Akiko Takeyama

Social and Behavioral Sciences

Associate Professor

Women, Gender & Sexuality Studies, Anthropology

takeyama@ku.edu

Primary office:

785.864.2645

Fraser Hall, 611

University of Kansas

1415 Jayhawk Boulevard

Lawrence, KS 66045-7590

Second office:

Bio
Academics
Publications
Presentations
Contracts/Grants
Awards/Honors

Akiko Takeyama is an associate professor of Anthropology and Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at the University of Kansas. Her research and teaching interests lie in changing gender, sexuality, and class dynamics in the context of neoliberal globalization. Her first book, Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club (2016 Stanford University Press), theorizes the commercialization of feelings, emotions, and intimate relationships among socially marginalized population —the youth and the female— in contemporary Japan's service-centered economy. Her book was shortlisted for 2017 Michelle Rosaldo Book Prize, Association of Feminist Anthropology in American Anthropological Association.

Her second book project, entitled "Japan's Adult Video Industry: Gender, Technology, and Labor in the Age of Internet and the Content Business," explores the interrelation among politico-legal systems, information technology, and the global economy. Specifically, she intends to bring human affect —hope, fear, and a sense of vulnerability— to the center of an analysis of 21st century capitalism, complicating such legal categories as human rights and individual consent especially when sexual and economic exploitation are carried out in the name of individual freedom of choice. Her research will shed light on the complex set of social, economic, and legal contexts wherein consent and coercion, pleasure and danger, and hopes and disparity coexist intimately.

Teaching

Her teaching explores human experience through which cultural meanings are created and negotiated in everyday lives. She also often uses gender, among other factors, as an analytical lens to critically analyze social structure and lived experiences in various socio-historical contexts, (post)colonial geopolitics, and global capitalism.

Teaching Interests

Gender
Sexuality
Class
Subjectivity
The body and affect
Labor and commodity
Popular Culture
Neoliberal globalization
Trafficking in persons
Human rights
Feminist epistemology
Critical theory
Japan
East Asia

Research

Her research interests, as well as teaching interests, lie in changing gender, sexuality, and class dynamics in the context of neoliberal globalization. She employs interdisciplinary informed theories and methods in her research.

Research Interests

Gender
Sexuality
Class
Subjectivity
The body and affect
Labor and commodity
Popular Culture
Neoliberal globalization
Trafficking in persons
Human rights
Feminist epistemology
Critical theory
Japan
East Asia

Service

She values service for the university, the community, and the profession as important part of her career and personal development.

Selected Publications

Takeyama, Akiko. 2020. “Possessive Individualism in the Age of Postfeminism and Neoliberalism: Self-Ownership, Consent, and Contractual Abuses in Japan’s Adult Video Industry .” Book Chapters. In Advanced Undergraduate Theory Reader in Women’s/Gender/Feminist/LGBTQ+/Sexuality Studies, Edited by L. Ayu Saraswati and Barbara L. Shaw, (Forthcoming) . Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Takeyama, Akiko. 2019. “Opening the Box: An International Asian Woman Scholar’s Fight.” Book Chapters. In Fight the Tower, Eds. Kieu Linh Caroline Valverde and Wei Ming Dariotis , 234–54. New Jersey: Rutgers University Press.

Takeyama, Akiko. 2016. Staged Seduction: Gender Politics and Class Struggle in a Tokyo Host Club. Books. Stanford University Press. https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=24190#extras.

Takeyama, Akiko. 2010. “Intimacy for Sale: Masculinity, Entrepreneurship, and Commodity Self in Japan’s Neoliberal Situation.” Journal Articles. Japanese Studies 30 (2): 231–46.

Takeyama, Akiko. 2005. “Commodified Romance in a Tokyo Host Club.” Book Chapters. In Genders, Transgenders and Sexualities in Japan, edited by Mark McLelland and Romit Dasgupta, 200–215. New York: Routledge.

» Show All Publications

Selected Presentations

Takeyama, A. (12/20/2017). 「誘惑の舞台：夢を売る仕事　～東京ホストクラブ～」(Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club). Book Talk at the Center for Gender Research and Social Sciences, Department of Cross-Cultural Studies, Kanagawa University. Kanagawa, Japan

Takeyama, A. (11/6/2017). Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club. Book Talk at the Japanese Studies in English Lecture Series 2017, Hitotsubashi University. Tokyo, Japan

Takeyama, A. (4/20/2017). Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club. Book Talk at the Department of Anthropology, San Diego Miramar College. San Diego, CA

Takeyama, A. (3/18/2017). Ambivalent Possibilities of Adult Video Industry. Annual Meeting of Association of Asian Studies and International Convention of Asia Scholars. Toronto, Canada

Takeyama, A. (2/10/2017). Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club. Book Talk at the Department of Anthropology and Asian Studies Center, University of Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh, PA

Takeyama, A. (1/30/2017). Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club. Book Talk at the Department of Humanities & Social Sciences Arts and Science Seminar, Clarkson University. Potsdam, NY

Takeyama, A. (11/10/2016). Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club. Book Talk at the Center for Japanese Studies, University of Michigan. Ann Arbor, MI

Takeyama, A. (9/22/2016). Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club. Book Talk at the University of Kansas Bookstore. Lawrence, KS

Takeyama, A. (7/8/2016). Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club. Book Talk at the Modern Japanese Studies Program, University of Hokkaido. Hokkaido, Japan

Takeyama, A. (7/6/2016). 「誘惑の舞台：夢を売る仕事　～東京ホストクラブ～」(Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club). Book Talk at the Center for Gender Research and Social Sciences, Hitotsubashi Universit. Tokyo, Japan

Takeyama, A. (6/29/2016). Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club. Book Talk at the Institute of Comparative Culture Lecture Series, Sophia University. Tokyo, Japan

Takeyama, A. (6/16/2016). Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club. Book Talk at the Graduate School of Asia-Pacific Studies, Waseda University. Tokyo, Japan

Takeyama, A. (4/1/2016). Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club. Book Talk at the Kinokuniya Bookstore. Seattle, WA

Takeyama, A. (3/2/2016). Staged Seduction: Selling Dreams in a Tokyo Host Club. Book Talk at the Department of Sociology & Anthropology, Washburn University. Topeka, KS

Selected Grants

General Research Fund (#2301571). Center for Research, Inc.. $14305.00. (1/1/2016 - 12/31/2017). University (KU or KUMC). Status: Funded

Fellowship. 2014-15 Japan Foundation Research Fellowship. $53700.00 (JPY 5,500,000, roughly $53,700)). Submitted 9/1/2013 (12/22/2014 - 12/21/2015). Not-for-Profit (not Foundation). Status: Funded

#2301772. 2013 General Research Fund, Center for Research, Inc., KU. $10000.00. (5/1/2013 - 7/31/2014). University (KU or KUMC). Status: Funded

Wenner-Gren Hunt Postdoctoral Fellowship. Wenner-Gren Foundation, New York. $40000.00. (1/1/2010 - 12/31/2011). Foundation. Status: Funded

#2302172. 2008 New Faculty General Research Fund, Center for Research, Inc., KU. $8000.00. (7/31/2008). University (KU or KUMC). Status: Funded

#2301467. 2010 General Research Fund, Center for Research, Inc., KU. $3792.00. Submitted 1/1/2010. University (KU or KUMC). Status: Funded

2301571. 2011 General Research Fund, Center for Research, Inc., KU. $8744.00. Submitted 1/1/2011. University (KU or KUMC). Status: Funded

PE11542. 2011-12 Social Science Research Council (SSRC)-Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) Fellowship. $71000.00. Submitted 1/1/2011. Federal. Status: Funded

2017-18 Sabbatical Leave. Submitted 1/1/2017. University (KU or KUMC). Status: Funded