Beginning in 2021-2022, the center welcomes Postdoctoral Fellows in Japanese Studies for appointments spanning the academic year. Postdoctoral Fellows teach two courses over the academic year and participate in center events and related activities at U-M. Their research can cover any historical period of Japan—including contemporary Japan—and involve any academic discipline in the humanities and social sciences.
Postdoctoral Fellows 2025-26
Thomas Monaghan
CJS Postdoctoral Fellow | tnmon@umich.edu
Thomas Monaghan received his PhD in History from Yale University. His dissertation, 'The Satsuma Empire and its Sugar Colonies on the Edges of Early Modern Japan’, examines how Satsuma domain captured the Amami Islands from Ryukyu and transformed them into dependencies supplying sugar for Japan’s domestic market. His research interests include the history of technology and migration, maritime networks, and border islands in Japan’s early modern to modern transition. His article, 'The Diffusion of Sugar-making Knowledge in the East China Sea: Japan, Amami, and Ryukyu, 1609-1868’, appears in a forthcoming special issue of Itinerario. He is currently revising his dissertation for publication and developing a project on the transregional interests of Satsuma domain and the early modern antecedents of the Japanese empire.
Felicity Stone-Richards
CJS Postdoctoral Fellow | fsr@umich.edu
Felicity Stone-Richards received her PhD in Political Science at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She is a comparative political theorist of Japanese and Black American political thought and activist organizing. Her research focuses on the political claims and organizing strategies of progressive activists in Japan, as well as the history of Japanese intellectuals incorporating black radical politics into their practice. Dr. Stone-Richards has been the recipient of the Fulbright Research Award and the AAUW Dissertation Fellowship
