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Derek Hird

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Derek Hird

Dr

Former affiliations
 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4530-9338

  • FASS Building

    LA1 4YW Lancaster

  • Confucious Institute

    LA1 4YW Lancaster

Accepting PhD Students

PhD projects

I welcome PhD proposals taking a cultural studies approach to topics relating to Chinese/Sinophone masculinities and gender identities/relations more broadly, feminist activism and theory, class identities and social stratification, and health and wellbeing. I also welcome proposals on critical language pedagogy in Chinese language education and across other languages, informed by critical sociolinguistics, which employ e.g. decolonising and social justice approaches.

20122026

Research activity per year

Personal profile

Current Teaching

CHIN100/101: Chinese in Context (Convenor)

CHIN233: Shaping Contemporary China: Moments and Movements

(Convenor)

DELC215: Language and Identity in France, Germany, Spain and the Sinophone World

DELC218: Thinking Queerness: LGBTQIA+ lives, identities and politics in contemporary thought and cultural production 

DELC331: Transnational TV Crime Drama: Armchair Detectives, Crime, Cultures and Circulation

DELC334c: Academic writing in a second language (Chinese) (Convenor)

DELC338: Spirits in the Material World: Cultures and Sciences (Convenor)

DELC372: Sinophone Literature and Film (Convenor)

DELC403: Applied Translation

DELC416: Academic and Professional Methods in Translation

DELC420: Translation Project

DELC468: Intercultural Business Communication

SUMMARY of research interests (100 words)

My research principally concerns gender and class in Chinese/Sinophone populations, with a particular focus on middle-class masculinities. I have also published on happiness in China. My most recent China-focused project looks at Chinese male beauty vlogging and makeup for men. More widely, I have also developed a research interest in critical pedagogy in modern languages and the future of languages and cultures as a sector, particularly involving its interdisciplinary interactions with STEM disciplines. I often approach topics from a wide-ranging cultural studies perspective, covering discourse and practice. Ethnographic, narrative and critical discourse methodologies frequently inform my data gathering and analysis.  

External Roles

  • Council Member, British Association for Chinese Studies (2014–17)
  • Co-editor of the Transnational Asian Masculinities book series (Hong Kong University Press) (2015-)
  • East Asian Studies representative, University Council of Modern Languages, 2017-2020
  • Council member (2023-), Vice-Chair (2025), Chair (2025-) Universities' China Committee in London  
  • Co-Editor in Chief, New Perspectives on Languages (2023-)
  • Editorial Board, Men and Masculinities (2025-)

Office Hours

Lent Term 2026: 

Wednesday 1-2pm, on Teams or in person in the Roundhouse B08.

External positions

External Examiner, UG and PGT Chinese programmes, University of Leeds

1/11/2021 → 31/10/2025

External Examiner MA Translation (Chinese), BA Modern Languages (Chinese) , Exeter University

2017 → 2021

Keywords

  • Gender
  • Culture, identities and diasporas
  • Culture
  • Film and popular culture
  • Literature and gender
  • Transcultural writing

User-defined keywords

  • Chinese cultural studies
  • Masculinities
  • Chinese language pedagogy

Collaborations and top research areas from the last five years

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