Yen-Yu Lin
(she/her)
Yen-Yu Lin
(she/her)
I am a sociologist using qualitative methods to study race, colonial empires, and material culture.
View my CV
On leave from Jul through Dec 2026
I received my sociology Ph.D. from the University of Virginia and started as an Assistant Professor of Sociology and Anthropology at DePauw University (tenure-track) in 2023. Prior to my Ph.D. studies, I was trained in political science at National Taiwan University (International Relations – undergrad major; Comparative Politics – grad school major) and at Waseda University in Japan (Global Political Economy - undergrad major).
I specialize in race, art, and empires, primarily using archival methods. I am particularly interested in the relationship between material culture and systems of domination, and how this relationship has historically affected marginalized peoples.
RESEARCH
My current book project, The Raceless Racism: Visibility and Invisibility of Race in Taiwan under Japanese Colonial Rule, studies how racial categories were constructed and deconstructed through visual representations in colonial Taiwan. My research has been published in English, Mandarin, and Japanese, engaging interdisciplinary audiences across sociology, history, and political science. The most recent publication is a co-authored book chapter titled "Raceless East Asians? Self-racialization of Japanese and South Korean peoples" in the Handbook of Anticolonial, Decolonial and Postcolonial Sociologies.
TEACHING
I am committed to teaching difficult topics such as class, race, and gender from comparative perspectives. At DePauw, I teach Introduction to Sociology, Social Theory, Methods of Social Research, Global and Transnational Sociology, Sociology of Art, and Sociology of Spirituality. I also co-taught a travel course, Asian Cultures and Global Arts, taking DePauw students to Taiwan in 2025. Syllabi are available upon request.
SERVICE
I currently serve as a board member of the North American Taiwan Studies Association (2024–2027). I co-founded the Ngasan Maku Study Society in Tokyo during the 2014 Sunflower Movement as an undergraduate student, engaging interdisciplinary, transnational dialogues about Taiwan and the world through public events and reading groups.
ORCID: 0009-0003-8443-9298.