Jean Ma writes about film, sound media, and moving image art. She is the author of Melancholy Drift: Marking Time in Chinese Cinema (2010), Sounding the Modern Woman: The Songstress in Chinese Cinema (2015), and At the Edges of Sleep: Moving Images and Somnolent Spectators (2022).

She is the Mr. and Mrs. Hung Hing-Ying Professor in the Arts at the University of Hong Kong.