Link to Jennifer M. Yoo’s complete CV

Japanese Studies Specialist.

As a Japanese Studies specialist, Jennifer has a particular interest/experience in Japanese pre-modern history and traditional culture, which she has studied extensively for more than 15 years. She is fluent in Japanese and has accumulatively spent about 5 years living, working, as well as travelling in Japan.

Jennifer M. Yoo received a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) in East Asian Studies (Japanese Focus) degree from Wellesley College (Wellesley, MA) and her Master of Arts (M.A.) in Theatre (Asian Focus), as well as a Doctorate of Philosophy (Ph.D.) in Asian Theatre (Japan Focus) from the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa.

For her doctoral dissertation project “Monstrous Wives, Murderous Lovers, and Dead Wet Girls: Examining the Feminine Vengeful Ghost in Japanese Traditional Theatre and Horror Cinema”, Jennifer was awarded the Crown Prince Akihito Scholarship for 2017-2018, as well as a Center for Japanese Studies Fellowship for 2018-2019, allowing her to conduct her field research at the Ritsumeikan University’s Art Research Center in Kyoto.

Jennifer is also interested in the more hands-on approach to learning about Japan.  She studied fusion-style ikebana (flower arrangement) in New York City and learned basic Urasenke school tea ceremony.  She has also received training in kyōgen (traditional Japanese comedy) and nihon buyo (Japanese classical dance).

Aside from Japanese Studies, Jennifer’s interests also include Asian-American theatre and literature, women’s issues and representation in the media, as well as East Asian cinema.

Teacher. 

With more than 15 years of teaching and presenting experience, Jennifer has taught ages ranging from middle school, high school, through college-level.

Upon graduating from Wellesley College, she went to work in Japan where she co-taught and led English classes to students at a Japanese senior high school as part of the Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) Program for 2 years. In addition to working formally for the JET Program, she has volunteer taught seminars and semester or half-semester-long courses on Japanese history and culture to middle school and high school students at MIT’s Educational Studies Program (ESP) for more than 5 years and at the Voyagers Homeschooling Cooperative Center in Acton, MA, for nearly 3 years.

As part of her graduate studies, Jennifer has worked with members of the Theatre Department faculty at University of Hawai’i at Mānoa to assist/co-teach, guest lecture, as well as take lead as primary instructor in classes related to Asian Theatre. During her tenure as a PhD student, she taught remotely a graduate-level seminar course on her dissertation topic for the 2021 spring semester.

Currently, Jennifer works as a Lecturer of Japanese Culture, Literature, and Film at Tufts University in the Department of International Literary and Cultural Studies.

For a more detailed look at Jennifer’s teaching experience, please refer to her teaching CV.

Aside from teaching formal classes, Jennifer M. Yoo has been giving solo presentations/lectures pertaining to Japanese history and culture at anime conventions and Japanese cultural conferences in the New England area since 2006. She has been presenting papers/research at academic conferences since 2011.

For a more detailed look at Jennifer’s presenting experience, please refer to her presenting CV. For detailed descriptions of the panel presentations Jennifer offers, please refer to her panel list.

Writer and Playwright. 

Jennifer M. Yoo regularly writes papers concerning various subjects regarding areas of personal academic interest. She was awarded Second Prize in the Edward Seidensticker Award for Best Graduate Student Paper on Japan at the SPAS Graduate Student Conference in Asian Studies at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa (2015), and successfully defended her doctoral dissertation in 2022, for which she was awarded the James R. Brandon Award for Excellence in Asian Theatre.

Jennifer’s historical and cultural knowledge of Asian theatre also fuels her playwriting. Her first play, Fire Horse, was accepted and produced by the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa’s student-driven Late Night Theatre series 2015/2016 and was selected as a regional finalist for Kennedy Center’s American College Theater Festival 49.

For a more detailed look at Jennifer’s writing history, please refer to her writing CV.

For more detailed descriptions of written plays and for script requests, please visit Jennifer’s profile on the New Play Exchange.