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Welcome! I'm Jing Wang. It is written as 王菁 in Chinese. The given name jīng 菁 conveys my mom's best wishes: knowing the essence of things and growing like wild grass in this wild world. Hope our paths cross soon!

About

As an anthropologist and media scholar, I am an assistant professor in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication (SJMC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Before joining SJMC, I worked as Senior Research Manager at the Center for Advanced Research in Global Communication (CARGC), Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania, with an affiliation at the Center of the Study of Contemporary China (CSCC).

My research, teaching, and public scholarship have been mainly driven by two questions: How do socially disadvantaged communities make their own voices heard? What are the limits and potentialities of global media cultures in shaping the lives and histories of these communities? Driven by these questions, my research interests include:

· Global Media and Communication;

· Sound and Podcast Studies;

· Gender, Race & Ethnicity;

· Anthropology of Islam and Muslim Societies;

· Mobility, Diaspora & Memory;

· Translation Practices and Theories;

· China, East Asia, Asian American communities;

· Multimodal and Public Scholarship.

Currently, I am working on a book manuscript under contract with Columbia University Press. This book examines the media practices of Chinese Muslims to construct and sustain vibrant Islamic publics in a Global South, Muslim-minority context. I have published in peer-reviewed journals such as New Media and Society, Made In China Journal, Media Theory, Asian Anthropology, Journal of Contemporary East Asia, Terrain: Anthropologie & Sciences Humaines, and Journal of Transformative Learning.

Meanwhile, multimodality and collaboration are central to my public-facing scholarship. I am a podcaster, archivist, curator, and translator. In 2015, I joined CNPolitics 政见 and initiated its podcast series. In 2020, I co-founded TyingKnots 结绳志, an independent, non-profit, volunteer-based group committed to breaking down walls between academia, media, and the public through translation projects and the promotion of public-facing scholarship. From September 2022 to July 2023, I co-founded and produced the Global Media & Communication podcast series as part of the multimodal project powered by the Center of Advanced Research in Global Communication (CARGC) at Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania. My commentaries and essays feature in academic and public media outlets such as Anthropology News, Pop Junctions, Today's Totalitarianism, Asian Review of Books, Initium, Inkstone, CNpolitics, Oriental History Review, TyingKnots, among others.