Rui Ding is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of Asian Studies at the University of British Columbia. As a pre-modern Chinese historian, her research spans the 14th to the 19th centuries, focusing on the northern frontiers of China from a transnational perspective, while illuminating topics such as state formation, the circulation of commodities, migration, and transborder relations. Her doctoral dissertation project, titled “The Ming Liaodong Society in the 14th-17th centuries: Land, Livelihood, and Commodity Circulation,” examines the military-agrarian society in the northeast Ming region, analyzing how the frontier and foreign policies of the Ming regime shaped borderland society. It also discusses how transnational interactions with Chosŏn Korea, the Jurchen, and the Mongol Empire influenced borderland social patterns, as well as how local initiatives challenged the state’s design. Alongside her doctoral research project, her current work encompasses 17th-century Chinese social and political transitions, premodern East Asian maritime travelogues, and the impact of imperial expansion on Asian Indigenous communities.

In her free time, she enjoys classical music, watching racing sports, and learning languages.