NYU Shanghai Welcomes 33 New Faculty Members

This fall, NYU Shanghai welcomes 33 new faculty members from 12 countries. Spanning 19 disciplines – from Computer Science to Physics to Sociology,  these new faculty members will expand and enrich NYU Shanghai’s academic environment. 

NYU Shanghai Provost Joanna Waley-Cohen said this cohort of new faculty is the result of NYU Shanghai’s ‘most successful recruitment season ever.’ She added, “We are delighted to welcome so strong and so international a group of new faculty members with such a broad range of academic expertise, and look forward very much to getting to know them over the coming months.”

The new cohort, including Professor of History David Atwill, who is the new Dean of Arts and Sciences and Nasir Memon, who is the Interim Dean of Computer Science, Data Science, and Engineering, join NYU Shanghai’s growing team of faculty. NYU Shanghai’s faculty has grown over ten years from 118 to 268, and now represent 29 nationalities and 43 academic fields.

Zou Xin joins NYU Shanghai after a decade of teaching at Princeton University. Newly appointed as director of NYU Shanghai’s Chinese Language Program and Associate Professor of Global China Studies, said she is most looking forward to empowering her students with the linguistic skills to deeply engage with China and its people. “It is through such profound connections that we can genuinely appreciate China’s remarkable achievements and understand her challenges with empathy,” she said. 

She added that language, more than just a communication tool, can be a foundation for students to build their academic and professional futures. “At its heart, language bestows upon us the confidence to embark on global adventures, and ultimately, the gift of an unbounded, limitless life,” she said. “I trust no academic institution is as close to fulfilling such an aim as NYU Shanghai, where China is no longer a distant civilization confined to textbook pages but a vibrant, living world right outside one’s door. 

Guohua Jean Zhang, appointed as Professor of Practice in Real Estate and Executive Director of NYU Shanghai’s newly established Institute for Cities and Real Estate in Emerging Markets, is joining NYU Shanghai after 23 years of experience in real estate as a senior executive with multinational real estate investors and developers. 

“I hope my North American and Chinese real estate investment, development and management experience will bring both international and Chinese local perspectives and contribute to the building of our institute into a world leading real estate education and research center,” he said. 

Zhang says heading a new institute at NYU Shanghai in cooperation with NYU SPS and Schack Institute is a challenge he is excited to take on. “Our new institute will provide cutting-edge academic and experimental real estate education with customized degree programs as well as professional training and executive education programs for Chinese and international students and industry professionals,” he said. 

Associate Professor of Economics Peio Zuazo-Garin, from Spain, joins NYU Shanghai after teaching at International College of Economics and Finance at HSE University and the University of the Basque Country. He said that coming to China is a great opportunity to “get acquainted with its society, culture and tradition, and be a witness of its emergence as a central actor in the international sphere, economically but also culturally.” 

A theorist with a focus on foundational aspects of Game Theory and Decision Theory, Zuazo-Garin said he’s looking forward to meeting his colleagues and learning from them, as well as his students. “I would expect that students will be able to offer perspectives in class…that are different from the ones I may be used to,” he said. “This is undoubtedly exciting!”

Sangeeta Banerji, a newly arrived Assistant Professor of Human Geography, said that as an urbanist, Shanghai’s sprawling metropolis has long intrigued her.  “I am looking forward to collaborating with faculty over at the Global Asia and the Shanghai Key laboratory of Urban Design and Urban Science,” she added. “I am extremely excited about the potential of beginning collaborative research here addressing the transformation of cities in India and China comparatively.”

Fresh from working as a postdoctoral research associate at Rutgers University in the US, Banerji said she is interested to work with students who have experienced different educational systems. "I look forward to interacting and learning with the myriad students from different parts of China and the world in my classroom," she said.

See the full list of the new faculty members below: