Biography:
Alisa Freedman is an academic expert in popular culture, modern Japanese literature, youth culture, visual media, digital culture, urban studies and gender. Freedman has taught and published widely on Japanese popular culture, modern literature, and urban studies, along with translations of Japanese literature. At the University of Oregon, she is professor of East Asian languages. She is the editor in chief for the U.S.–Japan Women’s Journal, a biannual, peer-reviewed interdisciplinary journal, and has participated in anime conventions, Japan festivals, TEDx, and Nerd Nite Tokyo.
Recent Media:
- VOV5| Talk with US Prof Freedman in Doraemon Anime 20th Anniversary (Voice of Vietnam, April 14, 2025)
- Elevating women scholars around the world (CAS Connection, Jan. 8, 2024)
- From war-torn Japan to the pantries of uni students worldwide: Instant noodles turn 65 (ABC Radio National, Nov. 20, 2023)
- Why Munch’s The Scream isn’t actually screaming (The Telegraph, June 10, 2022)
- Japan on American TV: SNL, Sesame Street, Marie Kondo & More (Japan Station Podcast, Jan. 15, 2022)
- How Cup Noodles became one of the biggest transpacific business success stories of all time (The Conversation, Dec. 8, 2021)
- The Most Popular Snoopy Quote in Japan (Under Understood Podcast, April 6, 2021)
- Back to the future: The world celebrates the 50th anniversary of Doraemon (The Japan Times, Feb. 1, 2020)
- How emoji became a multimillion-dollar business (Nikkei Asian Review, Nov. 27, 2019)
- Talk on emojis gets to the ♡ of the popular culture icons (OregonNews, Oct. 5, 2018)
- How Gudetama, a lazy egg yolk with a butt, became an unstoppable cultural phenomenon (Vox, April 18, 2017)
- Giant fembots dance with dinosaurs in the weirdest show on earth (WIRED, Nov. 15, 2013)