Yumeng Hou

Yumeng Hou is a digital humanities researcher and PhD candidate at the Laboratory for Experimental Museology (eM+), EPFL, working with Prof Sarah Kenderdine. Trained as a data scientist, Yumeng holds research and practical experience in data visualisation, analytics, human-computer interaction, and cloud solutions. Driven by a passion for leveraging computational strategies to preserve cultural heritage and traditional folklore, Yumeng switched her career to digital museology and cultural computing, examining the convergence of cultural heritage, computational archival science, digital narratives, knowledge encoding, and cultural AI.
Yumeng is preparing a doctoral thesis on safeguarding the living heritage of Chinese martial arts through digitisation, datafication, (re)presentation and augmentation. Her research interacts closely with archivists, scholars, and masters of historical martial arts across Hong Kong, mainland China, India, and Europe (primarily Switzerland and Italy). Her findings so far have been demonstrated through publications in highly recognised journals, international conferences, and contributions to books. And finally, she is growing into a Hung Kuen practitioner and learning Italian swords!