New digs

I’m writing from my new home in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. I had the amazing chance to move here, to the position of associate professor in the Asian Studies Department and adjunct associate professor (which just means affiliated faculty) in the History Department at UNC Chapel Hill. I join a number of colleagues in Japanese studies: Jan Bardsley and Mark Driscoll, both specialists in modern Japanese literature and culture; Chris Nelson, an anthropologist who works on Okinawa; Miles Fletcher, a historian of modern Japan; Jen Smith, a linguist who specializes in Japanese dialects; Inger Brody in Comparative Literature; and Barbara Ambros, a scholar of religious studies who works on early modern and modern Japan. Duke University is located nearby in Durham, and has a remarkable Japanese studies library curated by Kris Troost, a historian of medieval Japan, as well as a lineup of Japanese studies scholars. Also nearby is Raleigh’s North Carolina State University, which also has some top Japanese studies faculty. I’ve been enjoying the activities of the Triangle Japan Forum in particular, and hope to be able to work with Japan studies faculty in the region to build something that goes beyond an occasional forum to instead serve as a center for the three universities and their faculty, graduate students, and undergrads.

View from my office in New West

Another great resource is the Ackland Museum of Art, which is part of the university and better integrated into campus academic life than any university museum I have encountered. The museum invites regular collaboration with faculty. In the short time I have been here, I have already brought students to the museum multiple times: once to see ceramics and paintings in a study room, twice to examine objects on display in a special exhibition, and more recently, to look at woodblock prints (ukiyo-e) that I selected for exhibition in the public study gallery that rotates bay displays selected by and for academic classes. It is remarkable. The museum has an impressive Asian art collection, with very strong Japanese works because of the activities of the late art historian and museum curator Sherman Lee, who retired to this area and worked with the museum before passing away in 2008.

One of my students examining some Tang dynasty "three color" ceramics.

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