Jonathan H. X. Lee

Jonathan H. X. Lee, PhD., is a professor at San Francisco State University who specializes in history, religious studies, Asian studies, and China studies. His family survived the Cambodian genocide and arrived in the United States in 1981, when he was five years old. He identifies as Chinese-Vietnamese-Cambodian American. He received his doctorate in Religious Studies from the University of California, Santa Barbara, in 2009 and has since published sixteen books, along with numerous articles and essays, on Asian and Asian American histories, folklore, cultures, and religions. His major publications include Encyclopedia of Asian American Folklore and Folklife (2010); Asian American Identities and Practices: Folkloric Expressions in Everyday Life (2014); Cambodian American Experiences: Histories, Communities, Cultures and Identities, 2nd ed. (2015); History of Asian Americans: Exploring Diverse Roots (2015); Asian American Religious Cultures, 2 volumes (2018); Southeast Asian Diaspora in the United States: Memories and Visions, Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow (2015); The Age of Asian Migration: Continuity, Diversity, and Susceptibility, Volume 1 (2015); and Japanese Americans: The History and Culture of a People (2018). His scholarship focuses on Chinese, Cambodian, Vietnamese, Chinese–Southeast Asian, and broader Asian American histories and religions. He currently serves as editor-in-chief of Chinese America: History & Perspectives, a peer-reviewed journal published by the Chinese Historical Society of America. Committed to anti-racist pedagogy, he has been invited by Silicon Valley corporations and public agencies to speak on equity, inclusion, diversity, and belonging. He and his husband are the proud fathers of two adopted sons. He has also served in various leadership roles at the Rainbow Community Center of Contra Costa County as part of his commitment to community service. At Rainbow, he has held several leadership roles, including Board President (July–October 2023), Interim Executive Director (October 2023–August 2024), Chief Financial Officer/Treasurer (August 2024–June 2025), and Secretary (July 2025–August 2026). He was also a featured guest on Hulu’s docuseries Out There: Crimes of the Paranormal. He is interviewed in episode 8, “Ghosts of Chinatown,” where he speaks about the religious dimensions of ghosts and ghost scams in the Chinese immigrant community. The series debuted on September 24, 2024, on Hulu. He is frequently interviewed by news publications such as ABC News, Axios, History dot com, National Public Radio, National Geographic, The New Yorker, The New York Times, Vice, and many other local, national, and global media outlets. In 2026, I launched a Substack where I explore insights in higher education, with a focus on the impact of artificial intelligence and generative AI.