Rebecca Suter

BA, Ph.D. Università degli Studi di Napoli “l’Orientale.”
Lecturer
Room 547, Brennan-MacCallum Building A18

+61 2 9351 6766

Rebecca Suter’s main research interest is in modern Japanese literature and comparative literature. Her first book, The Japanization of Modernity, focuses on contemporary Japanese writer Murakami Haruki, particularly on his role as a cultural mediator between Japan and the United States, as well as on his use of meta-fictional techniques. She is currently working on issues of translation and cross-cultural representation between Asia and the West, concentrating on the phenomenon of the “Japanization” of Western culture and the way it challenges current views of colonialism, postcolonialism and globalization. Before coming to Sydney, she has taught Japanese modern literature at Harvard University and at Brown University. She also works as a translator of manga, and has translated works by Shinohara Chie, Anno Moyoko, Miuchi Suzue, Asano Inio, Kitoh Mohiro, Katayama Kyoichi, and Unita Yumi, among others.

Research areas

• modern and contemporary Japanese literature
• Japanese popular culture, manga and anime
• cross-cultural representations
• literary theory
• East-West studies
• cultural studies
• postcolonial studies
• translation studies

Current projects

My main research interest is in the field of cross-cultural representations between Japan and the West, with a particular focus on the Japanisation of Western culture and the challenges it poses to current views of colonialism, postcolonialism and globalisation. I am particularly interested in exploring the way in which Japan’s relationship with Western culture questions some fundamental assumptions of postcolonial theory, primarily the binary distinctions that are still drawn between colonisers and colonised, East and West, modern and non-modern.

I am currently working on two research projects. The first aims to look at representations and cultural transits between Japan, the West and China. Drawing upon Iwabuchi Koichi and Befu Harumi’s theories on Japan and globalisation, I am looking at Japan’s domestication/Asianisation of Western popular culture and its subsequent re-export to Asian countries.

My second research project analyses one particular case of cross-cultural adaptation of Western modes of thought in Japan: the interpretations and misinterpretations of Christian images in modern and contemporary Japanese literature and popular culture. My goal is to analyse works that subvert Christian narratives, presenting them from an estranged perspective that is at times highly destabilising. In particular, I am interested in the focus on the magic and gothic elements of Christianity and in the interest on the intrinsic ambiguity of the figure of Lucifer, which recurs in modern Japanese fiction, from works of “pure literature” writers such as Akutagawa Ryûnosuke and Endô Shûsaku all the way to anime and manga authors, both in traditional shojo manga like those of Miuchi Suzue and Yuki Kaori and in fantastic/science fictional works such as those of Ishikawa Ken and Tanemura Arina.

On the side, in the past two years I have been involved in an ongoing international workshop focusing on an emerging current of Asian/American culture, incarnated by Asian intellectuals who live in the United States and simultaneously capitalise on their “Asianness,” exploiting their double cultural positioning in order to challenge inclusive notions of American culture from a trans-Pacific perspective, while at the same time attempting to de-centre Asian cultural essentialisms, challenging the idea of Asia as a site of tradition and national purity.

Selected publications

Books

Book chapters

• “From Jusuheru to Jannu: Girl Knights and Christian Witches in the works of Miuchi Suzue.” Mechademia 4, Minnesota University Press, 2009.
• “Immagini Anglo-Americane del Giappone.” Valerio Alberizzi and Marco Montanari, eds. Ricercando in Giappone. Rome, Domograf, 2008.
• “Kawaii/Kowai: the Reception of Manga in the United States.” Donatella Izzo, Giorgio Mariani, Paola Zaccaria. American Solitudes: Individual, National, Transnational. Rome, Carocci Editore, 2007.
• "Chainizu bokkusu/ireko: modernism and postmodernism in 'Tairando' and 'Airon no aru fûkei' by Murakami Haruki", in Donatella Izzo, ed. 'Contact Zones': Rewriting Genre Across the East-West Border, Naples, Liguori, July 2003.

Articles

• “Adrian Tomine tra Geek Chic e Gekiga.” ACOMA 38, Fall 2009.
• "From Genbun-icchi to JSL (and beyond?): phonocentrism and heterolinguism in Japanese language teaching", Aldo Tollini (ed.), The Third Conference on Japanese Language and Language Teaching. Proceedings of the Conference, Rome, 2005.
• "Rewritings Between East and West: Shiga Naoya's 'Kurodiasu no nikki'", Orientalistica, A.I.O.N., 63/1, 2003.
• "'Sorry, I don't Speak Japanese'. Interculturality in Kazuo Ishiguro's Novels", Anglistica, A.I.O.N. (Annali Istituto Orientale Napoli), 1999, 3/1.
• "'We're like Butlers': Interculturality, Memory and Responsibility in Kazuo Ishiguro's The Remains of the Day", Q/W/E/R/T/Y, Arts, Littératures et Civilizations du Monde Anglophone, P.U.P. (Publications de l'Université de Pau), October 1999.

Translations

• Saiyuki - Journey to the West, Japanese adaptation by Matsueda Shigeo (1985) from the Chinese original Xiyouji by Wu Cheng'en, Bologna, Kappa Edizioni, April 2005.

Translation of manga

• Akaishi Michiyo, Alpen Rose
• Anno Moyoco, Happy Mania
  —, In The Clothes Named Fat
• Asano Inio, Subarashii Sekai – What a Wonderful World
  —, Hikari no machi – City of Light
• Atsushi Kaneko, Bambi
• Igarashi Yumiko, Mayme Angel
• Kaneyoshi Izumi, Sonnanjaneeyo
• Katayama Kyoichi, Kazui Kazumi, Sekai no chûshin kara ai o sakebu
• Kazune Kawahara, Kôkô debyü
• Kitô Mohiro, Bokurano
• Matsunaga Toyokazu, Ryuguden – Castle of the Dragon
• Mimori Ao, B.O.D.Y.
• Miuchi Suzue, Miuchi Suzue Kessakushû – Best Works
• Onozuka Kaori, Crazy Smile
• Q-ta Minami, Cool Pine
• Shinohara Chie, Sora wa akai kawa no hotori – Anatolia Story
  —, Mizu ni sumu hana – Romance of Darkness
• Shoji Yoko, G.I.D. – Gender Identity Disorder
• Unita Yumi, Sukimasuki

Areas of teaching and research supervision

Teaching

• JPNS2621, JPNS 2622 (Japanese 5 and 6)
• JPNS3676 Monsters and Ghosts: Japanese fantasy and Science Fiction (semester 1, 2009, 2010)
• ASNS6905 Asian Popular Culture (Semester 1, 2009)
• ASNS6901 Japan in the Western Imagination (Semester 2, 2009)
• ASNS2677 Beyond the Geisha/Samurai Binary (Semester 2, 2010)
• ASNS6907 Sex in Japanese film and literature (Semester 2, 2011)
• GCST6904 Asian Diasporic Cultural Studies (Semester 2, 2010)

Supervision

• Japanese literature
• Japanese popular culture
• Cross-cultural representations
• Comparative Literature
• Literary theory
• Asian Cultural Studies
• Postcolonial Studies
• Translation Studies

Conference activity

• “Cosmopolitanism and anxiety of influence in Akutagawa Ryûnosuke’s Kirishitan mono.” Otago Conference on Japanese Modernism, Otago University, New Zealand, August 14-16, 2009.
• “Cross-dressing as soft power in shôjo manga.” The Japanese Studies Association of Australia Biennial Conference, Sydney, July 13-16, 2009.
  “Creative Misreadings of Christianity in Michiyo Akaishi’s Amakusa 1637.” The 18th New Zealand Asian Studies Society International Conference, Victoria University of Wellington, 6-8 July, 2009.
• “Human and superhuman in contemporary Japanese girls’ culture.” The Human and Humanities in Literature, Language and Culture, AULLA (Australasian Universities Language and Literature Association), The University of Sydney, 4-6 February 2009.
• “Gender and Technoculture in Japanese ‘Irregular Detective Fiction.’” Glocalising Sex and Gender: Consumption, Culture, Practice, Sydney University, GCS Department, February 26-27, 2009.
• “Science fiction as subversive hypothesis: henkaku tantei shôsetsu between entertainment and Enlightenment.” Shinseinen: from Entertainment to Enlightenment International Workshop, University of Sydney, December 3-4, 2008.
• “It’s a kind of magic: creative misreadings of Western religion in Akutagawa Ryûnosuke's Kirishitan mono.” AASRN International workshop with professor David Eng, Melbourne, December 11-12, 2008.
• “Lost in translation? Murakami Haruki and the Japanisation of the English language.” Murakami Haruki Symposium, University of California at Berkeley, Centre for Japanese Studies, October 12, 2008.
• “Modanizumu and Science Fiction: Naoki Sanjûgo’s henkaku tantei shôsetsu.” Asian Studies Association of Australia, Melbourne, July 1-3, 2008.
• “Murakami Haruki and the Japanisation of Modernity”, Italian School of East Asian Studies (ISEAS) and Ecole Francaise d’Extrem Orient (EFEO) Kyoto Lectures, Kyoto, March 27th, 2008.
• “Murakami Haruki as paramodernist”, Avant-pop Revolutions Panel, Nippon 2007 SF Worldcon, Yokohama, August 31-September 3, 2007.
• “From Jusuheru to Jannu: creative misreadings of Christianity in the manga of Miuchi Suzue”. PCA/ACA Annual Conference, Boston, April 6-8, 2007.
• "Lost in Translation? Murakami Haruki and the Japanisation of the English Language." Wellesley College, October 25, 2006.
• "Murakami Haruki and the Power of Imagination", Japan Forum Lectures, Reischauer Institute for Japanese Studies, Harvard University, December 9, 2005.
• "Kawaii/Kowai: the reception of Manga in the United States", The Asian/American Workshop, Italian Association for North American Studies (AISNA) Biennial Conference, Bari, October 6-8, 2005.
• "From Genbun-icchi to JSL: phonocentrism and heterolinguism in Japanese language teaching", XIII Conference on Japanese Linguistics and Language Teaching (JLLT) at the Japanese Institute of Culture (Nihon Bunka Kaikan) Roma, March 17-19, 2005.

Other professional contributions

• Invited contributor of a monthly column on foreign fiction for the journal Hayakawa Mystery magazine
• Co-organiser of the Shinseinen from Entertainment to Enlightenment workshop to be held at Sydney university in December 2008