Campus
- Downtown Toronto (St. George)
Fields of Study
- Linguistic Anthropology
- Sociocultural Anthropology
- Europe
- North America
Areas of Interest
Research Keywords: migration, cross-border mobility, concepts and infrastructures of integration; language, pedagogy, and language ideologies; semiotics and social difference; NGOs, care, politics/ethics of hospitality Research
Region: Western Europe – Switzerland, Canada
Biography
Shirley Yeung's research has focused on language and migration. Her SSHRC-supported project, "Welcome Work: Hospitality and the Mediation of Migrant Mobility in Swiss Integration Policy" critically examined dominant policies and practices of integration in international Geneva, exploring the ways NGOs mediate the social, linguistic and legal inclusion of immigrants via pedagogies of popular education. Her research sheds light on the ethics of popular education - the ways volunteers and migrant educators aspire towards hospitable practice while mediating the neoliberal policies, structural inequalities, and transnational and social (im)mobilities that shape their students' lives. Shirley has also conducted life history research with members of Toronto's Filipino community, and has conducted work on the Sikolohiyang Pilipino (Filipino Psychology) Indigenization movement.
Shirley has additional expertise in teaching foundation academic writing skills at both college and graduate levels. She has led interdisciplinary writing and proposal workshops for the University of Chicago's Writing Program and the Mellon-Mays Undergraduate Fellowship, has designed and implemented Writing Across the Curriculum initiatives for the social science classroom, and currently provides writing workshops and ongoing support for St. George anthropology students.
Education
Ph.D. University of Chicago, 2020
Publications
Articles & Chapters
2016. From Cultural Distance to Skills Deficits: Expatriates, Migrants, and Swiss Integration Policy. Multilingua: Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication 35(6): 723–746.
2016. Flubacher, Mi-Cha and Shirley Yeung. Discourses of Integration: Language, Skills, and the Politics of Difference. Multilingua: Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication 35(6): 599–616.
2010. Natural Manners: Etiquette, Ethics, and Sincerity in American Conduct Manuals. In Ordinary Ethics: Anthropology, Language, and Action, M. Lambek (ed.), pp. 235–248. Fordham University Press.
2009. McElhinny, Bonnie and Valerie Damasco, Shirley Yeung, Angela DeOcampo, Monina Febria, Christianne Collantes, Jason Salonga. “Talk About Luck”: Coherence, Contingency, Character, and Class in the Life Stories of Filipino Canadians in Toronto. In Beyond Yellow English: Towards a Linguistic Anthropology of Asian-Pacific America, A. Lo and A. Reyes (eds.), pp. 93–110. Oxford University Press.
2008. Michael Lambek and Shirley Yeung. A Guide to the Literature. In A Reader in the Anthropology of Religion, M. Lambek (ed.), pp. 613–629. Blackwell.
Blog Post
2016. Flubacher, Mi-Cha and Shirley Yeung. Discourses of Integration: Language, Skills, and the Politics of Difference. Language on the Move.
Book reviews
2014. Migrants in Translation: Caring and the Logics of Difference in Contemporary Italy by Cristiana Giordano. Somatosphere.
2013. Life within Limits: Well-being in a World of Want by Michael Jackson. Journal of Religion in Africa 43(4): 482–84.