Dr. Laura Miller

Eiichi Shibusawa-Seigo Arai Endowed Professor of Japanese Studies and Professor of Anthropology

Phone: 314/516-7246
Email: millerlau@umsl.edu 

Education: Dr. Laura Miller received her Ph.D. from the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1988. She came to UMSL in August 2010. Endowed Chair in Japanese Studies.

Teaching:  After graduation from the University of California, Santa Barbara with BA degrees in Anthropology and Asian Studies, Dr. Miller taught English and supervised an English language program for Teijin Educational Systems in Osaka, Japan (1977-1981). She began teaching anthropology in the 1980s in Los Angeles, and has been a faculty member at several universities. At UMSL, she will teach new courses on Japanese culture and linguistic anthropology.

Professional Activities: Dr. Miller has been active as a leader in many professional organizations, including her role as the President of the Society for East Asian Anthropology, American Anthropological Association (2003~2005) and Chair and Program Director of the Midwest Japan Seminar (2000~2003). She has served on the editorial board of several academic journals. She has published more than fifty articles and book chapters on Japanese culture and language, including topics such as the Korean wave, English loanwords in Japanese, the Abeno Seimei boom, girls’ slang, and print club photos.  http://www.umsl.academia.edu/Laura Miller/              

Dr. Miller is the author of Beauty Up: Exploring Contemporary Japanese Body Aesthetics(University of California Press, 2006) http://www.amazon.com/Beauty-Up-Exploring-Contemporary-Aesthetics/dp/0520245091

Together with Jan Bardsley, she is co-editor of two books: Bad Girls of Japan (Palgrave, 2005) http://www.amazon.com/Bad-Girls-Japan-Laura-Miller/dp/1403969477 andManners and Mischief: Gender, Power, and Etiquette in Japan  (University of California Press, 2011)  http://www.amazon.com/Manners-Mischief-Gender-Power-Etiquette/dp/0520267842/ref=tmm_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1291570079&sr=1-1

She is currently working on two new book projects. Japanese Girl Stuff builds on multiple interests and expertise in linguistic anthropology, Japanese popular culture, and gender and media. She is also co-editing (with Alisa Freedman and Christine Yano) the volume Modern Girls on the Go: Gender, Mobility, and Labor in Japan, a collection which crosses the fields of history, anthropology, literature, and visual studies, investigating the lived experiences and cultural depictions of women who worked in service industries related to ideas of mobility.