About Xiangyu

Ma Xiangyu is an assistant professor in sociology at Nanyang Technological University, where he also serves as the co-Lead of the Social Lab at the Asian Center of Digital Cultures. He writes about the objective measure of subjectivities. He is currently building a theory of complex tastes, using it to extend canonical theories of taste and fashion dynamics. Lately, he has been working with large-language models a fair bit, in particular on problems related to the algorithmic fidelity of synthetic estimates derived from so-called “silicon samples.” He also studies the social construction of authenticity under generative AI regimes. His writings have been published in outlets such as Socius, Poetics, and Cultural Sociology. He graduated with a PhD in sociology from the University of Chicago, and a BA in sociology, magna cum laude, from Pomona College.

A copy of his most recent CV can be found here.