Her research and teaching interests include comparative ethnic American literatures, speculative fiction (science fiction, utopian fiction, dystopian fiction, etc.), critical race studies, and globalization studies. She is researching the historical relationship between speculative fiction and scientific racism, starting from the American Eugenics Movement of the early 1900s and comparing it to the DNA revolution of the 21st century. Joo is interested in how literature, as a cultural narrative, helps to influence popular understandings of racial categories at different historical moments.