Stephen Filler

Stephen Filler
Associate Professor of Japanese

375 O'Dowd Hall
248-370-2070
[email protected]

DEGREE: Ph.D. in Japanese, Ohio State University

RESEARCH INTERESTS: Japanese anarchism, Japanese naturalist literature, romanticism, and historical fiction

Dr. Stephen Filler is Associate Professor of Japanese and Chair of the Department of
Modern Languages and Literatures.

Dr. Filler was always fascinated by languages. As an undergraduate at Brown University,
he concentrated in Classics (Greek and Latin). During this time he picked up an interest
in Japanese film and martial arts and after graduation traveled to Japan to teach English.
This led to into an extended stay in Japan that included two years on the JET (Japan
Exchange and Teaching) Program in the large city of Kitakyushu. He returned to the
United States to obtain his doctorate in Japanese literature at the Ohio State University.
After holding positions at Oberlin College and Denison University, he began teaching at
Oakland in 2006. Dr. Filler enjoys traveling and camping in his role as a Boy Scout
leader. He is also a member of the Detroit Story League, which promotes the art of
storytelling in Michigan through various workshops and events.

Dr. Filler’s research interests include oral storytelling (kōdan and rakugo), popular
literature, proletarian literature, modernism, romanticism, and depictions of the family in
modern and contemporary Japanese literature. He is also interested in the theory and
practice of translation. His publications include “‘Righteous thieves’ in socialist
storytelling: shakai kōdan of Arahata Kanson, Sakai Toshihiko, and Kamitsukasa
Shōken” (JSPS Kakenhi, Okuno Kumiko, PI, 2021) and “Hirabayashi Taiko’s Proletarian
Fiction of the Worksite,” 2013).

He is the translator of two full-length scholarly books: Living on the street in Japan:
Homeless Women Break Their Silence (Maruyama Satomi, Josei homuresu to shite ikiru,
2018) and Ryosai kenbo: The Construction of the Educational Ideal of Good Wife, Wise
Mother (Koyama Shizuko, Ryosai kenbo to iu kihan, 2012). He has translated numerous
other articles and book chapters.