Language and Information Sciences

Research Interests

My first monograph, based on my PhD dissertation that filed to the University of Tokyo in 2016, “Yakeato” no Sengo Kukanron (Charred Ruins—A Discussion of Postwar Spaces, Seikyu-sha 2018), deals with the representation of urban space in Japan under the United States’ occupation after its defeat in World War II.

Its discussion focused particularly on “yakeato” (charred ruins) and “yamiichi” (black markets) which frequently emerge in narratives of the era immediately after WWII. (For more detailed information about the book, please refer to UTokyo BiblioPlaza, https://www.u-tokyo.ac.jp/biblioplaza/en/A_00126.html)

Following that publication, I extended my research target from the 1930s to the 1950s which is considered as a political, social and cultural transitional period in Japan; where it transitioned from a militaristic empire to a nation-state in the Cold War structure.

Currently I am focusing on three poets who have been considered as “the poets of resistance”; a Japanese mainlander, Kaneko Mitsuharu; an Okinawan, Yamanoguchi Baku; and a Zainichi Korean, Ho Nam-gi. I reconsider the label that was attached to them in relation to the discourse of postwar thought and criticism.

Aside from this specific topic, my academic interest covers postcolonial theories, posthuman theories, Japanese film history, and contemporary Japanese literature/criticism.