418. doi:10.2752/174589210x12753842356403
- Yeh, D. (2000). Ethnicities on the move: ‘British‐Chinese’ art – identity, subjectivity, politics and beyond. Critical Quarterly, 42(2), pp. 65-91. doi:10.1111/1467-8705.00287
- Yeh, D. (2000). Groping in the Dark: Encountering the works of Steve McQueen. Room 5, 1(1), pp. 39-55
Working paper
- Karaivanova, I., Blunt, G.D., Couture-Ménard, M.-.È., Bernier, L., Breton, M., Ménard, J.F.... Germain, S. (2021). Beyond the Virus: Multidisciplinary and International Perspectives on Inequalities raised by COVID-19. London, UK: The City Law School
Professional activities
Keynote lectures/speeches (4)
- Cultural Politics in Migration: Negotiating Identity, Belonging and Racism. Autonomous University of Barcelona (2015). The Impact of East Asia in Europe: Cultural Production, Politics and Society
- The Cultural Politics of In/Visibility: Contesting ‘British Chineseness’ in the Arts. British Chinese Studies Network, University of Liverpool
- 2018 ‘Why (Not) Asia? Theatre, Activism and Social Change’, Sight/Unseen: Amplifying Voices of Southeast and British East Asian Theatre Playwrights’ conference. Goldsmiths College
- 2018 'Whither Asia?: Yellowface and Whitewashing: From Hollywood to British Screen and Television’, Yellow is the New Blackface. Edge Hill University
Radio programmes (7)
- How Welcoming is the West, on anti-Asian racial violence and on Hong Kong British National Overseas arrivals, Backchat, Hong Kong Radio and Television, Hong Kong. (2021).
- ‘Disorienting’, Archive on 4, BBC Radio 4. (2020).
- Li Yuan Chia. BBC Radio 4 (2015). Li Yuan Chia was one of the first significant Chinese abstract artists of the 20th century. This programme examines his career from the place he spent the last 28 years of his life: a stone farmhouse, built next to Hadrian's Wall in Cumbria. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00pcf5j. First broadcast 2009.
- The Chinese in Britain: Artistic Pursuits. BBC Radio 4 (2014). Recent research has uncovered the rich mix of writers, artists and intellectuals who were living in Britain before the Second World War. Anna Chen speaks to Diana Yeh about two of the earliest British Chinese to break the mould and make their mark on the British public. Chiang Yee’s enormously popular Silent Traveller books in London, Oxford, Edinburgh and the Lakelands cast a humorous Chinese gaze on British life. His friend Hsiung Shih-I became the first Chinese to write and direct a West End play with his 1935 adaptation of the popular Chinese story Lady Precious Stream which ran for 1000 nights in London to glowing reviews, was revived several times during the war and soon became a staple of repertory and school productions. First broadcast 2007. http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/factual/chinese_in_britain8.shtml
- ‘O Other Where Art Thou?: The Yellow Peril’. Resonance FM (2013). Discusses yellowface, the return of blackface and whether it's all going backwards
- 'Paul Robeson, Meet Anna May Wong’. Resonance FM (2013). About the world's first internationally renowned African American singing star Paul Robeson and the Hollywood screen legend Anna May Wong. With Dr Diana Yeh talking about some of the forgotten pioneering Black and Asian stars of the stage in the early 20th century.
- Anna May Wong: A Celestial Star in Piccadilly. BBC Radio 4 (2009). Anna Chen presents a tribute to Hollywood's first Chinese-American movie star, Anna May Wong, star of the classic 1929 silent movie Piccadilly. Filmed in London, it made her a celebrity in Britain in the 1930s. Despite her talent, Wong struggled against racial prejudice throughout her career, and was banned from even kissing her leading men. However, her reputation is now enjoying a revival thanks to the restoration and re-release of Piccadilly. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00gl694
Television programmes (7)
- Interview for Channel News Asia documentary on the postwar deportations of Chinese seamen. (2022).
- Interview for the History Channel for the series ‘Empire Builders II: China’ on the Chinese diaspora. (2021).
- 15-minute interview about Racism and COVID-19 for Arirang, South Korea national television, international, March. (2020).
- Interview about Racism and COVID-19 for Channel 5, UK. (2020).
- Interview about Racism and COVID-19 for China Global Television Network Europe. (2020).
- Interview on my book, The Happy Hsiungs for ‘Footprints’ documentary series, Phoenix Television, Los Angeles. (2016).
- ‘Showcase Special Edition on Food & Art’, TRT World, Turkey. (2016).