Catherine Fung

Catherine (Cat) Fung is always thinking about what makes our experiences-- our joy, our pain, our trauma, our power-- visible. She wonders how can such experiences become markers of our identities?

A former college professor-turned-high school teacher, Catherine’s scholarship specializes in Critical Race Theory, Ethnic Studies, and Asian American literature.

As an English teacher at Lick-Wilmderding High School, Catherine believes that serious things can be fun and fun things can be taken seriously. She enjoys inviting students to find an unexpected connection to a text, no matter how seemingly stodgy or “classic,” by reading it alongside popular culture, the way we talk about things day-to-day, and our guilty pleasures.  Cat approaches teaching adults from a similar approach.

She has published articles on topics such as how hate crimes are made legible in both the law and popular discourse and how refugees tell their stories to become recognized within communities they live in.

Catherine’s writing can be found in academic journals such as SocialText and College Literature as well as the collective blog UnMargin and the online magazine Dismantle.

She also serves as a consultant for the Oakland-based non-profit ARTogether.

Catherine holds a PhD in English from the University of California, Davis.