MARIKO YOSHIDA

Last Updated :2026/09/13

Affiliations, Positions
Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Assistant Professor
E-mail
myoshidahiroshima-u.ac.jp
Self-introduction
Mariko Yoshida is a cultural anthropologist whose research explores ecological uncertainty and precariousness within the interconnected metabolic processes of the underwater realm. Her current monograph project examines the transnational life of oysters, where ecological emergencies, alterations, and disruptions unfold across inter- and intra-species metabolic dynamics. Yoshida teaches environmental anthropology, adopting interdisciplinary approaches such as commodity chain analysis, feminist science and technology studies (STS), blue humanities, and multispecies ethnography.

Basic Information

Academic Degrees

  • M.A.(Media and Governance), Keio University
  • M.A.(Anthropology), Columbia University
  • Ph.D. (Anthropology), The Australian National University

Educational Activity

  • [Bachelor Degree Program] School of Integrated Arts and Sciences : Department of Integrated Global Studies : Integrated Global Studies
  • [Master's Program] Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences : Division of Humanities and Social Sciences : International Peace and Co-existence Program
  • [Doctoral Program] Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences : Division of Humanities and Social Sciences : International Peace and Co-existence Program

Research Keywords

  • Sociocultural anthropology
  • Environmental anthropology
  • Multispecies ethnography
  • Political ecology
  • Feminist STS
  • Interspecies labor in the Anthropocene
  • Oyster aquaculture

Affiliated Academic Societies

  • American Anthropological Association
  • Society for Social Studies of Science
  • Association for Asian Studies
  • The Japanese Society of Cultural Anthropology

Educational Activity

Course in Charge

  1. 2026, Liberal Arts Education Program1, 2Term, Peace and Wellbeing
  2. 2026, Liberal Arts Education Program1, 2Term, Introduction to Cultural Anthropology
  3. 2026, Liberal Arts Education Program1, 1Term, Introduction to International Cooperation
  4. 2026, Undergraduate Education, 3Term, Invitation to Integrated Global Studies II
  5. 2026, Undergraduate Education, 4Term, Political Ecology of Water I
  6. 2026, Undergraduate Education, 4Term, Political Ecology of Water II
  7. 2026, Graduate Education (Master's Program) , 2Term, Science History for Humanities and Social Sciences
  8. 2026, Graduate Education (Master's Program) , 2Term, Science History for Humanities and Social Sciences
  9. 2026, Graduate Education (Doctoral Program) , Year, Research into Humanities and Social Sciences
  10. 2026, Graduate Education (Master's Program) , 3Term, Peace and Co-existence B
  11. 2026, Graduate Education (Master's Program) , 1Term, Environmental Anthropology

Research Activities

Academic Papers

  1. ★, "Cultivating the Ocean: Reflections on Desolate Life and Oyster Restoration in Hiroshima", Nurturing Alternative Futures: Living with Diversity in a More- than-Human World, 2023
  2. ★, "On Scaling Precarity: The Materiality of Ocean Acidification", Japanese Review of Cultural Anthropology, 21(1), 457-491, 2021
  3. Roundtable Report: "COVID-19 and Cultural Anthropology" and Subsequent Activities, Cultural Anthropology, 85(2), 366-369, 202009
  4. "Seed Oysters in Entangled Worlds: Ecological Disturbances, Knowledge Making, and Potentialities in Miyagi, Japan", Environment & Society Portal, Arcadia, 47, 2019
  5. ★, "Knowing Sea-Level Rise: Interpretive Practices of Uncertainty in Tuvalu", Practicing Anthropology, 41(2), 24-28, 2019

Publications such as books

  1. Multispecies Mixtures and the Animals In-Between, Michigan State University Press, 2027, 2027, Scholarly Book, Cocompilation, English, Kavesh, Muhammad, Mariko Yoshida, and Natasha Fijn
  2. 2026, Food Connects and Divides the World: Anthropology of Food Supply Chains, Jinruiken Booklet 2026, Vol. 10, Values in the Shell: Translation, Practices, and Materiality in the Plumping of Oysters in Japan, Anthropological Institute, Nanzan University, 2026, 2026, Others, Contributor, Mariko Yoshida
  3. 2024/07/17, Spawnless Nature in the Making, Spawnless Nature in the Making, 2024, 07, Others, Single work, English, Mariko Yoshida
  4. 2024/04/27, Introduction to Science, Technology, and Society, edited by Ryuma Shineha and Koichi Mikami, BOOK CHAPTER: Multispecies Ethnography, Nakanishiya Press, 2024, Scholarly Book, Single work, 9784779517792
  5. 2023/12/22, Nurturing Alternative Futures: Living with Diversity in a More-than-Human World, edited by Muhammad Kavesh and Natasha Fijn, BOOK CHAPTER: Cultivating the Ocean: Reflections on Desolate Life and Oyster Restoration in Hiroshima, Routledge, 2023, Scholarly Book, Single work, English, 9781003439011
    Repository URL
  6. 2021/11/01, Eat, Consume, Symbiose: Exploring Food Systems from the Perspectives of Multispecies Ethnography, Seido-sha, Scholarly Book, Cocompilation, Shiaki Kondo and Mariko Yoshida, 978-4-7917-7422-7
  7. 2021/09/18, More-than-Human: Multispecies Anthropology and Environmental Humanities (ed. Katsumi Okuno, Shiaki Kondo, and Natasha Fijn), Thinking through Human-Animal Labor, Ibun-sha, 2021, Scholarly Book, Contributor, Alex Blanchette and Mariko Yoshida, 4753103641
  8. 2018/02/16, Lexicon: Contemporary Anthropology (ed. Katsumi Okuno and Toshiaki Ishikura), Anna Tsing's Ethnographic Method of Inquiry, Ibun-sha, 2018, Scholarly Book, Contributor, 日本語, 9784753103447, 72-75
  9. 2017/02/28, Symposium Report, Fieldnet Lounge Planning Symposium, "The Biography of "Toxicity": Rethinking Fieldwork Methods in the Contemporary World through Interdisciplinary Encounters" ed. Kentaro Shimoda, Becoming Toxic: Knowledge Practices of Comparison in the Oyster-Human Entanglement, Tokyo Foreign Language University, 2017, Others, Contributor, 日本語
  10. 2015, Discussion Paper "Pacific Diaspora Mobility, Transnationalism, and Identity of Tuvalu", The Nansen Initiative, 2015, Report, Single work, English

Invited Lecture, Oral Presentation, Poster Presentation

  1. Confluences in Aquatic Science and Technology Studies, Mariko Yoshida, Confluences in Aquatic Science and Technology Studies, 2026/07/06, With Invitation, English
    Related URL
  2. Commentary on Thomas Itsuo Fujishima's Pre-Fieldwork Research Seminar, Mariko Yoshida, Work Space, 2026/06/18, With Invitation, English, DFG Research Training Group 2686: Contradiction Studies – Constellations, Heuristics, and Concepts of the Contradictory, University of Bremen
  3. "What directs the contingency of assemblages?", Mariko Yoshida, Discussant, Panel Session "Perspectives from Assemblage: The Current State of Multispecies Anthropology/Ethnography," 60th Annual Meeting of the Japanese Society of Cultural Anthropology, 2026/05/30, With Invitation, Japanese, Wei Zhang, Kyushu University, Japan
  4. "Translating oyster quality across markets and food cultures", Mariko Yoshida, 118th Annual Meeting of the National Shellfisheries Association, 2026/03/24, Without Invitation, English, National Shellfisheries Association, Portland, OR
  5. "Narrating with Speculative Oysters", Mariko Yoshida, The Multispecies Ethnography and Artful Methods conference, 2025/12/03, With Invitation, English, The Australian National University, Australia
  6. Haunted Epistemologies and Ancestor Afterlives: Anthropology and Interdisciplinarity in Environmental Sciences. Roundtable participant., Mariko Yoshida, Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association (AAA), 2025/11/20, With Invitation, English, Dr. Lydia Gibson and Dr. Paige West, New Orleans, USA
  7. "Values in the Shell: Translation, Practices, and Materiality in the Plumping of Oysters in Japan", Mariko Yoshida, How "Food" Connects and Divides the World: Anthropology of Food Supply Chains, 2025/04/05, With Invitation, Japanese, National Institutes for the Humanities (NIHU), Japan; Research Institute for the Promotion of International Cultural Studies, Kobe University, Japan, Nanzan University Anthropological Institute
  8. "Spawnless Temporality: Rifts, Hybridity, and the Values of Triploid Oysters", Mariko Yoshida, The Food System Temporalities Conference, 2025/01/09, With Invitation, English, University of Cambridge
  9. Commentary on Ria Tsuzuki's Presentation "Care Relations among Humans, Honeybees, and the Environment: Focusing on Interspecies Attraction", Next-Generation Development Seminar, 2024/12/01, With Invitation, Japanese, The Japanese Society of Cultural Anthropology, Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
  10. Comments on Dr. Kjell Ericson's presentation "The Transpacific Tidelands of the Pacific Oyster", Mariko Yoshida, The 258th Nichibunken Evening Seminar on Japanese Studies, 2024/10/03, With Invitation, English, International Research Center for Japanese Studies, Kyoto, Japan
  11. "Oyster Reef Restoration and Urban Coastal Care in Times of Metabolic Disruptions", Mariko Yoshida, The 42nd Annual Meeting: Symposium on 'Unpacking "the Invisible" Beyond the Boundaries of Urban Sociology', 2024/09/05, With Invitation, Japanese, The Japan Association for Urban Sociology (JAUS), Rikkyo University, Japan
  12. "Metabolic Thinking with Oysters: Multi-scalar Unknowing(s), Ocean Restoration, and More-than-Human Coordination", Mariko Yoshida, The 11th quadrennial joint conference of 4S/EASST, 2024/07/19, Without Invitation, English, 4S/EASST, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, the Netherlands
  13. "Intraspecies Frontiers: Imperial Expansion, Industrial Capitalism, and Racialized Oysters", Mariko Yoshida, Hybridity: Unravelling the Nexus of Domestication and Wild, 2024/04/24, With Invitation, English, Muhammad Kavesh, Natasha Fijn, and Mariko Yoshida, The Australian National University
  14. "Intraspecies Frontiers: How 'alien' Japanese oysters became naturalized as 'Pacific' oysters", Mariko Yoshida, Roundtable organizer and chair for "The Curious Case of Nonhumans in Anthropology," Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association (AAA), 2023/11/17, Without Invitation, English, AAA/CASCA, Toronto, Canada
  15. "Values in the Shell: Interspecies Labor in the Making of Japanese Oyster Seasonality", Mariko Yoshida, Annual Meeting of The Society for Social Studies of Science (4S), 2023/11/10, Without Invitation, English, The Society for Social Studies of Science (4S), Honolulu, HA
  16. "Coexistence As a Fractal: Exhausted Oyster Life, Ocean Warming, and Multispecies Care in Japan", Mariko Yoshida, Annual Meeting of the Association for Asian Studies (AAS), 2023/03/17, Without Invitation, English, Association for Asian Studies (AAS), Boston, USA
  17. "Cultivating the Ocean: Regenerating the Seto Inland Sea through Multispecies Temporalities", Mariko Yoshida, Symposium of the Japanese Society of Cultural Anthropology, 2022/12/04, With Invitation, Japanese, Japanese Society of Cultural Anthropology, JMS Aster Plaza, Hiroshima, Japan
  18. Book Launch Seminar and Other Events, "Eat, Consume, Symbiose: Exploring Food Systems from the Perspectives of Multispecies Ethnography", Collaborative Research Seminar, "Ethnography of Capital and Power: Towards an Ecology of Publicness", 2022/01/23, Without Invitation, Japanese, National Museum of Ethnology
  19. Discussant for Kristian Karlo Saguin's monograph, "Making and Remaking Urban Ecologies across Manila's Edge", Mariko Yoshida, The 1st Seminar of the Anthropological Institute of Hiroshima (TAIHI), 2022/11/29, With Invitation, English
  20. "Plowing the Ocean: Pacific Oyster Aquaculture and Marine Ecosystem Restoration in Hiroshima, Japan", Mariko Yoshida, Anthropology and Conservation Virtual Conference, 2021/10/26, Without Invitation, English, Royal Anthropological Institute
    Related URL
  21. "Scaling Precarity: The Material-Semiotic Practices of Ocean Acidification", Mariko Yoshida, Society for Social Studies of Science (4S) Annual Meeting, 2021/10/09, Without Invitation, English, Virtual
  22. "Shucking Uncertainty: How the Pacific Oyster Guides Attention to Commodity, Climate Science, and the More-than-human Condition", Mariko Yoshida, Research Seminar, Hakusan Anthropology Study Group, 2021/06/21, With Invitation, English, Hakusan Society of Anthropology, Japan
  23. "Troubling Ecologies of the Pacific Oyster in Japan", Mariko Yoshida, Society for Social Studies of Science (4S)/The European Association for the Study of Science and Technology (EASST), 2020/08/18, Without Invitation, English
  24. Guest speaker, "The Seafood Market During COVID-19: Continuity and Rupture in Supply Chains, Fish Species, and Contingency", Mariko Yoshida, Roundtable "Anthropological Explorations of Living with COVID-19", 2020/06/15, With Invitation, Japanese, Virtual
  25. "Troubling Ecologies and Biocultural Opportunities of the Pacific Oyster in Japan", Mariko Yoshida, When Species Travel: On the Rise and Consequence of Invasive Ecologies in Asia and the West Pacific, 2020/02/17, With Invitation, English, National University of Singapore, Singapore
  26. "Seed Oysters in Entangled Worlds: Ecological Disturbances, Knowledge Making, and Potentialities in Miyagi, Japan", Mariko Yoshida, The Politics and Pitfalls of Maritime Governance II: An International Seminar by the UK-Japan Network on the Political Ecology of Coastal Societies, 2019/10/26, With Invitation, English, University of Aberdeen, UK, Tohoku University, Japan
  27. "Thinking through Oysters in an age of Uncertainty: Ecological Crisis and Aquaculture Practices in Japan", Mariko Yoshida, Ecologies of Knowledge and Practice Workshop on Japanese Studies and Environmental Humanities, 2017/10/27, Without Invitation, English, University of Oxford, UK
  28. "More-than-Human Temporality: Thinking through Oysters in an Age of Risk and Uncertainty", Mariko Yoshida, Time, Technologies and the Anthropocene: Asian and Pacific Perspective, 2017/09/11, Without Invitation, English, The Australian National University, AUS
  29. "Becoming Toxic: Knowledge Practices of Comparison in the Oyster-Human Entanglement", Mariko Yoshida, The Biography of Toxicity: Reconsidering Fieldwork Methods in the Contemporary World through Interdisciplinary Approaches, 2017/01/21, Without Invitation, Japanese, The Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, Japan
  30. "Oyster Knowledge, Practice, and Nature in the Anthropocene", Mariko Yoshida, Annual Meeting of Anthropology of Japan in Japan (AJJ), 2016/04/23, Without Invitation, English, Anthropology of Japan in Japan (AJJ), Tohoku University, Japan
  31. "Selfish Shellfish: Oyster Knowledge, Practice, and Nature in the Anthropocene", Mariko Yoshida, The Ethics of Hope? Posthumanism, Life, and Climate Change, 2015/11/25, With Invitation, English, La Trobe University, Melbourne, AUS
  32. "Technological Landscapes of Traveling Texts, Things, and Truths: Rethinking Ethnographic Praxis in Tuvalu, 2006-2010", Mariko Yoshida, Annual Meeting of the Association for Social Anthropology in Oceania (ASAO), 2015/02/04, Without Invitation, English, Association for Social Anthropology in Oceania (ASAO), Santa Fe, NM
  33. "In Between Fluctuations: Interpretive Practices and Discursive Transformation under Climatic Pressure in Tuvalu", Mariko Yoshida, Annual Meeting of the Association for Social Anthropology in Oceania (ASAO), 2014/02/04, Without Invitation, English, Association for Social Anthropology in Oceania (ASAO), Kona, HI
  34. "Knowing Sea-Level Rise: Local Practices of Constructing the Environmental Risk", Mariko Yoshida, Annual Meeting of the Society for Applied Anthropology (SfAA), 2013/03/19, Without Invitation, English
  35. "Responses to the Risk of Sea-level Rise among the Locals: A Case of the Small South Pacific Island Nation of Tuvalu", Mariko Yoshida, International Conference for Environmental Governance, 2011/06/10, Without Invitation, English, National Cheng Kung University, Taiwan

Awards

  1. Best MA Thesis Prize in Anthropology, Columbia University, Knowing Sea-Level Rise: Interpretive Practices of Uncertainty in Tuvalu

Works, etc.

  1. 映像人類学作品 "In Between Fluctuations", Mariko Yoshida, 2010, Columbia University, New York Univeresity, Australian National University, etc, Artistic Activity
  2. ドキュメンタリー映画『ビューティフル・アイランズ』（監督:海南友子）, Subtitle Translator (Tuvaluan–Japanese) for Beautiful Islands, directed, filmed, and edited by Tomoko Kana. Official Selection, Busan International Film Festival; Recipient, Asia Cinema Fund Award., 2009, Artistic Activity
  3. NHK-BSアフリカ2008『ルワンダ 女性たちの国づくり』（後藤健二）, NHK/Independent Press, Subtitle Translation (English–Japanese), 2008/05/24, The Others

External Funds

Acceptance Results of Competitive Funds

  1. Joint Usage / Research Center, Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Kyoto University: International Collaborative Research Hub for Southeast Asian Studies toward Global Coexistence, Arts of Living in a Polluted World: The Mobility of Chemical Substances and the Reproduction of Place in Asia, 2026, 2028
  2. Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Research (Pioneering), An Anthropology of (Un)inhabitable Zones: Toward Understanding the Processes of (Re)production of Place Associated with Invisible Substances, 2026, 2029
  3. The International Society for the History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology Travel Grant, Confluences in Aquatic Science and Technology Studies, 2026
  4. The 57th Kurata Grants, Humanities and Social Sciences, The Hitachi Global Foundation, Metabolic Rifts in Bioengineered Life: Environmental Anthropological Perspectives from Oyster Aquaculture, 2026
  5. Grant-in-Aid for Early-Career Scientists (KAKENHI), 2024, 2028
  6. Incentive Research Grant (the best project in the Humanities and Social Sciences), The Lotte Foundation, 2024
  7. Grant-in-Aid for Research Activity Start-up (KAKENHI), The Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, 2021
  8. Research Grant, The Matsushita Konosuke Memorial Foundation, 2019
  9. Vice-Chancellor's Higher Degree Research Travel Grant, The Australian National University, 2018
  10. International Postgraduate Research Scholarship (Tuition Fee Exemption Sponsorship), The Australian National University, 2014
  11. University Research Scholarship, The Australian National University, 2014
  12. Fieldwork and Travel Grant, The Australian National University, 2014
  13. Fulbright Grant for Graduate Study, The US Fulbright Foreign Student Program, 2011, 2013
  14. Taikichiro Mori Memorial Research Fund, Research Promotion Grant, 2008
  15. The Masuda Educational Foundation, Fieldwork Grant, 2007
  16. Keio University, Educational Incentive Award for Overseas Fieldwork, 2006

Social Activities

History as Committee Members

  1. Member, 2026, Multispecies Ethnography Artful Methods (MEAM) Network
  2. judge, 2025, Japan Oyster Association
  3. judge, 2024, Japan Oyster Association

Organizing Academic Conferences, etc.

  1. Hybridity: Unravelling the Nexus of Domestication and Wild, 2024/

Other Social Contributions

  1. Reflecting Hiroshima: Between the Mountains and the Sea, Invited Lecture, Thinking with Oysters, 2025/01/18, Lecturer, Lecture, General
  2. Thinking about Metabolic Disruptions in the Anthropocene: Oysters, Humans, and the Ocean, Invited Talk, De-silo (General Incorporated Association), 2024/10/15, Lecturer, Seminar or workshop
  3. Guest Lecturer, Episode 11, "Scientific Fieldwork in the Anthropocene Era," The Open University of Japan, Fieldwork and Ethnography, 2023/11/27, The Open University of Japan, TV or radio appearance, TV or radio program
  4. Related Talk Event, Exhibition Toutou Tarari Tararirata Tarariagarirarari Toutou, Three-way conversation with Shiori Watanabe (exhibition curator) and Sakurako Goto (Curator, Contemporary Art Center, Art Tower Mito), How Is Coexistence Possible in the Anthropocene and Capitalocene, 2022/11/27, Panelist, Meeting or assembly
  5. Tokyo Jiten, Lifeworlds of the Sea, Tokyo Metropolitan Foundation for History and Culture; Arts Initiative Tokyo (AIT), 2013/02/21, Lecturer, Seminar or workshop

History as Peer Reviews of Academic Papers

  1. 2026, Science, Technology, & Human Values, Others, Reviewer, 1
  2. 2025, Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space, Others, Reviewer, 1
  3. 2024, Environment and Planning E: Nature and Space, Reviewer, 1
  4. 2024, Philosophy and Global Affairs, Reviewer, 1
  5. 2023, Disasters Journal, Reviewer, 1