Classes taught

Introductory Seminar, Problem Solving and Critical Thinking Seminar, Culture and Creation 1 (Cultural Anthropology), Methods of Social Research I, Culture and Creation 1 (Cultural Anthropology), 1, Regional Understanding and Partnership Seminar I and II, Ecological Theory

Short biography

I matriculated to the Faculty of Science, Kyoto University in April 1984. Initially, I had planned to major in mathematics or physics, but then I began to take an interest in humankind. So when I learned that they have a section for anthropology at the Faculty of Science, Kyoto University, I advanced on to the graduate school there. For my Master’s Course (1988 – 1990), I performed economic anthropological research on the fishing society on Iheya Island in Okinawa. In 1990 I advanced onto a Doctoral Course, where I studied the Aka Pigmies in the tropical rainforest region in the Republic of the Congo in Central Africa beginning in 1991. My research focused mainly on their hunting and gathering activities and their division of food. I completed the Doctoral Course in March 1996, and obtained a PhD in science. Afterwards, I switched the site of my fieldwork over to Cameroon, due to the civil war in the Republic of Congo and other reasons, and have carried on with my research on hunters and gatherers. In 1999 I was asked to study bananas, and so I studied the cultivation and use of bananas in several Southeast Asian countries, as well as India, Tanzania, and Ghana. I enjoy surveying bananas in the supermarkets and markets of different countries. In October 1997 I became a Lecturer at the Faculty of Education, Yamaguchi University, after which I became an Assistant Professor, an Associate Professor, and a Professor, before transferring to the Faculty of Global and Science Studies in April 2015, where I have remained until the present.

Major papers, books, and works

Seasonal changes in the subsistence activities and food intake of the Aka hunter- gatherers in northeastern Congo. African Study Monographs, vol. 16 (2): 73-118, 1995. People, Nature and History of African Tropical Forests I: From Ecological Perspectives, Kimura, D., Kitanishi, K. (eds.), Kyoto University Presentations People, Nature and History of African Tropical Forests II: From Ecological Perspectives, Kimura, D., Kitanishi, K. (eds.), Kyoto University Press

A Message to the Students