Steven Yao, the Edmund A. LeFevre Professor of Literature, delivered a paper as an invited participant at the conference, America's Asia/Asia's America. Yao's paper, "The Shape of Water: Rethinking Territory and Influence for Asian American Studies in a Global Age," discussed the need to reconfigure the dimensions of "Asian American" as a category beyond the boundaries of the nation-state.

The conference was hosted by the Asian Research Institute at the National University of Singapore and co-sponsored by the United States Embassy in Singapore. Taking place from August 13-14, the conference addressed the relationship between a shifting geo-political landscape and the dynamics of culture in an of global interconnectedness.