Those who knew Jiani Yu were not only touched by her kindness and perseverance, but also her constant commitment to comforting others during times of hardship.
Yu, who also went by Thea, was a second-year graduate student in Duke’s Critical Asian and Middle Eastern Humanities program. The University announced her death in a Dec. 1 email to graduate students, though her cause of death has not been released.
“One of the things I found the most impressive [about] her is that she c[ould] … accept other people's emotions first, comfort other people first … she always trie[d] to understand others’ feelings or opinions first. I think that [was] her gift,” said Chenyi Huang, Yu’s roommate and a second-year master’s student in the East Asian Studies program.
At the age of 14, Yu moved to the United States with her parents from a rural province in China, settling near the Chinatown neighborhood in Oakland, California. She completed her undergraduate studies in applied linguistics in 2021 at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
Yu is remembered as a “caretaker” for both her family and her friends, always taking the time to “mak[e] sure other people were okay,” according to Eileen Chow, associate professor of the practice of Asian and Middle Eastern studies and director of graduate studies for the East Asian Studies program.
In an email to her Asian and Middle Eastern Studies 335: Chinatowns: A Cultural History class, Chow described Yu’s decision to “pursue her dream” of attending graduate school as “a huge act of bravery” by both Yu and her parents, as she would have to leave them in California and relocate to the East Coast. According to Chow, Yu attended Duke with her family’s “full blessing and support.”
Coming from a first-generation, low-income household, Yu was tasked at an early age with supporting her working-class parents who did not speak English. As the first in her family to speak the language fluently, Yu helped to lighten her family’s burden by filing taxes and handling rent leases and employment documents.
“She shouldered all the responsibility for her parents,” said Lujia Li, one of Yu’s closest friends and a second-year master’s student in the East Asian Studies program. “… She worked as a truck driver. She worked at a post station. She worked at a lot of restaurants to earn the money and to save for the family.”
According to Li, one of the most memorable pastimes he shared with Yu was buying lottery tickets at the convenience store. He recalled that Yu “always kind of hoped that she [could] win the lottery someday” to alleviate her family’s financial struggles.
Yu’s empathetic and caring nature was felt especially by those in her circle.
As an international student from China, Li recalled the difficulties acclimating to academic and social life in the U.S. Yu and Li soon developed a deep friendship due to their similar personalities and shared experience with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. When Li struggled to adjust, Yu would share her own experiences from high school, explaining how she also found it difficult to fit in when she first immigrated to the U.S.
“If we struggle to fit in in a new environment, in a new country — it is not our fault, and we can just still be ourselves,” Li said. “We don't have to change anything, and we need to stick together.”
Yu taught Huang that “everyone has their own struggle, and everyone is doing their best.” When Huang, also an international student, struggled with speaking fluent English, Yu comforted her, explaining that no one should be judged for not meeting expectations.
Zoey Liu, Yu’s roommate and a second-year master’s student in the East Asian Studies program, remembered that Yu always lent a listening ear to those around her.
“Sometimes when she sense[d] that we [were] kind of in a depressed mode, she always c[a]me to us and she would say, ‘Because I have also been in the same condition, I will never judge you, so just feel free to come to me,’” Liu said.
Liu shared that one of her most valuable memories with Yu was playing Nintendo Switch in their apartment room. Together with Huang and Yu’s former roommate, the four would often dine out and host parties with other friends in Duke’s graduate programs. Liu recalled that “although sometimes [they knew] that Thea might not be in … a good mood,” she was always willing to hang out.
“Thea was always willing to share, even if it was her painful memory or deepest memory,” Liu said. “She reassured me that it's actually okay to share, and it's actually okay to build connection.”
Chow was impressed by Yu’s intellectual curiosity, noting that she embraced a wide range of new knowledge and perspectives, from cultural anthropology to women’s studies.
According to Chow, one of Yu’s “proudest moments” came from organizing a book talk in March with Elena Shih, Manning assistant professor of American studies and ethnic studies at Brown University, to discuss the abuse of women workers and sex worker rescue programs. Later that day, Yu invited members of Red Canary Song, a grassroots collective of Asian and migrant sex workers and massage workers based in New York, to screen their film “Fly in Power,” which follows the story of a Korean massage worker who became one of the group’s core organizers.
While eager to share her own story, Chow pointed out that Yu also explored deeper systemic and structural forces shaping immigrant communities in her work.
During her time at Duke, Yu combined her interests in anthropology and gender studies with her lived experiences and family relationships. Her master’s thesis focuses on the lives of Chinese massage therapy workers in California and examines the gender, ethnic and labor dynamics within the Chinese diasporic community.
Yu’s interest in the tactile nature of massage work was rooted in her mother’s experience working as a masseuse in Chinatown.
“As she observed [in her research], tactility is our most reciprocal sense, in that whereas it is easy to see without being seen, or hear without being heard, it is difficult to touch without being touched,” wrote Chow and Carlos Rojas, professor of Asian and Middle Eastern studies and Yu’s thesis adviser, in their eulogy for Yu.
Yu’s work resonated with Li, who learned how the “power of touch” translates into the “power of connections” with family and friends. Inspired by Yu, Li described how he found motivation to “keep in touch” with those around him.
Studying the dynamics of the massage parlor where her mother worked not only provided Yu with a way to understand her family, but also helped her come to terms with her identity and life prior to arriving at Duke.
In an essay Yu wrote for Chow, she described her daily routine knitting hats and interacting with her mother’s colleagues in the parlor. Although her education and command of English gave her the opportunity to “break free” from the “confinement” of the parlor, she felt at home in “the drowsy and subdued environment of the staff room.” The “discomfort” propelled her to tell the story of her lived experiences.
“I was guided by an incipient voice that impressed upon me the mission of telling the narratives of people who remained enclosed within the confines of my previous life,” Yu wrote.
Yu’s passing came as a shock to Huang, who noted that Yu “ha[d] been down for a long time.” Despite discussions with their friends about Yu’s mental health, Huang felt that this semester had been particularly difficult for her.
Huang expressed how grateful she was for Yu’s warmth. She recalled her last time seeing Yu in person — she called to ask Yu for a ride to school, which Yu gave, despite being woken up by the call.
Liu said that Yu was one of the most courageous individuals she has met, citing how despite battling mental health challenges, Yu made an effort to bring joy to other people.
“She definitely doesn’t want people to think she’s weak, but I also think she thought that it's okay not to be tough,” Huang added. “You can just be yourself and accept who you are.”
In the final hours Li spent with Yu, he shared that she comforted him about his stress from final exams, reminding him to “take it easy” and reassuring him that he would “make it through.”
“Even at the last moment of her life, she was so tender, so loving, so caring,” Li said. “… She really wished that we can live properly [and] pursue our dreams successfully, so we will be bearing that hope that she gave to us.”
Editor’s note: Chenyi Huang was a staff reporter for The Chronicle’s 119th volume.
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Lucas Lin is a Trinity sophomore and a university news editor of The Chronicle's 120th volume.