Aug 23

Old Lhasa: A Biography of a Sacred City

Michael Aldrich joins John Ross to discuss Old Lhasa: A Biography, his richly detailed portrait of Tibet’s historic capital. It’s the third book in his trilogy on Asian cultural centers. He wrote the first two, on Beijing and Ulaanbaatar, while living in those cities, where he wo ... Show More

32m 48s

Aug 19

Po-Yi Hung, "Routes of Taiwan Tea: Mobility, Borders, and Territoriality" (U Washington Press, 2026)

From misty mountain oolongs to the global boba boom, Taiwan’s teas carry far more than flavor. They embody contested borders, evolving identities, and the complexities of nationhood. Routes of Taiwan Tea: Mobility, Borders, and Territoriality (U Washington Press, 2026) by Dr. Po- ... Show More

49m 43s

Aug 19

WE HEREBY REFUSE: Japanese American Resistance to Wartime Incarceration with Bruce Rutledge

John talks to Bruce Rutledge, founder of Chin Music Press, about running an independent Asia-focused press, the origins of the company in Tokyo, and the move to Seattle, where Chin Music now has a bookstore in Pike Place Market. They talk about Chin Music’s highly successful grap ... Show More

35m 32s

Jul 2024

Wendy Matsumura, "Waiting for the Cool Moon: Anti-Imperialist Struggles in the Heart of Japan's Empire" (Duke UP, 2024)

In Waiting for the Cool Moon: Anti-Imperialist Struggles in the Heart of Japan's Empire (Duke UP, 2024) Wendy Matsumura interrogates the erasure of colonial violence at the heart of Japanese nation-state formation. She critiques Japan studies’ role in this effacement and contends ... Show More

59m 25s

Jun 2022

The Forgotten Children of the Second Sino-Japanese War

Disparaged as "Japanese devils" and "half-breed," some children with Chinese mothers and Japanese fathers born during the Second Sino-Japanese war long looked to Japan as their true homeland. Learn about this largely unseen group of individuals, just a few of the countless childr ... Show More

22m 45s

Dec 2020

Kelly A. Hammond, "China's Muslims and Japan's Empire: Centering Islam in World War II" (UNC Press, 2020)

The 1930s-40s expansion of the Japanese empire was marked by significant interest among Japan-based scholars and policy-makers in China’s Muslim population and how best to write them into a new pan-Asian story. At the very same time, as Kelly Hammond shows in China's Muslims and ... Show More

59m 34s

Sep 2021

Part One: The Slavery Loving Fascist who Built Modern Japan

Mia Wong is joined by Robert Evans to discuss Nobusuke Kishi. FOOTNOTES: <ol> <li>Machiavelli’s Children Leaders and Their Legacies in Italy and Japan by Richard J. Samuels</li> <li>Chinese Comfort Women Testimonies from Imperial Japan’s Sex Slaves ... Show More

1h 2m

Mar 2026

Maurice Rafael Magaña, "Cartographies of Youth Resistance: Hip-Hop, Punk, and Urban Autonomy in Mexico" (U California Press, 2020)

In Cartographies of Youth Resistance: Hip-Hop, Punk, and Urban Autonomy in Mexico (U California Press, 2020), based on a decade of ethnographic fieldwork, Maurice Magaña considers how urban and migrant youth in Oaxaca embrace subcultures from hip-hop to punk and adopt creative or ... Show More

1h 4m

Oct 2023

Chrissy Yee Lau, "New Women of Empire: Gendered Politics and Racial Uplift in Interwar Japanese America" (U Washington Press, 2022)

This episode, which is co-hosted with Mika Thornburg, features a conversation with Dr. Chrissy Yee Lau, the author of the newly published New Women of Empire: Gendered Politics and Racial Uplift in Interwar Japanese America (U Washington Press, 2022). The book centers the compell ... Show More

56m 21s

Oct 2025

Honor and Loyalty: The Story of Japanese American Soldiers in WWII

On this episode of Our American Stories, they were Americans by birth but treated as outsiders when the war began. After Pearl Harbor, many Japanese Americans were sent to camps under suspicion of aiding the enemy. Yet from those same camps came volunteers who joined the U.S. Arm ... Show More

7m 59s

Aug 2023

Michael R. Jin, "Citizens, Immigrants, and the Stateless: A Japanese American Diaspora in the Pacific" (Stanford UP, 2021)

This episode features a conversation with Dr. Michael R. Jin regarding his recently published book Citizens, Immigrants, and the Stateless: The Japanese American Diaspora in the Pacific. Published in November 2021 by Stanford University Press, the book weaves together Jin’s speci ... Show More

1h 7m

Dec 2021

Alisa Freedman, "Japan on American TV: Screaming Samurai Join Anime Clubs in the Land of the Lost" (Association for Asian Studies, 2021)

Alisa Freedman's book Japan on American TV: Screaming Samurai Join Anime Clubs in the Land of the Lost (Association for Asian Studies, 2021) explores political, economic, and cultural issues underlying depictions of Japan on U.S. television comedies and the programs they inspired ... Show More

56m 54s

Sayaka Chatani, "Nation-Empire: Ideology...