Olga Sooudi

Olga Sooudi recently received her PhD in Anthropology at Yale University in December 2008, and her BA from Duke University in 2000 in Literature and French Studies. She is based at the Amsterdam School for Social Science Research in 2008-2009, during which time she completed her dissertation, which she is now revising for publication. Her dissertation focuses on Japanese modernity, as produced through transnational practices and aesthetic production. She examined these themes through a study of contemporary Japanese lifestyle migrants in New York City, particularly artists. Her fieldwork and research were completed over two years, in New York City (2005-2006), and Tokyo (2006-2007). In New York, she conducted an ethnographic study of migrants, their work, and everyday lives. In Tokyo, she interviewed returnee migrants, and conducted archival and media research.

Her research was funded by a Fulbright IIE Fellowship, as well as a Yale MacMillan Center Dissertation Research Grant, and a Yale Council on East Asian Studies Dissertation Research Grant.