Alumni Spotlight – Drew Wallin
This interview features Drew Wallin, BA ’11. Mr. Wallin is currently a Program Manager at Google.
Alumni Spotlight – James Mutter
This interview features James Mutter, BA ’05 in Japanese Language and International Relations. Mr. Mutter is currently Vice-Consul at the Consulate General of Canada in Hong Kong.
Alumni Spotlight – Alison Winters
This interview features Alison Winters, BA ’89 in China, Chinese Poetry in the Tang Dynasty (618-907 A.D.). Since then, she has started her own consulting company specializing in Event Management, Marketing, and Canada China business and relations.
Alumni Spotlight – Nick Angiers, BA '08
This interview features Nick Angiers, BA ’08 in Chinese language. He is currently an advisor at a private high school, for students from China and Taiwan.
Alumni Spotlight – Jimmy Mitchell, MA '95
This interview features Jimmy Mitchell, MA ’95. His MA is in Modern Chinese History with a thesis on the end of WWII in China. He is currently Vice President at Business Development at AdvantageBC.
Alumni Spotlight – Nick Stember, MA '16
The Alumni Spotlight is an interview series where we interview Asia Studies alumni about their career paths, how they became interested in Asian Studies and for any advice that would be useful to our students. This interview features Nick Stember, MA ’16, who works as a freelance Chinese to English translator in Vancouver, BC.
Alumni Spotlight – Taylor Sadler, BA '15
Taylor Sadler, BA ‘15, worked as a Cultural Ambassador for the Labo International Exchange Foundation in Japan after graduating. Her job involved going to different community groups and giving children a chance to interact with a foreigner, learn about a foreign culture, and practice their English.
Clayton Ashton
Ph.D. Student – Early Chinese history
I study the political and intellectual history of early China. My dissertation is focused on the period of about 300 BCE. This was a period of history when people were beginning to ask some fascinating and original questions about some big topics that we’re still struggling with today: how to organize a state, how to balance individual desires with collective needs, and what it means to be ethical during a period of upheaval.
Ben Whaley
Ph.D. Student – Modern Japanese literature, Graduated 2016
I research Japanese video games (Bleep Bloop!) and write about the ways in which they engage with social issues and national trauma. For my purposes, this means analyzing console games that address issues of natural disasters, a declining birthrate and aging population, and traumatic war memory in Japan.
Douglas Ober
Ph.D. Student – Modern Indian buddhism
My dissertation rests at the intersection of South Asian history and Buddhist studies. Put simply, the conventional view in academia (and beyond) is that sometime between the 12th – 15th century, Buddhism “died” or “disappeared” from India before being “reborn” in 1956 when the Indian constitutionalist, Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, converted to Buddhism along with half a million of his Dalit (“Untouchable”) followers.