Jonathan Sun is an interdisciplinary researcher, designer, engineer, artist, comedian, author, and playwright. He is a doctoral student at MIT, an affiliate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard, and a creative researcher at the Harvard metaLAB, where he studies social media, AI, and online community.
He is also the author behind @jonnysun and “everyone’s a aliebn when ur a aliebn too” (HarperPerennial, 2017), the creator of @tinycarebot, and the co-creator of the MIT Humor Series. His comedic work has appeared on NPR and in TIME Magazine, BuzzFeed, Playboy, GQ, and McSweeney’s. Recently, he was profiled in the New York Times and named one of TIME Magazine's 25 Most Influential People on the Internet.
Jonathan is a graduate of the Yale School of Architecture (M.Arch. 2015), where he was the recipient of the 2015 William Edward Parsons Memorial Medal (for achievement in city planning), an H.I. Feldman Prize nominee, a James Gamble Rogers Fellow, and a Teaching Fellow. He is an honors graduate of the Infrastructure program in Engineering Science at the University of Toronto (B.A.Sc. 2012), where he was the recipient of the 2012 L.E. Jones Award (for outstanding contribution to engineering and the arts), the 2012 Engineers for the World award, a University of Toronto Arts Council Award, and a Gordon Cressy Leadership Award.
As a playwright, Jonathan's work has been performed at the Yale School of Drama, Factory Theater in Toronto, Hart House Theater, Theater Lab in Toronto, and the University of Toronto Drama Festival (where he received the President’s Award for Best Production). As an artist and illustrator, his work has been commissioned by the New Haven ArtSpace, and exhibited at MIT, the Yale School of Architecture, and the University of Toronto. Previously, he was editor-in-chief of the Yale School of Architecture journal, Retrospecta 36 (Yale Press, 2013).
Jonathan is an advocate for interdisciplinary education and continues to work and teach across the fields of design research, architecture, engineering, art, and theater.
contact: jfsun (at) mit.edu.
full CV available upon request.