Biography
My name is Ru Chu (or Bruce for communications in English). I graduated from Communication University of China in 2018 with a PhD thesis on a study into action films from the perspective of philosophical aesthetics. I am working in Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics as an associate professor. My research interests encompass Chinese Mainland cinema, Hong Kong cinema, emotions/affect, ideological criticism, and philosophical aesthetics of film. Across these fields, I pay special attention to the interplays between power and cinema. I tend to discover in film the aesthetic agency to contest rational, homogenous, and repressing power. Additionally, I have a strong interest in translating pioneering film theories from the English-speaking world into Chinese, contributing to intellectual exchanges.
For the visit to UW, I aim to investigate within propaganda cinema how modernity is weaponized as a fetishistic object in constructing the "sublime nation-state". The research project is titled "Enchanting Modernity and Sublime Nation-State: Ideological Fetishism in Main Melody Films".
Beyond academic life, I am quite athletic, with strong hobbies in basketball, skiing, boxing and hiking. Just get in touch if you share similar interests with me.