Minerva traces her journey in Asian Studies back to her childhood in Sydney in the 1990s, when her mother insisted she learn Chinese and enrolled her in a Chinese school. As the only white student, she was warmly embraced by the Chinese Australian community—an experience that shaped her enduring commitment to Chinese language and culture. At university, she initially paired Chinese with art history, discovering through encounters with Chinese avant-garde art that she could unite her language skills with her passion for visual culture. Her PhD at the University of Sydney shifted her focus to modern Chinese history, drawing on visual and material culture as key sources. Now a historian of modern China, she researches the intersections of art, class, and politics in socialist China and teaches with everyday objects and ephemera to illuminate lived experience. She has also curated exhibitions of contemporary Chinese art. Within ASAA, Minerva first participated as a PhD student presenter before serving as Secretary (2021–24), where she valued the Association’s professionalism and advocacy, particularly its report on Asia education. She highlights the importance of language learning as both a decolonising practice and an indispensable tool for understanding China, while urging Asian Studies scholars to strengthen advocacy, interdisciplinary collaboration, and public engagement to sustain the field’s vitality.

Watch Minerva’s interview below or on the ASAA’s youtube channel here. See the other interviews in the series here.