Department/College/UnitSocial Sciences Division

TitlePhd Student

AffiliationGraduate

Primary Office LocationRachel Carson College Academic Building
235

Mail StopRachel Carson College Faculty Services

Research Interests

Labor and work, International migration, Precarious legal status, Precarious work, Citizenship, Labor migration, High-skilled migrant workers, Ethnicity, Gender, Human Trafficking

Selected Publications

Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles

Liang, X. (Forthcoming) Stay or Leave: The Role of Legal-Status-Making Timelines in Skilled Migrants’ Job Mobility. Migration Studies

Liang, X. (2025). Legal Status Categorization, Transitions, Starting Points as Employment Stratifying Mechanisms: Evidence from US Student-Migrant-Workers. International Migration Review, 0(0).

Liang, X. (2025). Immigration regulations as frame of reference: trade-off between precarious employment and precarious legal status among US student-migrant-workers. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 51(5), 1207-1227.

Liang, X. (2024). Cascading employment as paradigmatic form of precarious work: The case of IT agency workers in the United States. The Economic and Labour Relations Review, 35(4), 959–979. doi:10.1017/elr.2024.57

Liang, X. (2023). Marriage Trafficking: Demand, Exploitation, and Conducive Contexts—A Study in China–Vietnam Border Areas.Violence Agaisnt Women, 29(3-4). 548-579. 

Fukurai, H., Gabriel, R., & Liang, X. (2023). The COVID-19 crisis, herd immunity, and “vaccine apartheid” in the age of anthropocene. Asian Journal of Law and Society, 10(1), 1-10. 

Book Reviews

Liang, X. (2022). Review of "What's wrong with work? By Lynne Pettinger Bristol", England: Policy Press. (2019). 230pp. AUS $33.68. Paperback. New Technology, Work and Employment. https://doi.org/10.1111/ntwe.12232

Liang, X. (2021). China’s criminal justice institutions-Construction of Guilt: An Empirical Account of Routine Chinese Injustice By Yu MOU Oxford, Hart Publishing, 2020. 280 pp. Hardcover, $79.00. Asian Journal of Law and Society, 8(3), 582-584 https://heinonline.org/HOL/P?h=hein.journals/ajulsoc8&i=581

Liang, X. (2020). Orphan Relief in China-Anna High, Non-Governmental Orphan Relief in China: Law, Policy, and Practice (New York: Routledge, 2019) pp 174. Hardcover: $53.99. Asian Journal of Law and Society, 7(3), 583-585. https://heinonline.org/HOL/P?h=hein.journals/ajulsoc7&i=593

Refereed Book Chapters

Liang, M., Chen, W., Liang, X. (2024). Transnational migration, mobility, and identity on the Sino-Vietnamese border, Shanghai People’s Press. ISBN-10: 7208167532. (In Chinese)