Professor Jennifer Coates
School of Languages, Arts and Societies
Professor of Japanese Studies
Full contact details
School of Languages, Arts and Societies
4.21
Jessop West
1 Upper Hanover Street
Sheffield
S3 7RA
- Profile
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I am Professor of Japanese Studies at the School of Languages, Arts, and Societies, University of Sheffield. I teach and research Japanese cinema, arts, and culture from an interdisciplinary perspective. My first book, Making Icons: Repetition and the Female Image in Japanese Cinema, 1945-1964 (2016) offered a close reading of popular film texts derived from Art History methods, while my second book Film Viewing in Postwar Japan, 1945-1968: An Ethnographic Study (2022) is the first ethno-history of cinema-going in Japan. I have co-edited volumes on Engaging with War Memory: Legacies of East Asian Conflicts, 1930-1945 (Palgrave, 2023, with Buchheim, E.), Japanese Visual Media: Politicizing the Screen (Routledge, 2021 with Ben-Ari, E.) and The Routledge Companion to Gender and Japanese Culture (Routledge, 2019 with Fraser, L., and Pendleton, M.) and I am currently completing a project on cultural arbitrage in the transmission of Japanese arts and cultures while serving as the President of the British Association of Japanese Studies and Honorary Secretary of the UK Council for Area Studies Associations.
I have been an AHRC Innovation Scholar (2023-2024) and recipient of the 2021 Philip Leverhulme Prize for Visual and Performing Arts. Before joining Sheffield, I studied, researched, and taught in many areas of the world: as an AHRC Kluge Fellow at the Library of Congress, Washington D.C. (2012), a Visiting Research Fellow at the Australian National University (2011), Assistant Professor at the Hakubi Center for Advanced Research, Kyoto University (2014-2018), and Senior Lecturer in Japanese Arts, Cultures, and Heritage at the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures at the University of East Anglia (2018-2019).
- Qualifications
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PhD in Film and Media, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London (2014)
MA (Distinction) in History of Art, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London (2008)
MA (First Class) Joint Honours English Literature and History of Art, University of Glasgow (2007)
- Research interests
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My current research project is titled Persona, Pseudonym, Symbol: ‘Japan’ Outside Japan and offers the first interdisciplinary and multi-sited assessment of the contemporary role of an imagined ‘Japan’ in everyday life in the UK. While art history has charted the influence of Japonisme on Anglo-European arts at the turn of the 20th century, and studies of science and technology often invoke Japan as an outsize influence on a global (real or imagined) future, we lack a comprehensive understanding of the impact of ‘Japan’-identified people and products on our contemporary era. Setting workplace ethnography conducted in key cultural production spaces against a historical account of the UK’s engagement with Japan through specific areas of arts and culture, this project focuses on the people who transmit an idea of ‘Japan’ outside Japan itself, and the impact of this imagined ‘Japan’ on our daily lives in the UK. The project will result in a book and a series of articles. My projects in development include a comparative study of how film and media can help people imagine new ways of living suitable for a degrowth future in the UK and Japan. I have supervised PhDs and postdoctoral projects on concepts of home in East Asian cinema, gender in news reporting, and politics in contemporary Japan.
- Publications
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Books
- Film viewing in postwar Japan, 1945-1968: an ethnographic study. Edinburgh University Press. View this article in WRRO
- Making icons : repetition and the female image in Japanese cinema, 1945–1964. Hong Kong University Press. View this article in WRRO
Edited books
- War Memory and East Asian Conflicts, 1930–1945. Palgrave Macmillan. View this article in WRRO
- Japanese visual media : politicizing the screen. Abingdon: Routledge. View this article in WRRO
Journal articles
- City of Many Worlds. Film Quarterly, 79(3), 19-31.
- Care, Ethics, and Omoiyari: Doing Ethnography in Japan. Japan Review, 40, 195-212.
- Hamaguchi Ryūsuke's
Evil Does Not Exist
as Degrowth Parable. positions.
- Introduction: Performance, Projection, Provocation! Relational
Creativity in Contemporary Japan. Asia-Pacific Journal, 23.
- Ageing, personhood and care in Chie Hayakawa’s Plan 75 (2022). Screen, 65(3), 352-372. View this article in WRRO
- Book Review: Suzuki Seijun and Postwar Japanese Cinema by William Carroll. Japan Review, 38, 246-248. View this article in WRRO
- Voices from an unusual archive: university film circle writings, 1945-1960. Asia-Pacific Journal : Japan Focus, 21(6), 5777. View this article in WRRO
- Tsuchi: Earthy materials in contemporary Japanese art. The Journal of Asian Studies, 489-491. View this article in WRRO
- Maiko masquerade: crafting geisha girlhood in Japan. Journal of Gender Studies.
- Powers of the real: Cinema, gender, and emotion in interwar Japan by Diane Wei Lewis. Technology and Culture, 63(3), 910-911. View this article in WRRO
- Back to the future: imaginaries of Africa on East Asian Screens. Open Screens, 4(1). View this article in WRRO
- Quietly Critical: Ten Years Japan. Frames Cinema Journal, 15. View this article in WRRO
- Blurred boundaries : ethnofiction and its impact on postwar Japanese cinema. Arts, 8(1). View this article in WRRO
- Journeys from the east: the popular geopolitics of film motivated Chinese tourism. International Journal of Tourism Anthropology, 6(3), 219-236. View this article in WRRO
- Setsuko Hara vs. the press: the post-war trolling of a wartime icon. Frames Cinema Journal, 13. View this article in WRRO
- Circular thinking: the Yamanote line on film. Japan Forum, 30(2), 224-239. View this article in WRRO
- Mediating memory: Shōjo and war memory in classical narrative Japanese cinema. Cultural Studies, 32(1), 105-125. View this article in WRRO
- Socializing the audience: Going to the cinema in post-war Japan. Participations, 14(2), 590-607. View this article in WRRO
- The fragmented family on film: Kinoshita Keisuke's Nihon no Higeki (The Tragedy of Japan) (1953) and the antecedents of the contemporary fragmented family in Japan. Intersections: Gender and Sexuality in Asia and the Pacific, 40. View this article in WRRO
- Gambling with the nation : heroines of the Japanese yakuza film, 1955–1975. Japanese Studies, 37(3), 353-369. View this article in WRRO
- How to Be a Domestic Goddess: Female Film Stars and the Housewife Role in Postwar Japan. U.S.-Japan Women's Journal, 50(1), 29-53.
- The Shape-Shifting Diva: Yamaguchi Yoshiko and the National Body. Journal of Japanese and Korean Cinema, 6(1), 23-38.
- Victims and bystanders: Women in the Japanese war-retro film. Media, War & Conflict, 6(3), 233-248.
- Rethinking the young female cinema audience: Postwar cinema-going in Kansai, 1945-1952. U.S.-Japan Women's Journal, 54, 6-28. View this article in WRRO
- Introduction: Representing youth and gender in Japanese popular culture. U.S.-Japan Women's Journal, 54, 3-5. View this article in WRRO
Book chapters
- Japanese Audiences, and Japanese Audience Studies, Handbook of Japanese Media and Popular Culture in Transition (pp. 217-230). Routledge
- Kinoshita's Children: Memories of Kinoshita's Films among Audiences of the Postwar Era, Cinema of Kinoshita Keisuke Films of Joy and Sorrow (pp. 277-293).
- The pan-Asian 'Miss Granny' phenomenon In Diffrient DS & Chan K (Ed.), East Asian Film Remakes (pp. 272-290). Edinburgh University Press View this article in WRRO
- A sense of a memory: prosthetic war memories among the Japanese cinema audience In Buchheim E & Coates J (Ed.), War Memory and East Asian Conflicts, 1930–1945 (pp. 213-236). Palgrave Macmillan View this article in WRRO
- Introduction: engaging with war memory and the legacies of East Asian conflicts, 1930-1945 In Buchheim E & Coates J (Ed.), War Memory and East Asian Conflicts, 1930–1945 (pp. 1-14). Palgrave Macmillan View this article in WRRO
- Re-Presenting Sino-Japanese Relations through Flavors of Youth, TRANSNATIONAL EAST ASIAN STUDIES (pp. 169-183).
- Female Stardom and National Identity in Postwar Japan (pp. 316-333). Wiley
- Japanese Visual Media Politicizing the Screen Introduction, JAPANESE VISUAL MEDIA (pp. 1-12).
- Representing Japan: Stereotyping and self-stereotyping in the many careers of Yamaguchi Yoshiko, Capture Japan Visual Culture and the Global Imagination from 1952 to the Present (pp. 224-244).
- Audiences as cultural intermediaries: a case study from Kyoto, Japan In Ben Ari E & Wong H-W (Ed.), Cultural Intermediaries in East Asian Film Industries (pp. 52-71). London: Routledge. View this article in WRRO
- Audiences as cultural intermediaries, Cultural Intermediaries in East Asian Film Industries (pp. 52-71). Routledge
- Politicizing the audience? Film fans’ experiences of cinema in the 1960s In Coates J & Ben-Ari E (Ed.), Japanese Visual Media: Politicizing the Screen (pp. 180-200). Abingdon: Routledge (Taylor & Francis). View this article in WRRO
- Cultural memories of occupation in the Japanese cinema theatre, 1945-52 In Taylor JE (Ed.), Visual Histories of Occupation : A Transcultural Dialogue (pp. 75-96). London: Bloomsbury Academic. View this article in WRRO
- Creativity at the margins in the ‘Golden Age’ of Japanese cinema (1945–1965) In Otmazgin N & Ben-Ari E (Ed.), Creative Context : Creativity and Innovation in the Media and Cultural Industries (pp. 101-117). Springer View this article in WRRO
- The Yakuza film : a genre 'endorsed by the people' In Phillips A & Fujiki H (Ed.), The Japanese Cinema Book (pp. 348-360). Bloomsbury / British Film Institute View this article in WRRO
- Bodies in the dark : the postwar cinema audience and the body as ‘Ground Zero’ In Holca I & Sǎpunaru Tămaș C (Ed.), Forms of the Body in Contemporary Japanese Society, Literature, and Culture (pp. 237-257). Lexington Books View this article in WRRO
- Gender and culture in Japan today INTRODUCTION, ROUTLEDGE COMPANION TO GENDER AND JAPANESE CULTURE (pp. 1-7).
- Introduction : Gender and culture in Japan today In Coates J, Fraser L & Pendleton M (Ed.), The Routledge Companion to Gender and Japanese Culture (pp. 1-7). Routledge View this article in WRRO
- Gender in digital technologies and cultures In Coates J, Fraser L & Pendleton M (Ed.), The Routledge Companion to Gender and Japanese Culture (pp. 240-250). Routledge View this article in WRRO
- The making of an auteur : the early films (1958-1959) In Coleman L & Desser D (Ed.), Killers, Clients and Kindred Spirits : The Taboo Cinema of Shohei Imamura (pp. 21-40). Edinburgh University Press View this article in WRRO
- Alternative viewership practices in Kyoto, Japan In Magnan-Park AHJ, Marchetti G & Tan SK (Ed.), The Palgrave Handbook of Asian Cinema (pp. 221-241). Palgrave Macmillan, London View this article in WRRO
- Alternative Viewership Practices in Kyoto, Japan, Palgrave Handbook of Asian Cinema (pp. 221-241).
- 時を超えて出会いは再び訪れる:李香蘭／山口淑子／シャーリー・ヤマ グチ In Wada I & Katsura K (Ed.), 他者との邂逅は何をもたらすのか: 「異文化接触」を再考する (pp. 18-48). Showado
- Pleasures of Recognition and Mediation in the Spectacle of the Nation In Drummond P (Ed.), The London Film and Media Reader 3: The Pleasures of the Spectacle The London Symposium
- The Routledge Companion to Gender and Japanese Culture In Coates J, Fraser L & Pendleton M (Ed.) Routledge
Book reviews
- Promiscuous Media: Film and Visual Culture in Imperial Japan, 1926–1945 by Hikari Hori. The Journal of Japanese Studies, 45(2), 415-419. View this article in WRRO
- Modern Girls on the Go: Gender, Mobility and Labor in Japan. The Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology, 15(1), 94-96.
- Scripted Affects, Branded Selves: Television, Subjectivity and Capitalism in 1990s Japan. The Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology, 13(3), 299-301.
- Noriko J. Horiguchi, Women Adrift: The Literature of Japan's Imperial Body (Review). Intersections: Gender and Sexuality in Asia and the Pacific, 30.
- Film viewing in postwar Japan, 1945-1968: an ethnographic study. Edinburgh University Press. View this article in WRRO
- Research group
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Yuxin Zhang, “Family and National Identity in East Asian Biographical Films: The Political and Cultural Tension between ‘Returning Home’ and ‘Abandoning Home’” (1st supervisor) Zhangbo Liu, “An Analysis of the Reporting on Chinese Female Victims of Violent Crimes in British Newspapers, 2011-2021” (1st supervisor) Luca Dorothy Pihaj, “Identity in Japan’s International Relations: Negotiating the ‘Self’” (2nd supervisor) Junxi Yao, “Understanding Japan’s Sharing Economy – National System of Innovation and Institutional Work Perspectives” (2nd supervisor)
- Teaching interests
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At the University of Sheffield I have led undergraduate modules on “East Asian Cinema: People, Platforms, Places,” “Japanese Popular Culture,” “Researching Japan: Stardom and Celebrity,” “Japan Research Project,” and “Contemporary Japanese Society,” and have co-taught on “Mass Culture and Digital Society,” and “Gender and Identities in East Asia.” I supervise MA and MSc students, PhD students, and undergraduate dissertation projects.
At Kyoto University (2014-2018) I taught undergraduate modules on “Postwar Japanese Cinema,” “Gender in Japan,” and “Interpreting the Humanities Through Gender Relations” (in Japanese).
- Teaching activities
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LAS225 Contemporary Japanese Society
LAS258 East Asian Cinema
- Professional activities and memberships
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President of the British Association of Japanese Studies (2025-2028)
Honorary Secretary of the UK Council for Area Studies Associations (2026-2029)
Stream convenor, European Association of Japanese StudiesAwards and Fellowships:
Philip Leverhulme Prize PLP-2021-030
AHRC Innovation Scholars Secondment in Design AH/X004961/1
AHRC Research Networking Scheme award AH/V00090X/1
Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Wakate B Award
Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Science, Sport, and Technology (MEXT)
Postgraduate Research Fellowship
Kluge Research Fellowship, Library of Congress, Washington D.C.Editorships and Board memberships:
Co-Editor of the Routledge Series in East Asian Cinema in a Global Context
International board member of Japan ReviewPublic Engagement (selected):
Panellist and discussant for film screenings and festivals at the Barbican Arts Center, The British Film Institute, The British Museum, The Garden Cinema London, Sheffield Showroom Cinema, the Phoenix Cinema Leicester, and Japan Foundation Touring Film Programme.
Essayist and on-disc interviewee for film rereleases by BFI, Radiance Films, and Eureka distributors and festival programmes.