CRCS Directors

Fenggang Yang
Director

Dr. Fenggang Yang is Professor of Sociology and Director of the Center on Religion and Chinese Society (CRCS) at Purdue University. He received his BA from Hebei Normal University, MA from Nankai University, and Ph.D. from The Catholic University of America. His research focuses on religious change in China and immigrant religions in the United States. He is the author of Chinese Christians in America: Conversion, Assimilation, and Adhesive Identities, the co-editor of State, Market, and Religions in Chinese Societies and Conversion to Christianity among the Chinese (a special issue of the Sociology of Religion: A Quarterly Review). Two of his articles won “Distinguished Article Awards”: “Transformations in New Immigrant Religions and Their Global Implications” and “The Red, Black, and Gray Markets of Religion in China”. Dr. Yang’s current research focuses on the political economy of religion in China, Christian ethics and market transition in China, faith and trust among business people in China, and Chinese Christian churches in the United States. He has given many invited lectures at major universities in the United States and China, invited presentations at major think-tanks, and interviewed by the Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, USA Today, etc. and some newspapers in Asia.

Curriculum Vitae                     Publications                     Activities

George Hong
Co-Director

Dr. Z. George Hong is Professor of History at Purdue University Calumet (PUC). He received his Ph.D. in history from the University of Maryland at College Park in 1992. Dr. Hong has authored three books, edited and co-edited five books, and published more than eighty refereed articles and book chapters in the fields of modern China, U.S.-China relations, comparative modernization, and economic history. Currently, Dr. Hong is studying the role of faith in Chinese corruption.