SAALER SVEN

I am a historian of modern Japan teaching at Sophia University in Tokyo. As an academic, my main interests are the foreign relations of modern Japan and Japan’s place in the world with a particular focus on East Asian regionalism. Please refer to my website for details: http://www.japanesehistory.de/

Closely related to these historical issues, I have also explored the legacies of Japan’s history in the twentieth century. Addressing how history is discussed in contemporary society, I have written extensively on monuments, museums and memorials and how they portray the history of colonialism and war. In total, I have written and edited more than twenty books, almost a hundred articles, several encyclopedia entries and many columns and commentaries on topical issues. I have written articles in German, English and Japanese, and some of my publications have been translated into French, Korean, Chinese and Turkish. My academic work also includes half a dozen of exhibitions on historical topics.

I also have been serving on a number of editorial and advisory boards. Currently, I am a member of the board of the National Institutes of the Humanities (NIHU) of Japan, a member of the editorial board of the German East Asiatic Society of Japan (OAG), and a member of the editorial board of Japan Focus/The Asia-Pacific Journal.

I have appeared in and written for a variety of media outlets, including CNN, NHK (Japan), Deutsche Welle TV (Germany), ARD (German TV and radio), ZDF (German TV), BBC, the news agencies AP (US), Reuters (UK), dpa (Germany) and Kyodo (Japan) as well as the newspapers Asahi Shinbun, Süddeutsche Zeitung, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ), Die Welt, Japan Times, Handelsblatt, taz and a number of Japanese regional newspapers. I also have written columns for Asahi, Kyodo, IPG, nippon.com, the online journal “Article 9.” Podcasts I have participated in can be found here.