Japan

Background

Smethurst was a junior fellow at the Center for Hellenic Studies in Washington, D.C., where she began her work on the comparison of Greek tragedy and Japanese noh.

Her books include, The Artistry of Aeschylus and Zeami: A Comparative Study of Greek Tragedy and Noh (Princeton University Press, 1989), which received the Association of American University Presses’ Arisawa Memorial Award. She also has published articles about Greek tragedy and the comparison of tragedy and noh. Another book, Dramatic Representations of Filial Piety (Cornell University East Asia Program, 1998) was awarded a Japan-United States Friendship Commission Prize by Columbia University's Donald Keene Center of Japanese Culture in 2000. In 2003 she edited a book entitled The Noh Ominameshi: A Flower Viewed From Many Directions (Cornell University East Asia Program, 2003).

Background
Hiroshi Nara specializes in Japanese language pedagogy—in particular, issues relating to teaching reading in Japanese. He has been with the University of Pittsburgh since 1987.

In graduate school, Nara was trained as a specialist in Montague semantics, which made use of modal logic to analyze natural language phenomena. His interests then moved toward applying this approach to natural language processing—computational linguistics and its application to artificial intelligence and expert systems. Later, his focus shifted to Japanese language pedagogy. Using his skills in computational linguistics, he obtained grants to produce computer-based language software for teaching reading in Japanese.

Background

Rawski has been an observer of China’s economy since the 1960s. He coedited China’s Rise and the Balance of Influence in Asia (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2007), a multifaceted examination of China in the areas of economics, trade, investment, politics, diplomacy, technology, and security. He also coedited China’s Great Economic Transformation (Cambridge University Press, 2008).

Rawski’s work has received international recognition in the form of lecture invitations and paper presentations, most recently in the form of an Astor Visiting Professorship at the University of Oxford.

Background

Smethurst is currently studying the modern history of noh theater in Japan. He is focusing on facets that the relationship of the leading schools of noh actors to Japan’s royal family and to the newly created imperial mystique. He also is studying industrial policy in late 19th-century Japan. Smethurst’s books include From Foot Soldier to Finance Minister: Takahashi Korekiyo, Japan’s Keynes (Harvard University Asia Studies Center, 2007), translated for publication in Japanese by Tôyô Keizai Shinpôsha in 2009; Agricultural Development and Tenancy Disputes in Japan, 1870–1940 (Princeton University Press, 1986); and A Social Basis for Prewar Japanese Militarism: The Army and the Rural Community (University of California Press, 1974). He has published op-ed pieces on the contemporary relevance of Takahashi in the Asahi Shimbun and the Nihon Keizai Shimbun, two of Japan’s major newspapers.

Background
In addition to serving as an assistant professor, Muge Koften Finkel is a consultant for the World Bank. She received her PhD in foreign affairs from the University of Virginia, her master’s degree in international relations from the International University of Japan, and her bachelor’s degree in political science and international relations from Bogazici University, Istanbul, Turkey.

Background

Before coming to the University of Pittsburgh, Hashimoto was a research associate at the United Nations University in Tokyo. Her published books are Imagined Families, Lived Families: Culture and kinship in contemporary Japan (SUNY Press, 2008), The Gift of Generations: Japanese and American Perspectives on Aging and Social Contract (Cambridge University Press, 1996), and Family Support for the Elderly: The International Experience (Oxford University Press, 1992).