Yushu Zhu

Assistant Professor

Urban Studies and Public Policy

Yushu Zhu

Assistant Professor

Urban Studies and Public Policy

Education

  • PhD University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (Architecture)
  • MSc Sun Yat-sen University (Geography)
  • BSc (Hons.) Sun Yat-sen University (Geography)

Biography

Yushu Zhu 朱宇姝

With a background in human geography and urban studies, Yushu’s research focuses on housing and community issues against the backdrop of urbanization and globalization. Her empirical research examines the spatial and temporal patterns of housing stratification, sense of home, and social relations that constitute urban neighbourhoods. She pays a special attention to communities of immigrants, low-income populations, and ethnic minorities. Her research has appeared in leading peer-reviewed journals, including Urban Studies, Urban Geography, Habitat International, and Environment and Behavior. Yushu teaches courses in housing, urban transformation, public policy, and research methods.

Previously, Yushu worked at the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada and held postdoctoral fellowships at the Institute of Asian Research at UBC and at Brown University. Yushu received her Ph.D. in Architecture from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and her M.Sc. and B.Sc. (Hons) in geography from Sun Yat-sen University, China.

A list of Yushu’s publications can be found here.

Current Projects

Community Housing Canada: Partners in Resilience (2020-2025)

As part of the Community Housing Canada research project, faculty members Yushu Zhu and Meg Holden co-lead the thematic area on Housing for Vulnerable Canadians to study housing accessibility and equity for vulnerable populations. Community Housing Canada, funded by a joint Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation and Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council grant for the period 2020-2025, aims to advance understanding and operationalization of community housing as a key component of fulfilling the right to housing across Canada. This research group will include student researchers as well as community housing partners and will engage across the Canada-wide project to promote better understandings and solutions to housing challenges faced in particular by vulnerable groups. 

作為加拿大社區住房研究項目(Community Housing Canada) 的研究成員，朱宇姝(Yushu Zhu)教授和梅格·霍爾登(Meg Holden)教授將共同主持“加拿大弱勢群體住房”的專題研究，尤其是關注弱勢群體的住房可及性和公平性。加拿大社區住房部由加拿大抵押貸款與住房公司(CMHC)以及社會科學與人文研究委員會(SSHRC)聯合資助，為2020-2025年提供研究經費，旨在促進社區住房的理解和運作，了解其在解決加拿大全國住房權中的重要角色。該研究小組將包括學生研究人員以及社區住房合作夥伴，並將參與整個加拿大範圍的項目，以增進對弱勢群體所面臨的住房挑戰的了解和解決方案。

 

The Restructuring of Home and Sense of Home: Examining the Socio-Spatial Outcomes of Urban Redevelopment in Urban China since 2000 (2020-2021)

This one-year program was funded by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy to examine the impact of China’s state-led urban development on gentrification and displacement over the past 20 years. As the principal investigator, Yushu Zhu takes historical census data to study the temporal changes in the housing and demographic compositions of urban neighborhoods in the metropolitan city of Guangzhou. She also works with local Chinese scholars and planners to conduct survey and ethnographic research to explore neighborhoods’ socio-spatial restructuring may affect local residents’ place attachment and social networks, and how residents respond to these changes. Research findings from this project may be relevant for other global cities experiencing urban gentrification and displacement.

這項為期一年的研究項目由林肯土地政策研究所（Lincoln Institute of Land Policy）提供資助，旨在研究中國國家主導的城市發展在過去20年中對城市社區紳士化及非意願遷移的影響。作為項目主持，朱宇姝(Yushu Zhu)將通過分析歷史人口普查數據了解廣州城市居民住房和人口構成的時間變化。她還將與當地的中國學者和規劃師合作開展社區問卷調查和田野調查，以探索社區的社會空間結構調整對當地居民的社區歸屬感及社區網絡的影響以及居民如何應對這些變化。該項目的研究結果也將為其他正在經歷城市高級化和流離失所的全球城市提供參考。

Publications

Referreed Publications

  • Gu, Jiaxin, Xin Guo, Gerry Veenstra, Yushu Zhu, and Qiang Fu. In press. “Adolescent marijuana use in the United States and structural breaks: An age-period-cohort analysis, 1991 to 2018.” American Journal of Epidemiology.
  • Yushu Zhu, “Interests driven or socially mobilized? Place attachment, social capital and neighborhood participation in urban China,” Journal of Urban Affairs. doi.org/10.1080/07352166.2020.1773837.
  • Qiang Fu, Yanlong Zhang, Yushu Zhu, Ting Li, 2020, “Network centralities, demographic disparities and voluntary participation,” under review, Mathematical Foundations of Computing. doi:10.3934/mfc.2020011.
  • Qiang Fu, Yufan Zhuang, Jiaxin Gu, Yushu Zhu, Huihui Qin and Xin Guo, 2019, “Search for K: Assessing Five Topic-Modeling Approaches to 120,000 Canadian Articles,” 2019 IEEE International Conference on Big Data (Big Data), Los Angeles, CA, USA, pp. 3640-3647. doi: 10.1109/BigData47090.2019.9006160.
  • Changdong Ye, Yushu Zhu (corresponding author), Jiangxue Yang, Qiang Fu, 2018, “Spatial equity in accessing secondary education: Evidence from a gravity-based model”, The Canadian Geographer, 62(4), 452-469.
  • Yushu Zhu, Qiang Fu, 2017. “Deciphering the civic virtue of communal space: Neighborhood attachment, social capital, and neighborhood participation in urban China”, Environment and Behavior, 49(2), 161-191.
  • Qiang Fu, Yushu Zhu, Qiang Ren, 2015, “The downsides of market transformation: Housing tenure and types in reform-era urban China”, Social Science Research, 49, 126-140.
  • Yushu Zhu, 2015, “Toward community engagement: Can the built environment help? Grassroots participation and communal space in Chinese urban communities”, Habitat International, 46, 44-53.
  • Qiang Fu, Shenjing He, Yushu Zhu, Si-ming Li, Yanling He, Huoning Zhou, and Nan Lin, 2015, “Toward a relational account of neighborhood governance: Territory-based networks and residential outcomes in urban China”, American Behavioral Scientist, 59(8), 992-1006.
  • Yushu Zhu, Qiang Fu, Qiang Ren, 2014, “Cross-city variations in housing outcomes in post-reform China: An analysis of 2005 micro census Data”, Chinese Sociological Review, 46(3), 26-54.
  • Si-Ming Li, Yushu Zhu (corresponding author), 2014, “Intra-urban residential mobility in Guangzhou, China, 1990-2010: Local residents versus migrants”, Eurasian Geography and Economics, 55(4), 313-332.
  • Yushu Zhu, 2014, “Spatiality of China’s market-oriented urbanism: The unequal right of rural migrants to city space in urban China”, Territory, Space, Governance, 2(2), 194-217.
  • Yushu Zhu, Werner Breitung, Si-Ming Li, 2012. “The changing meaning of neighborhood attachment in Chinese commodity housing estates: Evidence from Guangzhou”, Urban Studies, 49(11), 2439-2457.
  • Si-Ming Li, Yushu Zhu, Limei Li, 2012. “Neighborhood type, gatedness and neighborhood experiences in Chinese cities: A study of Guangzhou”, Urban Geography, 33(2), 237-255.
  • Qiang Ren, Qiang Fu, Yushu Zhu, 2008. “Returns to education based on household registration system: A re-examination to wage disparity” (in Chinese), Population and Development, 14(3).

Invited Publications & Conference Proceedings

  • John Logan, Yushu Zhu, 2015, Interpreting the challenges of China’s rapid urbanization, Landscape Architecture Frontiers, 3(5), 12-25. 
  • Yushu Zhu, Si-Ming Li, 2014, A time-series analysis of residential mobility in Guangzhou, 1990-2010 (in Chinese), in Urban transformation, development, restructuring and planning education, edited by Xueqiang Xu, Anthony Li, Chunshan Zhou and Shenjing He, pp. 340-348.
  • Yushu Zhu, 2014, “The physical and social contexts of community participation: A study of neighborhood public space and civic participation in urban China”, Proceedings of the 45th Annual Conference of the Environmental Design Research Association.

Reports

  • Yushu Zhu (leading author), 2019, “2019 national opinion poll: Canadian views on high-tech investment from Asia.” Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada.
  • Yushu Zhu (leading author), 2018, “2019 National Opinion Poll: Canadian Views on High-tech Investment from Asia.” Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada.
  • Yushu Zhu (leading author), 2018, “2018 national opinion poll: Canadian views on Asia.” Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada.
  • Yushu Zhu (leading author), 2018, “2018 national opinion poll: Canadian views on Asia.” Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada.
  • Yushu Zhu (leading author), 2017, “2017 national opinion poll: Canadian millennial views on Asia.” Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada.
  • Yushu Zhu (co-author), 2017, “2017 national opinion poll: Canadian views on engagement with China.” Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada.

Media Coverage

  • Jeremy Chan, Yushu Zhu, “Despite national polling results, Canadian shouldn’t be dismissive of Asian investment,” The Globe and Mail, Op-ed published on June 12, 2019.
  • Eva Busza, Yushu Zhu, “Canada’s millennials are ready to engage with Asia,” The Globe and Mail, Op-ed published on Dec. 3, 2017.
  • Canadians remain skeptical about Asian investment. Radio interview with CBC The Early Edition. June 11, 2019.
  • Why Canadians are warming to trade with Asia? Radio interview with BIV Today. June 6 2018.
  • Canadians feel more connected to the Asia Pacific. TV interview with Fairchild TV. June 6, 2018.
  • Canadian millennial views on Asia. Radio interview with BIV Today. November 28, 2017.

Invited Speech and Panel Discussions