Michael Hicks earned his Ph.D. from Penn State University, where he studied Sino-African and Sino-US relations and Chinese strategy during the Cold War. His dissertation, which he is currently revising into a book manuscript, examines the role of Africans and African Americans in the formation and development of Chinese narratives about revolution at home and abroad under Mao Zedong. He has lived and worked in China and Taiwan for a combined total of six years, is fluent in Mandarin Chinese, and has extensive travel experience in the Indo-Pacific region.