As a bonus episode series for the NüVoices podcast, we have invited three winners of our 2025 NüStories personal essay contest to read out their essays. In this episode, you will hear from Chris Yitao Shen, who won first place for her essay, "What You Know (And Didn’t Know)."

Chris Yitao Shen is an international student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She’s a junior. She’s a creative writing major. She writes to remember. She writes quietly and deletes all exclamation marks. Her favorite book is Slaughterhouse Five. Not really a nonfiction but as thick. She has written a lot and will keep on writing. 

This week, NüVoices editor and freelance journalist Jessie Lau speaks to Yi-Ling Liu, a writer covering technology and Chinese society, about her debut book “The Wall Dancers: Searching for Freedom and Connection on the Chinese Internet”. 

In this episode, Yi-Ling discusses how communities from the margins navigate censorship on the Chinese internet. She also describes how her own experiences reporting for Chinese and Western media shaped her approach to Wall Dancers, her debut book.

As a bonus episode series for the NüVoices podcast, we have invited three winners of our 2025 NüStories personal essay contest to read out their essays. In this episode, you will hear from Juliette Yu-Ming Lizeray, who won first place for her essay, "You need glasses for Asian faces."

Juliette Yu-Ming Lizeray is a writer and comic artist. She won Singapore’s 2023 Golden Point Award and co-authored two books on the arts in Singapore, "Semionauts of Tradition" and "Reimagining Singapore."

This week, NüVoices host and founder Joanna Chiu joins NüVoices editor and board member Jessie Lau to discuss their exciting new life chapters that extend their vision of NüVoices.

From launching the website of NüVoices in a cafe in Beijing in 2018, to now creating two new initiatives that continue to amplify women’s and BIPOC voices, Joanna and Jessie discuss what drove them to begin this more entrepreneurial chapter of their lives. They also reflect on their China reporting in the past decade and their takeaways for emerging China journalists and professionals.

This week, NüVoices host and co-founder Joanna Chiu joins China human rights researcher Maya Wang to discuss the current state of China human rights advocacy amid Beijing's growing transnational oppression and the US cut of international aid. 

Joanna and Maya also discuss China's latest approach to Xinjiang and other ethnic minorities, and the global rise of extremism and political polarization. In a world of chaos, unreliable leadership and rising technological authoritarianism, what is the future of China human rights advocacy?

This week, host Solarina Ho and her guest, Hong Kong filmmaker Elizabeth Lo, discuss the director's award-winning new documentary, 'Mistress Dispeller', which premiered at the 81st Venice International Film Festival last September. The film is now playing in select theaters across the United States. 

The intimate film follows a middle-aged couple and Wang Zhenxi, a "Mistress Dispeller", who is hired by the wife to end the husband's affair with a younger woman. Solarina and Elizabeth discuss the film's meditative exploration of relationships, how Wang inserts herself into this couple's life, and how the couple — and the mistress — navigate the complex dynamics and emotions of marriage and infidelity, and their place within broader Chinese society. Elizabeth also discusses the painstaking, years-long process of finding her central characters, and the remarkable trust and sensitivity required that allowed her to tell their stories.

This week, NüVoices editor and board member Jessie Lau speaks to returning guest Barbara Demick about her new book, Daughters of the Bamboo Grove: From China to America, a True Story of Abduction, Adoption, and Separated Twins.

In this episode, Barbara describes the journey of writing about twin sisters who were born in China, forcibly separated, and finally reunited through her investigative reporting. She and Jessie discuss how the book explores the historical and political nuances regarding China's One Child Policy and Family Planning institution, as well as challenges common narratives about Chinese adoptees in the US. Barbara also zooms into the powerful, emotional moment of the sisters reuniting and the two families meeting for the first time.

This week, Tiffany Ap speaks with Grace Shao on the causes and development of AI in China.

In this episode, Grace Shao walks us through the divergent approaches to AI deployment in China and the US, the domestic AI talent in China and the future of robotics. Grace also talks about running her newsletter AI Proem while providing consulting to tech companies and raising a toddler while being 8 months pregnant on the podcast.

This week, we have NüVoices host and board member Sophia Yan in conversation with Amanda Hsiao, director in Eurasia Group’s China practice.

In this special episode, Sophia talks to Amanda on the new and old tactics used by Washington and Beijing in the latest rounds of US-China trade disputes.

This week, host Tiffany Ap gets in the weeds on how to live a more eco-conscious life with Sonalie Figueiras, the founder of Green Queen and Asia's leading sustainability voice.

In this episode, Sonalie explores Asia’s pivotal role in climate and food tech innovation, shares practical eco-friendly tips, and reflects on whether we're witnessing a cultural shift away from overconsumption.