Tian (Esther) Li is a media theorist, cultural scholar, and Assistant Professor of Media and Cultural Studies at Korea University.

Her work develops media theory through the study of screen cultures, with particular interests in media philosophy, transnational media, law and judgment, alterity and religion, and human–AI relations.

Working through Korean and Chinese screen cultures, Li examines how media organize capital, circulation, presence, affect, judgment, and agency. Her research develops conceptual frameworks including Screen Capitalism, Amnyu, Shamanic Audiovisualization, and Screen Justice.

Her first book, Riding the Korean Wave in China: The Afterlives of Korean Screen Culture, under contract with University of Michigan Press, examines how Korean audiovisual culture persists through remaking, localization, industrial transfer, and partial invisibility in China. Her second book project, The Spectral Screen: Media, Law, and the Historical Transformation of Screen Justice, develops a theory of Screen Justice, examining how screens become alternative sites of testimony and judgment when formal legal institutions fail.

Prior to joining Korea University, she held academic appointments and taught at Yale University, Harvard University, and Stanford University. Her teaching at Harvard was recognized with an award for Teaching Excellence.

She is also the founder of Seed Consultancy, where her work on AI governance extends her broader intellectual interest in judgment, agency, responsibility, and the human in an age of increasingly autonomous media systems.

Tian (Esther) Li is a media theorist and Assistant Professor of Media and Cultural Studies at Korea University. Her research develops concepts including Screen Capitalism, Amnyu, Shamanic Audiovisualization, and Screen Justice to examine how media organize circulation, alterity, judgment, and human agency.

Research areas: media theory and media philosophy; screen capitalism and transnational media; alterity, religion, and audiovisual media; law, judgment, and screen justice; human–AI relations.

Teaching areas: East Asian cinema, digital media politics, modern Chinese literature, global Korean culture, media planning and boundary-crossing media.

Teaching →

• 2023
  Poorvu Center Instructional Enhancement Award, Yale
• 2022
  ACLS Yvette and William Kirby Centennial Fellow in Chinese Studies
• 2021 – 2022
  American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) Fellowship
• 2021
  Teaching Excellence Award, Office of Undergraduate Education, Harvard
• 2020 – 2021
  Korea Foundation–Korea Institute Postdoctoral Fellowship
• 2018
  Korea Foundation Graduate Dissertation Fellowship

Full list in the CV.

• 2025
  Opening Speaker, Bong Joon Ho: Film Retrospective and Director Visit, Council on East Asian Studies & Yale Film Society
• 2024 & 2025
  Senior Thesis Advisor, Film and Media Studies & East Asian Languages and Literatures, Yale University
• 2023
  Reviewer, Roses in the Smokehouse by Miroslav Volf, Yale Center for Faith & Culture Consultation
• 2022 – 2023
  Academic Advisor, Yale University–New Asia Undergraduate Exchange Program (YUNA), Yale-China Association
• 2021
  Reviewer, Journal of Intercultural Communication Research and The Harvard Undergraduate Research Journal

Association for Asian Studies · Modern Language Association · Society for Cinema and Media Studies

Chinese (native), Classical Chinese, Korean (near-native), English (near-native), Japanese (professional working proficiency).