Ethan Chua (any pronouns) graduated from Stanford in 2021 with a BA (Honors, Distinction) in Anthropology and a minor in poetry. Their honors thesis, "We Carry on the Unfinished Revolution: Filipino American Activists’ Transnational Struggles for National Liberation," examined how 1.5 and 2nd-generation Filipino Americans became involved with the contemporary Filipino left, focusing on the ways members of the diaspora narrated histories of self and nation as part of their political practice.
Their research interests include Filipino nationalism, history, and politics; Southeast Asian studies; the intersections between race, globalization, and empire; and international, transnational, and diasporic movements in the Global South. As part of the Columbia-LSE dual degree program, they hope to research the diplomatic initiatives of the Hong Kong Junta, the Filipino revolutionary government-in-exile in Hong Kong from 1897-1903, with a particular focus on the ways that Filipino nationalists engaged in global politics as they struggled for self-determination and international recognition of their incipient nation.
Alongside their academic work, they are also a community organizer who's worked with Filipino tenants and immigrants in Daly City alongside Faith in Action Bay Area; an advocate for domestic workers' labor rights and bilingual interpreter with the Pilipinx Association for Workers and Immigrants (PAWIS) and the California Domestic Workers Coalition (CDWC); a poet and translator whose work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and can be found on The Journal and Alchemy; and a graphic novelist whose first book, Doorkeeper, was among CNN Philippines' Top Ten Graphic Novels of 2017, and who's working on a second comic about history, memory, and WWII-era Filipino collaborators with Scott Chua and Bianca Lesaca.
