Judy Joo

Judy Joo is Korean-American, French-trained chef based in London and New York, Judy Joo's culinary expertise spans the globe. Judy is an expert in cooking and has specialties in pastry and Korean cuisine. She is also a renowned television star, an international restaurateur and owner of Seoul Bird with locations in London, Las Vegas and New York. Judy has been featured in The New York Times, PEOPLE, Food & Wine, Us Weekly, and The Financial Times and has been a guest on Today, Good Morning America and The Talk.  Judy is a columnist for many publications as well as a cookbook author.

Soh Kim

Soh Kim is the Executive Director at Stanford Center for Innovation and Design Research, bringing a unique perspective to the world of food innovation, design thinking, and sustainability. With a multi-faceted professional background that spans several industries, Soh has managed to carve a unique niche in the realms of food innovation and design. Passionate about the future of food, Soh's work takes her beyond the academic sphere and into the real world, exploring and testing the boundaries of restaurant and kitchen operations. Through her work, she seeks to fuse creativity with practicality, continually pushing the boundaries of what's possible in food innovation and design. She is especially interested in addressing the sustainability aspect of the food industry, creating innovative solutions that balance gastronomy, ecology, and economy.

Rebecca Kinney

Rebecca Kinney is an interdisciplinary teacher and scholar of American Studies and Ethnic Studies, and the Director and Graduate Coordinator of American Culture Studies at Bowling Green State University, Ohio. Dr. Kinney’s award-winning first book, Beautiful Wasteland: The Rise of Detroit as America’s Postindustrial Frontier (University of Minnesota Press, 2016) argues that contemporary stories told about Detroit’s potential for rise enables the erasure of white supremacist systems. Her research has appeared in American Quarterly, Food, Culture & Society, Verge: Studies in Global Asia, Radical History Review, Race&Class, among other journals. Her second book Mapping AsiaTown Cleveland: Race and Redevelopment in the Rust Belt is anticipated from Temple University Press in 2025. Her third book, Making Home in Korea: The Transnational Lives of Adult Korean Adoptees, is based on research undertaken while she was a Fulbright Scholar in South Korea.

Robert Jisong Ku

Robert Ji-Song Ku is an associate professor of Asian and Asian American Studies at Binghamton University of the State University of New York. His main areas of research and teaching include Asian American studies, food studies, and studies of diasporic Korean popular culture. He is the author of Dubious Gastronomy: The Cultural Politics of Eating Asian in the USA and co-editor of four edited volumes: Eating Asian America: A Food Studies Reader; Pop Empires: Transnational and Diasporic Flows of India and Korea; Future Yet to Come: Sociotechnical Imaginaries in Modern Korea; and Eating More Asian America: A Food Studies Reader. He is currently completing a book tentatively titled “Diasporic Korean Food in the Age of K-pop” and co-edits the Food in Asia and the Pacific series for University of Hawai‘i Press. He is currently the Managing Editor of the Asian American and Pacific Islander Multimedia Textbook project spearheaded by the Asian American Studies Center at UCLA.

Jooyeon Rhee

Jooyeon Rhee is an associate professor of Asian Studies and Comparative Literature at Pennsylvania State University whose multidisciplinary research interests include literary history, literary criticism, gender studies, visual culture, diaspora studies in inter-Asian and inter-imperial contexts. She is the author of The Novel in Transition: Gender and Literature in Early Colonial Korea (Cornell, 2019) and co-editor of Gender and Food in Transnational East Asias (Lexington, 2021) and several special journal issues including "Culinary Culture on the Move" (Verge: Studies in Global Asias, 2023). Currently, she is working on two projects: popular imaginations of deviance in Korean and Japanese crime fiction; and food in global Korean literature and films to shed light on the intricate networks and movements of people, capital, and thoughts at the intersections of gender and race/ethnicity.

Ryu Soo-young

Ryu Soo Young, a multifaceted talent, has left an indelible mark in the Korean entertainment industry. With a career spanning over two decades, starting at the age of 20, he has graced the screens in over 40 drama series and movies, captivating audiences with his versatility. Beyond the glitz of the spotlight, Ryu Soo Young finds solace and joy in the kitchen. While known for his role as a chef on the TV cooking show "fun Restaurant" aired on KBS, his true passion lies in cooking for his beloved daughter, wife, and parents. Despite not being a professional chef, Ryu Soo Young's culinary skills and love for crafting recipes make him the undisputed king of his own kitchen. His cooking journey extends online, where his YouTube recipe clips boast over 100 million views, sharing his love for cooking with a global audience.

Gi-Wook Shin
 

Gi-Wook Shin is the William J. Perry Professor of Contemporary Korea in Sociology; senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies; the director of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center since 2005; and the founding director of the Korea Program, all at Stanford University. As a historical-comparative and political sociologist, his research has concentrated on social movements, nationalism, development, democracy, and international relations. Shin is the author/editor of twenty-five books and numerous articles. His recent books include Korean Democracy in Crisis: The Threat of Illiberalism, Populism, and Polarization (2022); The North Korean Conundrum: Balancing Human Rights and Nuclear Security (2021); Demographics and Innovation in the Asia-Pacific (2021); Shifting Gears in Innovation Policy from Asia (2020); Strategic, Policy and Social Innovation for a Post-Industrial Korea: Beyond the Miracle (2018).

Dafna Zur
 

Dafna Zur is an Associate Professor in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at Stanford University, and she is the current Director of the Center for East Asian Studies. At Stanford she teaches courses on Korean literature, cinema, and popular culture. Her first book, Figuring Korean Futures: Children’s Literature in Modern Korea (Stanford University Press, 2017), traces the investments and aspirations made possible by children’s literature in colonial and postcolonial Korea.  She has published on North Korean popular science and science fiction, North Korean translations, the Korean War in North and South Korean children’s literature, childhood in cinema, and Korean popular music and dramas. 

• The submission of a registration does not guarantee admission to the event. Registrants will be notified of admission status and arrival details by Monday, April 1.
  Email inquiries about admission status will not get replies. 
• Seating is limited and will be on a first-come, first-served basis. Please plan accordingly. 
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Parking Information

Click here for instructions to purchase visitor parking. The closest visitor parking to Encina Hall can be found at the following:

• Track House Lot (ParkMobile Parking Zone 7295)
• Memorial Lot (ParkMobile Parking Zone 7213)
• Littlefield Lot (ParkMobile Parking Zone 7282)
• Knight Management Center Garage (ParkMobile Parking Zone 7207)

For general inquiries, contact aparc-communications@stanford.edu.

All media representatives interested in covering the event or accessing the event site should contact aparc-communications@stanford.edu by 5 p.m. PT Friday, April 5, and include with their request a copy of a valid press credential from an established news organization. Freelance reporters should email a copy of a signed letter from the news organization for which they are working.

Press seating is limited. We will send notifications of press credential accreditation and admission status by Tuesday, April 9.