Nancy Yunhwa Rao, Distinguished Professor and head of music theory, has been named Board of Governors Professor of Music.
The Rutgers Board of Governors acknowledged Rao’s “award-winning scholarship on a wide array of topics, including gender and music, sketch studies, musical modernism, cultural fusion and racial representation. . . . She has brought Chinatown opera and its transpacific dimensions to the forefront of the field. Her groundbreaking work has not only established these traditions as vital to the historical narrative of American music, but has also redefined its historiographical frameworks.”
Her 2017 book, Chinatown Opera Theater in North America, chronicled the untold journey of Cantonese opera performers to North America, beginning at the western shores in San Francisco and Seattle. With innovative stage productions that combined western aesthetics with grand Chinese customs, these troupes became an important part of the community, she said. Yet, they have disappeared into historical obscurity, Rao has said, adding that much of entertainment history in America has focused on the transatlantic migration. Rao’s most recent book is 2025’s Inside Chinese Theater: Community and Artistry in Nineteenth-Century California and Beyond, detailing the arrival and establishment of Chinese opera theater as a significant performing art form in California.
In April 2024, Rao was one of three Rutgers professors elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (AAAS). In November 2024, she was inducted into the American Musicological Society (AMS) as an honorary member in recognition of her work in music study. Rao is one of 5 honorary members from around the world recently inducted into the AMS.
Read more about Rao’s faculty appointment by the Rutgers Board of Governors.