Dipesh KHAREL
(Visiting Researcher, Graduate School of Interdisciplinary Information Studies, the University of Tokyo)
Dipesh Kharel is a visual anthropologist and filmmaker. Currently, he is working as a researcher and lecturer at the Graduate School of Interdisciplinary Information Studies, the University of Tokyo. He teaches creative use of camera and audio recording as research tools for scientific research in cutting-edge topics and diverse disciplines, including Artificial Intelligence (AI). Kharel has received his Ph.D. degree from the University of Tokyo, and his Ph.D. dissertation has been honored with the Outstanding Thesis Award and the President Award. He has been researching immigrants in Japan for over a decade. His research fieldwork data have already resulted in manuscripts as well as several award-winning ethnographic documentary films, notably A Life with Slate (2006), Playing with Nan (2012), Tama Gaun (2015), Japani (2020). These films have already been presented at many international conferences, symposiums, universities, and more than 60 international film festivals worldwide and have received several prizes. Kharel has awarded with various research, ethnographic film, and project grants, remarkably the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Grants, the University of Tokyo Asia Globalization Studies Grant (2012-2013), The Japan Foundation Grant (2012), Asian Documentary Network Grant, South Korea (2011), Goteborg International Film Grant, Sweden (2011), The Toyota Foundational International Grant 2017 and 2020, and Wenner-Gren Foundation Grant, USA 2018. His recent publication on immigrants in Japan has received David Plath Media Award from the American Anthropological Association (the award for the best research work on East Asia that contributes to empirical and theoretical debate). He also received a prize from Oxford University Press, 2016, for the most outstanding journal article. Currently, Kharel is researching new immigrants in Japan.

Yoojin KOO
(Project Assistant Professor of East Asian Academy for New Liberal Arts, the University of Tokyo)
Yoojin Koo is Project Assistant Professor of East Asian Academy for New Liberal Arts, at the University of Tokyo. She received her B.A. in International Studies and Political Science from Handong University, M.A. in Area Studies from Seoul National University, Korea, and obtained her Ph.D. in Liberal Arts (focusing on Japanese Politics and Political science) from the University of Tokyo (Komaba). Her research interests are in Japanese conservative (or right-wing) movements, what triggers these movements in a globalizing world, social origins of political right-wing, conservative civil society, political participation, social movements, state-society relations, etc. She has published articles, including "Deformation of Conservatism in Japanese Politics:The Emergence of “Conservative Civil Society” in the 1990s and Onward," The Memoirs of Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia (forthcoming), “A Configurative Approach to Conservative Mobilization in Japan: The Effect of Combining Political Opportunities and Threats,” Japanese Political Science Review, Vol. 5, 2020.

Yoshiko NAKANO
(Associate Professor of Japanese Studies, the University of Hong Kong & Visiting Fellow (2015, 2019), Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia, the University of Tokyo)
Professor Nakano grew up in Kawasaki, went to graduate school in Washington, D.C, and moved to Hong Kong in April 1997, three months before the territory's historic return to Chinese sovereignty. After joining the University of Hong Kong's Department of Japanese Studies in 2000, Professor Nakano began looking into the globalization of "Made in Japan" products. Using the rice cooker as an example of this process, she has examined how this electrical appliance was localized for the Chinese market, and how it has followed in the footsteps of Asian migrants and made its way around the world. The resulting book is Where There are Asians, There are Rice Cookers: How “National” Went Global via Hong Kong (Hong Kong University Press, 2009). Her most recent article entitled "Wings of the New Japan: Kamikaze, Kimonos, and Airline Branding in Postwar Japan" (2018) examines Japan Airline's advertising frontier in the 1950s, when a small domestic airline became Japan's national carrier and expanded into the international market.

SAHASHI Ryo
(Associate Professor of International relations, Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia, the University of Tokyo)
Prof. Sahashi specializes in international politics and is currently focusing on East Asian security as well as Japanese security policy. His recent book is In a Search for Coexistence: the United States and Two Chinas during the Cold War (Tokyo: Keiso, 2015). He published numerous articles in Chinese, English and Japanese and is writing his next book on East Asia security order and architecture. He received his B.A. from International Christian University and his Ph.D. with honor from the Graduate Schools for Law and Politics at the University of Tokyo. He also studied at Department of Political Science, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

SONODA Shigeto
(Professor of Sociology, Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia, the University of Tokyo)
Prof. Shigeto Sonoda is professor of sociology and Asian studies at the University of Tokyo. Prof. Sonoda has taken initiatives in conducting researches including AsiaBarometer 2003-2008, Asia Student Survey 2008-2013, Tianjin Annual Survey 1997-2011. His special interest is in social stratification and globalization of cultures in Asia, and localization process of Japanese company in Asian countries. His latest publications include: Sino-Japan Relations, 1972-2012 IV. Private Sector, University of Tokyo Press (editor, 2014, in Japanese), Risk in East Asia, Keiso-shobo (editor, 2013, in Japanese), Sino-Japan Relations, 1972-2012 III. Society and Culture, University of Tokyo Press (editor, 2012, in Japanese), China Issues: How Experts See the Future of China, University of Tokyo Press (co-editor, 2012, in Japanese), Emerging Middle Classes in East Asia, Keisho-shobo (editor, 2012, in Japanese), Can Education Solve Social Inequality?, Iwanami Shoten Publishers (with Atsuko Shimbo, 2010, in Japanese), Social Inequality in Contemporary China, Chuo Koron (2008, in Japanese, awarded Special Prize of 20th Asia-Pacific Award), Where Chinese Society is Heading for?: Dialogue with Chinese Sociologists, Iwanami Shoten Publishers (editor, 2008, in Japanese). Prof. Sonoda initiated a lot of research/academic activities, including “Frontier of Comparative Studies of Asian Studies” (2010-12 FY) and “Educational Program for Young Scholars on ‘Asia Globalization Studies'” (2009-2012 FY), both of which were financially supported by Japan Society for Promotion of Science. Prof. Sonoda is now one of the core members of new type of graduate education program “Integrated Human Studies for Cultural Diversity” in the University of Tokyo.

Yijiang ZHONG
(Associate professor of Japanese history and religion, Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia, the University of Tokyo)
Prof. Zhong's research fields include modern Japanese history, Japanese religions, nationalism, and Japanese empire. He is also guest associate professor at International Research Center for Japanese Studies (Nichibunken) in Kyoto. His first book, The Origin of Modern Shinto in Japan: The Vanquished Gods of Izumo (Bloomsbury Academic 2016), explores how Shinto both enabled and compromised the creation of the modern nation-state in Japan in the Meiji period (1868-1912). Prof. Zhong is currently looking at the history of the Sea of Japan in relation to modern capitalist development and overseas colonial expansions. Prof. Zhong is one of the main organizers of the GJS summer program.