Research
In-between China and the UK:
Remembering the COVID-19 Pandemic through Moving Images
I am a PhD researcher in Communication and Media at the University of Liverpool. My practice-based research examines how moving images shape Chinese international students' memories of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The project focuses on participants aged 18 to 35 who travelled between China and the UK from 2020 to 2022. It asks how different systems of risk governance and media environments reshape the ways the pandemic is remembered. Cross-border mobility leads to a polarisation of remembering: comparison can strengthen critical views of China's pandemic governance, while other experiences may reinforce state narratives of a “correct collective memory” centred on collective discipline and national achievement.
The research analyses a selection of Chinese moving images produced by state-controlled organisations, vloggers and general netizens between 2020 and 2022. It focuses on short-form videos that contribute to the construction of digital memories of the pandemic. These videos, together with vlogs and platform-curated narratives, function as objects of viewing and representation. They also remain active through circulation, commentary and re-editing, which continually reshape their mnemonic meaning.
Practice and method
The practice component of the research is a 30-minute essay film. Drawing on interviews, moving-image archives including news footage and social media videos, and my own situated memories, the film explores how remediation intersects with personal and official narratives.
Through the essay film, I examine how pandemic memories are mediated and reshaped through creative practice. The research considers how these processes influence what is remembered, stabilised and reactivated in the ongoing construction of COVID-19 memory.
Research interests
- Digital media memory and everyday life
- The remembrance of the COVID-19 pandemic
- Chinese moving images and transcultural experience
- Migration, belonging and displacement
- Practice-based filmmaking as a research method
- Photography, experimental film and multimedia art
Conferences
- Creative Practice Colloquium 2026 — Birmingham, UK, June 2026
- BAFTSS Annual Conference 2026 — Bournemouth, UK, April 2026. Presented The Breath of Memory: Transcultural Remembrance of the COVID-19 Pandemic in Chinese Moving Images.
- Memory Studies Association Conference 2025 — Prague, Czech Republic, July 2025
- Spontaneous Memorials Conference 2025 — Manchester, UK, June 2025
- Creative Practice Colloquium 2025 — Birmingham, UK, June 2025
- Post-Pandemic Imaginaries Conference — Liverpool, UK, September 2024
- Creative Practice Colloquium 2024 — Birmingham, UK, June 2024
- BAFTSS 2024 PGR Workshop — Brighton, UK, April 2024. Invited speaker on essay film and practice-based research.
- Covid, Adaptation, Representation Workshop — Online, December 2023
- Diverse Voices – MeCCSA Postgraduate Conference 2023 — Online, July 2023
- Framing and Re-Framing ‘Pandemic Documentary’ Conference — Nottingham, UK, June 2023
- Film and Television: Memory, Nostalgia and Identity – 6th Annual B-Film PGR Symposium — Birmingham, UK, June 2023
- Trauma and Nightmare – 5th International Interdisciplinary Conference — Online, March 2023
Publications
- Transcultural Spontaneous Memorial: The White Paper Movement in China and Its Diaspora — Forthcoming book chapter in Spontaneous Memorials: Contemporary perspectives on their sociocultural, psychological and organisational impact, scheduled for publication in 2027.
Academic background
- PhD, Communication and Media, University of Liverpool (2023–present)
- MA, Film and Screen Media, Birkbeck, University of London (2021–2022)
- MA, Film and Digital Image, University of Sydney (2014–2015)