Faculty Profile: Shelly Chan

Shelly Chan is an Associate Professor of History at UC Santa Cruz and History alumna. This year she is a 2025-26 Faculty Fellow at The Humanities Institute. Her current project, “Disappearance of the Nanyang: A Forgotten History of a Diasporic Region,” examines a diasporic region between China and Southeast Asia known as the “Nanyang” or the “South Seas” and its impact on the global restructuring of Asia. We recently caught up with Professor Chan about her research and her experience transitioning from archival research and fieldwork to writing.

You also led the Transnational China Research Hub in 2022-2023 at The Humanities Institute. Could you share more about this research project, the events and collaborations it fostered, and the significance of approaching China from a transnational lens?

The research project that I co-led with Ben Read (Politics) and Yiman Wang (Film and Digital Media) tried to rethink China studies collectively from a juncture of multiple crises and shifts. The pandemic, increasing US-China tensions, surge of anti-Asian racism and violence, and conflicts within China and on its margins were changing base assumptions and revealing new and old divides. At that time, most of the scholarly conversations had been about how to keep doing China studies in practical terms, given various challenges with travel and research, but less to do with the shifting concerns and structures of feeling. When a campus-wide call for seed grants was announced, I also happened to have freshly arrived at UCSC and was looking to connect with like-minded faculty and student colleagues. With much support from THI, our team organized a speaker series, a reading group, and an international conference that gathered scholars from very different disciplines and a sizable audience online. We discussed the urgency of renewing attention not only to China as a country but also to the many different “Chinas” that have taken shape historically and globally, whether accepted or resisted. Transnational was certainly not a new concept, but it felt appropriate to reach for other configurations at a time of retreat and reflection. Our conference was one of the largest public conversations that tried to meet the moment in some way.

This framework also animates “Disappearance of the Nanyang: A Forgotten History of a Diasporic Region,” the project you’re working on for your THI Fellowship. Can you share more about the project? What initially drew you to it?

I am writing a book about how a diasporic region between China and Southeast Asia unraveled during the 1950s-60s, using its closure to explore the radical restructuring of Asia. Some of the most well-known facts about this transition were related to decolonization, nation-building, and the Cold War, but the story is not often told from the perspective of diasporic Chinese traders, laborers, and artists. What first drew me to this research is discovering how frequently the name “Nanyang” or “South Seas” appeared in the print and visual sources and built environments of the early twentieth century – as a geography, an identity, and a symbol of modernity associated with the Chinese diaspora – and then how quickly it was abandoned by the late 1960s. As national frontiers closed and the international economy was remade, the old patterns of migration and circulation also drastically changed. In other words, my project seeks to explain the disappearance of the Nanyang region and identity to get at the broad impact of regional and global restructuring.

Some of our readers might not be familiar with the Nanyang (南洋) region. What is the significance of understanding and centering the history of the Nanyang and how does your scholarship seek to intervene in existing conceptions of the region, as well as China?

You last conducted archival and field research overseas for the project in the summer of 2024. What archives did you visit and where? Can you tell us about your experience? Was there a specific moment in your research that particularly stands out to you?

I went to many places and was trying to finish my research that had gone on for a few years. Because one of the book chapters is about a group of diasporic Chinese artists known as “Nanyang painters,” I started in Singapore, doing research at the National Art Gallery and the National Library, before heading to Indonesia to meet local researchers and visit different museums in Jakarta, Surabaya, and Bali. My final stop was Hong Kong, where I spent time at the University of Hong Kong library’s Special Collections, Asia Art Archives, M+ archives, and the Public Record Office. It was a fruitful summer. Particularly standing out is how the signs of the Nanyang as a lost region were in fact everywhere – in the print and visual records, on the streets, in local conversations, and in everyday life. And I am only referring to the places I had the time to visit!

Lastly, it’s really special that you’re a UC Santa Cruz History alumna who is now an Associate Professor in the department. How has your experience—studying here, teaching at other universities, and then returning to this program—informed the way you approach your research, teaching, or mentorship? And how do you reflect on your academic journey and what it means to return to the place where it began?

Thank you for asking about that. Yes, it’s been special personally. I would attribute much of my student experience to the open, interdisciplinary environment in History, the Center for Cultural studies headed then by Jim Clifford and my advisor Gail Hershatter, and a grad student group called APARC (Asia-Pacific-Americas Research Cluster). Faculty did a lot for us, but we also shared a sense of vision and independence. Once I became a faculty member, I noticed how my training allowed me to engage meaningfully with others. Also, because I was fortunate to be at a larger institution where intellectual range and mentorship were highly valued, I continued to hone my skills and attention. The lesson I learned is that no researcher can exist alone, but it is also important to trust oneself and trust the process. Now back at UCSC, I try to practice and support that discovery, even if it sounds ordinary enough.