Liang Wu is a Postdoctoral Associate of Environmental Humanities in the Southeast Asia Program (SEAP) as part of the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies at Cornell University. He is also affiliated with the Department of Asian Studies, Department of Science and Technology Studies, and the inter-departmental consortium Cornell Oceans. His interdisciplinary research and teaching focuses on blue humanities, social oceanography, political economy, political ecology, and critical mobility, maritime, science and technology, labor, policy, globalization, and Anthropocene studies.

Wu received his PhD in anthropology from the Graduate Center, City University of New York. He is a National Science Foundation, Social Science Research Council, Wenner-Gren Foundation, Center for Engaged Scholarship, and Ralph Bunche Institute for International Studies Scholar. He is also a former mariner and Science Communication and Marine Policy Specialist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Before coming to Cornell, Wu was a Visiting Assistant Professor at Bates College in Maine, where he taught interdisciplinary oceanic courses such as “Peoples of the Sea: Sailors, Pirates, Fishers, and More” and “Global Capitalism and the Sea: Society, Economy, and Environment” that seek to understand the complex relationship between humanity and the oceans, and examine the intersection of transregional economy, society, and ecology of the sea. 

Since 2006, through mixed methodologies led by ethnographic fieldwork at ports, onboard, overseas, and online, Wu has been studying the lifeworlds and lifeways of seafarers – maritime workers delivering 90% of international trade who largely come from the Global South regions of Asia. His work specifically delves into the techno-economic, infrastructural, legal, geographical, social, and environmental conditions and ramifications of container shipping in the postwar era, thereby unraveling the sociotechnical and systematic workings of commodity fetishism, racial capitalism, environmental extractivism, and neocolonial globalism of our times. 

At Cornell, Wu works closely with Professor Juno Salazar Parreñas and other SEAP faculty on his post-PhD research and publications, including his book project about the sea and power – in its various senses from propulsion to organization, governance, and resilience. Wu will specifically focus on Southeast Asian seafarers who are the backbone of not only the international maritime workforce, but also the global economy and everyday lives in modern times. At the same time, Wu highlights that these overseas workers are bearing the brunt of climate change, geopolitical-economic currents, and industrial developments such as the Belt and Road Initiative and the latest decarbonization endeavors of shipping known as “the 4th Propulsion Revolution”.