Professor William M. Tsutsui has been appointed Edwin O. Reischauer Distinguished Professor of Japanese Studies for the academic year 2020-21. Professor Tsutsui is a specialist in the economic, environmental, and cultural history of modern Japan. He is currently Professor Emeritus of History at Hendrix College in Conway, Arkansas, where he served as President from 2014-2019. He also served as Dean of Dedman College Humanities and Sciences at Southern Methodist University from 2010-2014, following seventeen years of teaching at the University of Kansas. His ongoing research focuses on the environmental and business history of the Japanese fishing industry and on Japanese popular culture.

At Harvard, he will be teaching EASTD 115 "Japanese Monsters" (Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations), and he will be co-teaching HIST 2561 "Research Seminar in Japanese History" (Department of History) with Professor Andrew Gordon.