Dan Chen is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Richmond. Her research examines media politics, public opinion, local governance, and cultural politics in contemporary China. She is the author of Convenient Criticism: Local Media and Governance in Urban China (2020, SUNY Press). She has published articles on various topics including political trust, media effects on public opinion, local television news, state-media relationship, state capacity, and local governance. Currently, she is extending her research to examine the political ramifications of cultural production with a focus on how standup comedy transgresses the state rhetoric in public discourse. She earned her Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Kansas. In 2018, she was a visiting fellow at the China Studies Centre, the University of Sydney. From 2021 to 2023, she is a Public Intellectuals Program (PIP) Fellow with the National Committee on US-China Relations.

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Emily Matson is an Assistant Teaching Professor in the School of Foreign Service and the History Department at Georgetown University. This year, she is also a Council on Foreign Relations education ambassador, and she is also a former Wilson Center China fellow. While at the Wilson Center, she published a policy paper titled "From Regional to National: Northeastern Scholars and the National Discourse on the War of Resistance against Japan." Dr. Matson received a PhD in Modern Chinese History from UVA in fall 2020, and her areas of expertise include Chinese history, Japanese history, and historical memory. For her dissertation, she researched World War II museums in Northeastern China and the evolution of their exhibits over time. Dr. Matson is also an active contributor to NuVoices, an international editorial collective dedicated to promoting research on China from women and marginalized groups.

Clyde Yicheng Wang is an assistant professor of politics at Washington and Lee University. His research focuses on ideology, propaganda, and media politics in China. Clyde obtained a PhD in political science at Boston University. His academic articles have been published or are forthcoming in journals such as the Journal of Contemporary China, the Journal of Current Chinese Affairs, Nations and Nationalism, and Political Communication. He is currently working on a book project that examines the collaboration between China’s propaganda, media market, and public discourse. Apart from his scholarly work, he also writes as a columnist for several Chinese language media, including The Paper (Pengpai Xinwen) and The Initium (Duan Chuanmei).