Shunyuan Zhang became interested in gender/sexuality and its correlations with culture and social structure when she was in the Chinese University of Hong Kong. As a Ph.D. student at Emory University, she focused her studies on the intersection between gender/sexuality, feminist/queer theory, and cultural anthropology. In her dissertation field research, she worked on male-to-female transgendered practices in southwest China from a queer perspective. At Trinity, Professor Zhang teaches courses that bring in a transnational approach to the studies of women, gender and sexuality.