Application Due Date: January 15, 2024
The Global Studies Program at the University of Chicago is pleased to announce the L.C.K. Yung Global Studies Fellowship Fund in Hong Kong for undergraduate students. With generous funding from the L.C.K. Yung Fellowship Fund, we are launching an inter-institutional and interdisciplinary research program between the Hong Kong Jockey Club University of Chicago Academic Complex | The University of Chicago Francis and Rose Yuen Campus in Hong Kong and the University of Hong Kong. Students will work directly on faculty-led projects to explore topics in the following areas: global finance, migration, health, gender, and the environment. The Global Studies Program will provide funds to cover travel and lodging in Hong Kong for the research assistants. We will also provide administrative and research support in the form of mentoring, as well as methodological training at the campus in Hong Kong.
Accepted University of Chicago College students are eligible for a $1,000 Metcalf Grant Fellowship through the University of Chicago Career Advancement.
To apply, students will need to submit a cover letter along with the names of three references and their contact information. The cover letter needs to specify which project they would like to serve on, their research interests, as well as any methodological skills and language skills they bring to the project.
All applications need to submitted via BOX (https://uchicago.app.box.com/f/1d0c1a9fdcd44b7ab3dd804d7b839ec1) as a Word or PDF document named LASTNAME_FIRSTNAME_PROJECTNUMBER (for example, applicant John Smith interested in Project One would submit a document titled Smith_John_ProjectOne.doc)
Please see the list of faculty-led projects below.
Project #ONE
Internship Research Project for the The Hong Kong Jockey Club University of Chicago Heritage Courtyard and Interpretation Center
Prof. Kenneth Pomeranz, Faculty Director, University of Chicago Francis and Rose Yuen Campus in Hong Kong
The Hong Kong Jockey Club University of Chicago Heritage Courtyard and Interpretation Center (HIC) at the campus in Hong Kong is looking for a research assistant to help both with expanding its permanent exhibits and with preparing one of our upcoming rotating exhibits. For the work on the permanent exhibit, they need an intern who spoke Cantonese; for the work on the rotating exhibit, English would suffice. Prof. Pomeranz would serve as the main supervisor for these projects, though we could also arrange consultations with Hong Kong historians based in Hong Kong and (via Zoom) elsewhere.
One of our rotating exhibits will highlight the life of Dr. Solomon Bard (1916-2014) who lived in Hong Kong from roughly 1938- 1998. Bard was a faculty member at the HKU Medical School (and designed its student health system) as well as the chairman, first violinist, and occasional conductor of the Hong Kong Philharmonic, which he helped found. He was also involved in setting up Hong Kong’s system for the preservation of historic sites and other civic activities. We would like an intern to conduct interviews with people who knew Bard (we have a few names, and will gather more), and to conduct some library research as well, focusing on certain key moments that we already know about. (For instance, Bard led a musical group that, in 1956, became the first Hong Kong cultural organization to officially visit the mainland after the Revolution; we would like somebody to gather as many press accounts of that tour as possible.) Bard was interned as a POW during the Japanese Occupation of HK (having served as a medical volunteer for the British forces, and having been captured on Mount Davis, immediately adjacent to where our campus now stands); a number of local historians are very interested in this period, and the intern could also interview some of them. Depending on timing and interests, the intern could also potentially participate in meetings to plan the set-up of the exhibit, which will be more elaborate than most of the temporary exhibits we do; for instance, we hope to include a performance of an orchestral piece composed in Bard’s honor, written by a man who got to know him after he moved to Sydney late in his life. We hope to have this exhibit up by sometime late in 2024.
Our permanent exhibit covers a number of phases in the history of our site and its surroundings. One part of it concerns the Mount Davis Resettlement Cottages, also known as Kung Man Village 公民村) – a public housing complex composed of small cottages (before the government started focusing on building high rises) that opened in 1953, reached a peak of over 2,000 residents in the 1970s (more than it was designed for) and was condemned and knocked down in 2000. We have interviewed one person who grew up there (Tony Lam, now a prominent architect), but would like to find and talk to others; as of 2018, there was still a functioning Neighborhood Welfare Association for this community (relocated to Kennedy Town) which could be another source of contacts. We would love to learn anything we can about life in this community during its heyday. This would probably require somebody who spoke Cantonese. Once we had collected some interviews, the intern could then participate in creating materials based on them, to be posted to the HIC website as a supplement to the existing exhibit. There are also some possibilities for doing interviews and library/archival research to add to other sections of the HIC, but this would be the main task.
Project #TWO
Diasporic Logistics and the Afterlives of Empire
Dr. Wesley Attewell, Department of Geography, The University of Hong Kong
This project draws on archival research and semi-structured interviews to map the logistical landscapes that make southeast Asian diasporic life possible in post-1975 Hong Kong. It focuses on two figures that have historically built and sustained such landscapes: the Vietnamese boat person and the migrant domestic worker. It asks: how have these figures turned to logistics as a strategy for surviving and making do in a world structured by the violent logics of transpacific imperialism and racial capitalism? And how might such examples of diasporic logistics help us think relationally across seemingly distinct geographies of Southeast Asian migration and refuge?
Essential and preferred skills:
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Some experience or interest in working with/alongside Asian diasporic communities, either in North America or in Asia
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Some experience or interest in conducting archival research
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A familiarity with relevant work (on domestic work, global care chains, labour migration, gendered organizing, logistics/infrastructure and so on) in human geography and Asian/Asian diaspora studies
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Good close reading and analytical skills
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Some measure of fluency in Tagalog, Vietnamese, or Bahasa would be ideal, but not essential
Project #THREE
Examining the prevalence and impact of adverse childhood experiences and domestic violence in a representative sample of adult women in Hong Kong using a mixed method approach.
Dr. Carrie K. W. Li, Department of Social Work and Social Administration, The University of Hong Kong
Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are defined as traumatic events that happen in childhood, which has a long-term impact on domestic violence (DV). It was found that the ACEs among Hong Kong university students were higher than the global standards. Also, research on the impacts of ACEs on DV in non-Western cultural setting is scarce. Therefore, we aim to understand ACEs and DV from a representative sample of adult women in Hong Kong. About the methodology, we aim to randomly recruit 1000 women to participate in a survey via computer-assisted telephone interview system and obtain 10 river of life-3D oral histories.
The essential qualities I look for in the RA are their passion, curiosity, and sensitivity in this topic. The skill sets include doing quantitative data analysis (analytical skills; preferably excellent at using STATA or SPSS), doing qualitative data analysis (analytical skills), and doing literature review (reading and writing skills). Language skills, such as speaking Cantonese and Chinese, are bonus.
Project #FOUR
Trust Initiated Project: District-based Caregiver Support Units Project
Dr. Vivian Weiqun Lou, Sau Po Centre on Ageing/Department of Social Work & Social Administration, The University of Hong Kong
This project aims to develop a screening-guided multi-component intervention programme in district-based caregiver support units in Hong Kong, with the primary aim of facilitating responsive and effective risk screening and service matching to support caregivers of older adults. The four specific objectives are: 1) to conduct surveys for developing and validating a multi-dimension risk screening tool that can be self-administered by caregivers; 2) to examine the effectiveness of adapted evidence-based interventions with randomised controlled trials and a design-based natural experiment; 3) to establish a multi-component caregiver support service delivery model and test its effectiveness and cost-effectiveness; and 4) to evaluate the process of implementation of the screening-guided multi-component intervention using logic model. Multiple sources of quantitative and qualitative data will be collected at different stages with different groups of stakeholders to evaluate the process, and short-term, medium-term and long-term outcomes of this project.
Essential skills:
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a highly motivated team player
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passionate about enhancing the well-being of caregivers and older adults
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relevant experiences in social sciences research and gerontology subject, including coursework, volunteer work, student helper/summer intern, etc
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a good command of written and spoken English
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proficiency in MS Office applications (including Word, Excel, PowerPoint etc.)
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good interpersonal and organizational skills
Preferred skills (but not a must)
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good command of written and spoken Chinese (fluency in Cantonese would be an advantage)
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basic knowledge of statistical software (e.g., SPSS, R, Stata) and design software (e.g., Adobe Illustrator, Adobe InDesign, Canva)
Project #FIVE
Understanding the Impact of Language Modality on Decision Making
Prof. Boaz Keysar, Department of Psychology, University of Chicago
This project aims to experimentally test how the use of spoken language, as opposed to written language, influences decision making. Research suggests that people tend to think more intuitively when presented with spoken problems and more analytically when presented with written problems. Both intuitive and analytical thinking are crucial for decision making, but little is known about how the modality of language influences decision making. Therefore, this project aims to generate new scientific insights into how language modality affects decision making. In addition, the team is interested in conducting the study in Cantonese as opposed to the typical use of English in Psychological research. The project is looking for students who are interested in learning how to do laboratory research, have a lot of initiative, and thrive on working with little direct supervision.
Main Learning Outcomes:
- Learning how to design and program randomized experiments.
- Learning how to design experimental materials.
- Learning how to manage recruitment of participants.
- Learning how to collect quantitative data.
- Learning how to clean, analyse and interpret quantitative data.
Essential Skills:
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Fluency in spoken and written English.
Preferred Skills, not necessary:
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Some experience or interest in working experimentally.
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Some experience or interest in recruitment of participants.
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Some experience or interest in programming experiments using Qualtrics.
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Fluency in spoken and written Cantonese.
Project #SIX
American Oligarchy: Family Members of U.S. Political Elites Procuring Business Deals Abroad
Prof. Kimberly Kay Hoang, Professor of Sociology, University of Chicago
The main aim of Prof. Hoang’s current research project is to study how political elites in the US monetize familial and personal relationships to advance their own interest through offshore structures that facilitate foreign transactions. The team of undergraduate research assistants will work to triangulate different sources of data to find out the role fixers and shell companies play in enabling this structure of illicit financial activities. On the micro-scale, we look at how relationships are formed, money is channeled, and narratives are made about these activities. On the macro scale, we think about how the “political economy” is socially constructed as well as global systems that have been taken advantage of by those with greater access. This research will prepare itself to challenge the dichotomy between corruptive and non-corruptive states, which stereotypically overlap with western democracy versus non-western non-democratic states.
Who Should Apply
Students with an interest in questions around global political economy. Any student with an interest in sociology, political science, anthropology, economic, public policy are welcome. Students working on this project will help to gather data (newspaper articles, government reports, original and secondary sources), organize the data, and begin analyzing the data.
PROJECT #SEVEN
Pig Butchering
Prof. Kimberly Kay Hoang, Professor of Sociology, University of Chicago
Pig butchering scams involving romantic tactics using social media websites and dating websites in search of victims. The con artists engage in emotional labor to befriend or become lovers of their victims. As the relationship develops scammers introduce the idea of making business investments using cryptocurrency platforms and sophisticated AI technologies (manipulated facial profiles, ChatGPT, etc). Students working on this project will recruit and help to interview victims of pig butchering, transcribe interviews, and write fieldnotes.
Who Should Apply
Students interested in questions as they relate to the sociology of money, cryptocurrencies, AI technologies, qualitative research methods, computer science.
PROJECT #EIGHT
China’s Belt and Road Initiative: Is it Succeeding to Win the Hearts and Minds of the Global South
Mark Barnekow, Executive Director, University of Chicago Francis and Rose Yuen Campus in Hong Kong
China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), introduced by Xi Jinping in 2013, is a recent invention by China to expand its influence around the world, particularly with countries in the “Global South.” China has spent and lent billions to expand infrastructure projects through loans to participating countries around the world with approximately 149 nations joining the BRI. Chinese authorities and media are declaring the Belt and Road initiative a success, while western media, think tanks and pundits often report that the initiative is failing in BRI participating countries.
This project seeks to conduct interviews and analyze media reports and data to uncover the truth behind China’s Belt and Road initiative. Is BRI benefiting governments, societies, and people around the world? Or, is BRI having outsized influence on societies creating economic instability, corruption and political divisiveness in countries that participate?
Approach
Students will first work together to develop a design approach for the research. This may include developing a questionnaire and an interview guide to conduct in-person or Zoom interviews. The students will also identify primary and secondary sources to investigate and interrogate data in the public and private domain. Students will work to develop criteria for assessing the BRI’s success or failure. This may become a framework assessment of BRI projects in the future. A final paper/report will be written by the students providing an overview of the current situation, an assessment of BRI’s effectiveness within participating countries as well as findings, conclusions, and recommendations.
Who Should Apply
Students interested in framing big problems, asking insightful questions and shaping the project with creative approaches are invited to apply and will be considered. Any student with an interest in disciplines or future careers in the following areas are welcome to apply: academia, big data analytics, consulting, economics, journalism, government and policy studies, social enterprises and social media.
PROJECT #NINE
COVID’s Impact on Expanding the Global Art Market
Mark Barnekow, Executive Director, University of Chicago Francis and Rose Yuen Campus in Hong Kong
Major museums (e.g. M+, MoMA, The Metropolitan Museum of Art), art data repositories (e.g. Artprice, Artnet, Artsy) and auction houses (e.g. Sotheby’s, Christies, Philips, etc.) may be invited to provide data or participate in this project.
The art market has expanded significantly over the last two decades fueled by low interest rates, more financial buyers for blue chip works, and increased online websites, social media platforms and tools for viewing works to learn more about art and artists. The increase in interest in the art market is particularly apparent in Asia. In the Asia Pacific Region, Hong Kong has grown to the second largest market for art in the world.
This project will explore how more people became interested in the art market since COVID and what triggered the rise in interest in collecting art. The project will explore the role that more time and disposable income had during COVID as a driver for growth as well as social media’s role in increasing interest in art. Students will examine whether the NFT phenomenon was a vehicle for the new class of “young investor” collectors to participate in the market. Students also will examine whether art is a new financial asset class and the role banks, financiers, galleries, auction houses and other financial and art institutions are playing. In addition, students will also assess the current post-COVID environment of higher inflation and increasing interest rates and what impact a changing economic mix will have on the market to dampen or accelerate this new-found enthusiasm for collecting art.
Approach
Students participating in this project will conduct interviews, research primary and secondary sources to better understand the drivers behind 1) the growing number of collectors entering the art market and 2) prices exceeding or falling short of their estimates at auction. To bring focus to the project, the research will explore market developments for specific post-war artists during COVID through interviews with museums, artist foundations, collectors, and experts as well as analysis of data from the internet and social media platforms.
Who Should Apply
Students interested in framing big problems, asking insightful questions, and shaping the project with creative approaches are invited to apply and will be considered. Any student with an interest in disciplines or future careers in the following areas are welcome: academia, arts, art history, computer science, big data analytics, consulting, economics, entrepreneurship, investment, journalism, marketing, museum studies, the humanities, social enterprises, and social media are invited to apply.
PROJECT #TEN
The Role of Hong Kong Financial Institutions in Mitigating the Impact of Climate Change
Mark Barnekow, Executive Director, University of Chicago Francis and Rose Yuen Campus in Hong Kong
The Hong Kong Monetary Authority may also be engaged to participate in this project as part of the University of Chicago’s commitment to their partnership within HKMA’s project “The Alliance for Green Commercial Banks”.
The Guardian’s recent article: “Banks pumped more than $150bn in to companies running ‘carbon bomb’ projects in 2022”* introduces the question for this project; “What is the role of the Hong Kong banking and finance industry in helping to mitigate climate change?”
Talk of ESG compliance abounds in Hong Kong and throughout Asia and the world, but what role are banks and financial institutions playing to support corporate ESG within their lending practices? Are corporate ESG reports used by banks and financial institutions to make loan and investment decisions useful to help corporations reverse climate change? Or, do the systems and procedures for loan making exist simply to meet a financial institution’s KPI measurements? What is the growth trajectory of “green loans” and what data quality and standards are used for evaluation? Is there sufficient demand for “green loans” in Hong Kong and Asia compared to other countries that are perceived to be leading in this area? Does Hong Kong and China adhere to “special China economic characteristics” for lending compared to the rest of the world? How can bank shareholders, investors and society have more transparency of bank financial and lending decisions that impact the climate? This Research Deigns Studio project will set out to answer these and other questions.
Approach
Students will first work together to develop a design approach for the research. This may include developing a questionnaire and interview guide to conduct in-person or Zoom interviews. The students will also identify primary and secondary sources to investigate and interrogate data in the public and private domain. Students will work to develop criteria for assessing the financial sector’s success or failure when considering climate and ESG in their lending decisions. This may become a framework for further assessment of financial institutions globally. A final paper/report will be written by the students providing an overview of the current situation within the industry as well as findings, conclusions and recommendations.
Who Should Apply
Students interested in framing big problems, asking insightful questions, and shaping the project with creative approaches are invited to apply and will be considered. Any student with a team-oriented approach and interest in disciplines or future careers in the following areas are welcome to apply: academia, climate science, computer science, big data analytics, consulting, banking, finance, economics, entrepreneurship, journalism, marketing, policy, social enterprises and social media.
*https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/oct/31/banks-pumped-more-than-150bn-in-to-companies-running-carbon-bomb-projects-in-2022