Selina Lai-Henderson's scholarship is at the heart of transnational American Studies, where she locates works of American literature in twentieth-century China and in translation. The author of Mark Twain in China (Stanford UP, 2015), Lai-Henderson's current book-in-progress interrogates complex shifts of Afro-Asian discourses across the literary and cultural landscape of late Qing China through the Maoist era. Her recent publications include "Langston Hughes and the Shanghai Jazz Scene" in Langston Hughes in Context (Cambridge UP, 2022) and "You Are No Darker Than I Am: The Souls of Black Folk in Maoist China" forthcoming with PMLA (Spring 2023). She co-directs Freedom Lab and is on the Advisory Board of the Humanities Research Center at DKU. Prior to DKU, she was a Fulbright Scholar at Stanford University and a Research Assistant Professor at Hong Kong University. She is on the Editorial Board of Global Nineteenth Century Studies and is Senior Associate Managing Editor of Journal of Transnational American Studies. She is Co-Chair of American Studies Association's International Committee.

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.