Dr Nozomi Uematsu
BA, MA, PGCert, DPhil
School of East Asian Studies
Lecturer in Japanese Studies
Full contact details
School of East Asian Studies
Jessop West
1 Upper Hanover Street
Sheffield
S3 7RA
- Profile
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I am a comparative literary scholar both in Japanese and English literature, with a strength in critical theory on gender and sexuality.
Prior to joining Sheffield as a Lecturer in September 2019, I was a Teaching Fellow in Japanese at Durham University.
I also taught at Queen Mary University of London, Cambridge, Sussex and Akita International University (Japan). In 2016, I taught Japanese literature in SEAS, and I am very happy to come back.
- Qualifications
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- BA (International Christian University:Tokyo)
- MA (Hitotsubashi:Tokyo), PGCert (QMUL)
- DPhil (Sussex) and Fellow of Higher Education Academy
I obtained the Postgraduate Certificate in Academic Practice (PGCAP) with distinction at Queen Mary University of London in 2018, and I am a Fellow of the HEA.
- Research interests
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I am working on my monograph titled Monstrous Happiness: Neoliberalism, Women’s Lives and Women’s Writing in Japan and the UK, which developed from my PhD thesis.
I argue that neoliberalism created a particular culture we live now and this contemporary culture is the “harvest” of the 1980s.
Looking at social discourse and literary texts in Japan and the UK in the 80s, I examine the ways in which women writers respond to and explore the ideas of women’s liberty, happiness and its contradictions.
I examine literary texts such as works by Banana Yoshimoto, Foumiko Kometani, Jeanette Winterson and Doris Lessing.
I am currently interested in, as well as writing on, the concept of female masochism, especially its psychic and narrative construction from social discourse, in literary and visual texts.
This new project aims to provide a genealogy of female masochism, and how it differentiates from, as well as inherits, the idea of shame in Japanese culture.
Research Interests
- Affect, Happiness and Neoliberalism
- Comparative Literature
- Contemporary Women's Writing in Japanese and English
- Health, Well-being and Medical Discourses on Women’s Bodies
- Intersections of Gender and Sexuality
- Masochism
- Literary Cognitive Theory
- Publications
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Journal articles
- Dis-oriented desires and Angela Carter’s intersectionality: nationalism, masochism, and the search for “the other’s otherness”. Contemporary Women's Writing, 16(2), 171-189. View this article in WRRO
- Could women ever “Shine”? Happiness and its shadow in right-wing discourse since 2011 and Banana Yoshimoto’s Kitchen. Correspondence: Hitotsubashi Journal of Arts and Literature, 2, 37-64.
- Grotesque Maternity: Reading “Happiness” and its Eugenics in Doris Lessing’s The Fifth Child (1988). Gender and Sexuality(9), 5-30.
- グロテスク・マタニティ―ドリス・レッシング『破壊者ベンの誕生』の「幸福」と優生思想(9), 5-29.
Chapters
- Chapter 9 Writing Women’s Happiness in the 1980s: Labor and Care in Kometani Foumiko, Hayashi Mariko and Yoshimoto Banana, Handbook of Modern and Contemporary Japanese Women Writers (pp. 129-146). Amsterdam University Press
- Writing Women’s Happiness in the 1980s: Labor and Care in Kometani Foumiko, Hayashi Mariko and Yoshimoto Banana In Copeland R (Ed.), Handbook of Modern and Contemporary Japanese Women Writers (pp. 129-146). Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.
- Writing Women’s Happiness in the 1980s: Labor and Care in Kometani Foumiko, Hayashi Mariko and Yoshimoto Banana (pp. 129-146). Amsterdam University Press
- Envisioning Solidarity: Disrupting Linear Temporality in Studio Ghibli’s Howls Moving Castle and When Marnie Was There In Deszcz-Tryhubczak J & Jaques Z (Ed.), Intergenerational Solidarity in Children’s Literature and Film (pp. 70-84). University Press of Mississippi
- Envisioning Solidarity, Intergenerational Solidarity in Children's Literature and Film (pp. 70-84). University Press of Mississippi
- The 1980s and Jeanette Winterson’s “Happiness” In Kono S, Matsunaga N, Shin K & Aso E (Ed.), Feminism Unfinished: Language, Desire and “Working” Women (pp. 264-266). Tokyo: Kenkyusha.
- Dis-oriented desires and Angela Carter’s intersectionality: nationalism, masochism, and the search for “the other’s otherness”. Contemporary Women's Writing, 16(2), 171-189. View this article in WRRO
- Teaching interests
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In my classroom for literature, I aim to create a feminist pedagogical space, where everyone’s voices are valued, and this means building a safe space that students feel comfortable to talk in and reflect on their everyday lives through literature, situating their experiences of reading into the wider contexts of society and globalisation.
- Teaching activities
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This year, I will be teaching:
- EAS1031 Understanding Japan 1 (Autumn)
- EAS21003 Experiencing Japan through Literary Texts
I am a qualified and experienced HE teacher in literature in English and Japanese, critical theory, especially gender and sexuality.