On September 27, W. David Marx, Harvard College ’01, paid a special visit to Harvard’s Japanese Language Program — where his “journey began” — and spoke with current 5th year students, in Japanese, about how an interest in Japanese culture shaped his career trajectory in Japan, one that includes not only writing and research, but also working for CNN and for Google Japan’s Public Relations Division. Marx is an alumnus of the Reischauer Institute’s Undergraduate Summer Internship Program and recipient of the 2001 Noma-Reischauer Undergraduate Prize in Japanese Studies for his senior thesis about Japanese youth and the rise of the street fashion brand "A Bathing Ape."

An updated edition of his engaging cultural history, "Ametora: How Japan Saved American Style," has been released this month. First published in 2015, this monograph remains a meticulously researched, richly illustrated, and stylish study of the popular culture and the globalization as witnessed through the lens of Japanese postwar consumerism and street fashion.