Profile:
Professor Emeritus of the University of Tokyo, Advisor of Mitsubishi Corporation, Special Advisor to Fuji Television Network, Member of the Education Rebuilding Implementation Council of the Cabinet Office, and Chair of the Advisory Committee on Cultural Exchanges in Asia of the Cabinet Office.
He was born in Sapporo and obtained the Doctor of Philosophy degree at the University of Tokyo after withdrawing from the doctoral course of the Hokkaido University Graduate School. Before taking the current post at Meiji University, he served as visiting associate professor at Cairo University, lecturer at University of the Sacred Heart, Tokyo, associated professor at College of Arts and Science of the University of Tokyo, visiting research fellow at the Turkish Historical Society, visiting scholar at Harvard University, visiting professor at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies, and retired from a professor position at the Graduate school of Arts and Sciences of the University of Tokyo (doubling as director of the Centre for Middle Eastern Studies, Institute for Advanced Global Studies, the University of Tokyo) in 2012. He received the Prize for the Study of Developing Countries, the Suntory Prize for Social Sciences and Humanities, the Mainichi Publication Cultural Prize (twice), the Yoshino Sakuzo Prize, the Shiba Ryotaro Prize, and the Medal with Purple Ribbon in 2006.
Research themes:
Islamic area studies and the history of international relations
Main books and papers:
◆Iwanami Cyclopedia of Islam (“Iwanami Isuramu Jiten”) (co-editor, Iwanami Shoten)
◆Radical History (Chuokoron-shinsha)
◆Manner of History (“Rekishi no Saho”) (Bungeisyunju)
◆The Dream of Sultangaliev: The Muslim World and Russian Revolution (“Surutangariefu no Yume: Isuramu Sekai to Roshia Kakumei”) (The University of Tokyo Press)
◆Empire and Nation (“Teikoku to Kokumin”) (Iwanami Shoten)
◆An Introduction to the History of International Relations in the Middle East: The Turkish Revolution and Soviet Russia (1918 – 1923) (“Chuto Kokusai Kankeishi Kenkyu: Toruko Kakumei to Sobieto Roshia 1918 – 1923”) (Iwanami Shoten)