Mr Michael D. FOSTER

• Professor, Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, University of California, Davis, USA

• Session 2: Chair

Michael Dylan Foster is a Professor in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at the University of California, Davis. He teaches classes on Japanese folklore, literature, heritage, tourism, and popular culture. He is the author of The Book of Yōkai: Mysterious Creatures of Japanese Folklore (University of California Press, 2015), Pandemonium and Parade: Japanese Monsters and the Culture of Yōkai (University of California Press, 2009), and the co-editor of The Folkloresque: Reframing Folklore in a Popular Culture World (Utah State University Press, 2016). In addition, he has undertaken extensive fieldwork on Japanese festival and ritual, particularly in Akita Prefecture and Kagoshima Prefecture, and co-edited UNESCO on the Ground: Local Perspectives on Intangible Cultural Heritage (Indiana University Press, 2015).