Andrew Hao and Sport in China

Sport in China in this week’s podcast brought to you by the British Society of Sport History in association with the Institute of Historical Research with Y. Andrew Hao, who is a graduate student at the University of Texas at Austin. And again it’s a podcast takeover this week as Andrew is interviewed by the BSSH’s Postgrad and Early Career Rep, Conor Heffernan. Andrew talks about his path into academia in the States and the role of sport in the development of Chinese foreign policy during the 1960 and 70s, as well as discussing his passion for tennis history. There’s also some great detail on the pleasures of working in the archives in China but French historians should plug their ears when talk turns to who exactly was the President of France in 1966! Andrew is a regular attendee at the BSSH’s conferences and there’s room to discuss the various grants that are available for PG and ECR researchers to help them get the most out of their Society. Y. Andrew Hao is a Ph.D. Candidate in Physical Culture and Sport Studies at the H. J. Lutcher Stark Center for Physical Culture and Sports of the Department of Kinesiology and Health Education at the University of Texas at Austin. You can find him on Twitter @andrewrhao. Andrew’s research interests include the (international) political history of the Olympic Movement, history of sport and international relations, history of (East) Asian sports, and history of tennis. He has conducted archival research in the United States, China, and Europe and presented at the annual conferences of NASSH and BSSH. He received the 2019 PhD Students and Early Career Academics Research Grant from the International Olympic Committee’s Olympic Studies Centre. Andrew was born and raised in Fushun and Shenyang, China. He completed his undergraduate degree in International Relations at Fudan University in Shanghai. He moved to Austin, TX in 2013 to pursue a master’s degree in Kinesiology (Sport Management) before committing to the current Ph.D. study. Besides academia, he is a dedicated cinephile (his favourtie film of all time is The Tree of Life by Terrence Malick), an avid tennis player, a passionate trivia contestant, and a frequent world traveler (his favourite places besides Austin in the world are Berlin, Istanbul, Lausanne, and Tallinn).