Doctoral Students

E-mail: yixuan.jandovachen@upol.cz

Office: SV 3.24

Bio

Yixuan Jandová Chen is a senior lecturer in Chinese at the Department of Asian Studies, Palacký University Olomouc. Her research focuses on second language acquisition and teaching Chinese as a foreign/second language.

Dissertation Title

Exploring Formal Register Acquisition in Chinese as a Foreign Language

The dissertation investigates the use of formal written register by intermediate and advanced learners of Chinese. Drawing on learner corpus data, multidimensional register analysis, teacher judgments, and teaching materials, the project examines linguistic features associated with formal and conversational language, identifies recurring patterns and difficulties in learners’ register use, and considers how formal register can be more effectively addressed in Chinese language teaching.

Supervisor: doc. Joanna Ut-seong Sio, Ph.D.

E-mail: federica.cidale01@upol.cz

Bio

Federica Cidale is a PhD student in International Relations and Asian studies at Palacký University Olomouc in the Czech Republic. Her main research delves into the growing influence of cybertechnologies on international politics. Furthermore, her research interests extend to Japan's domestic politics, East Asian security, the Indo-Pacific region, ASEAN – particularly Myanmar – and non-Western state systems such as Mandala.

Dissertation Title

Securitization of Cybertechnologies in Japan

The dissertation examines Japan’s incomplete securitization of cybertechnologies, asking why securitizing moves have not resulted in full securitization despite a severe threat environment, sustained elite-level attention, and external pressure. Drawing on Bigo’s sociological approach to securitization, it examines how constitutional constraints, ministerial fragmentation, bureaucratic competition and societal opposition shape Japan’s cybersecurity policy. The analysis focuses on two cases: Japan’s cyber relations with China, representing the confrontational dimension, and Japan–ASEAN cybersecurity cooperation, representing the cooperative dimension, using longitudinal content analysis of official documents, political speeches, parliamentary debates, and Japanese-language newspaper coverage.

Supervisor: doc. Dr. Alfred Gerstl

E-mail: koreshkovayu@gmail.com, yuliakodzhaeva@yandex.ru

Bio

Researcher specializing in economic and social anthropology, with a regional focus on China and Chinese presence across post-Soviet Eurasia. Research interests include cross-border mobility, informal economies, digital infrastructures, and institutional change, with an emphasis on commodification processes in agricultural and forest-processing sectors. Experienced in multi-sited ethnography and STS-informed analytical approaches, with long-term fieldwork conducted in Eastern Siberia and additional research in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, and Vietnam. Fieldwork experience includes research with Chinese migrants, migrants from Central Asia, and small-scale producers in rural contexts.

Dissertation Title

Post-socialist commodification and Chinese presence in Siberia: hybrid trajectories in agriculture and forestry

My dissertation examines the post-socialist commodification of land and forest resources in Eastern Siberia, with a particular focus on the role of Chinese actors in agriculture and forestry. Rather than treating “Chinese” enterprises as bounded or externally imposed formations, I show how Chinese participation becomes embedded in existing local networks, infrastructures, labor arrangements, and formal and informal institutions. I conceptualize these developments as hybrid trajectories of commodification, through which inherited Soviet socio-material arrangements are reworked and combined with market practices, local adaptations, and cross-border economic participation.

Supervisor: doc. PhDr. Miroslav Nožina, Ph.D.

E-mail: huongpham251288@gmail.com

Bio

Thu Huong Pham is a Ph.D. candidate at the Department of Asian Studies, Faculty of Arts, Palacky University, Olomouc, Czechia. She also has been a researcher at Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences since 2011. She earned a master’s degree in Sociology and another master’s degree in International Development Studies. Her research focuses on partner choice of young Vietnamese, Vietnamese diaspora, migration, family studies.

Dissertation Title

Partner choice of second generation Vietnamese in the Czech Republic: Patterns and Impact factors

This dissertation examines how second generation Vietnamese in the Czech Republic choose their life partners. Drawing on theories of cultural racism, identity formation and partner choice, it traces the pathway that runs from identity to partner preferences, and from preferences to actual partnerships under impact factors such as macro, meso and micro. Although migration research commonly treats interethnic marriage as a measure of how far a minority has adapted to the host society, preliminary findings show that this cohort tends to prefer co-ethnic partners, a tendency connected to their complex identity formation and social position in Czech society. The study thereby contributes to the literature on identity and intimate relationships among the descendants of migrants, a topic that remains largely unexamined in the Czech context.

Supervisor: Filip Kraus, Ph.D.