Selina Lai-Henderson's research is at the heart of transnational American Studies, locating works of American literature in twentieth-century China and in translation. She is the author of Mark Twain in China (Stanford UP, 2015). Her article, "You Are No Darker Than I Am: The Souls of Black Folk in Maoist China" (PMLA, Sep 2023), is the 2023 winner of the 1921 Prize in American Literature (tenured category). In addition to The Yale Review, MELUS, and Journal of Transnational American Studies, her work has appeared in edited volumes on Langston Hughes and Mark Twain published by Cambridge UP. She is the incoming Book Review Editor of American Quarterly (publication of the American Studies Association). In Spring 2025, Lai-Henderson will be joining Harvard University’s Hutchins Center for African & African American Research as a W.E.B Du Bois Institute Fellow.

Lai-Henderson has a B.A. in English and comparative literature and a Ph.D. in American studies from The University of Hong Kong (HKU), and an M.A. in American studies from Heidelberg University, Germany. She was also a Fulbright Scholar at Stanford University.