Jordi Serrano-Muñoz, PhD
Jordi Serrano-Muñoz is a postdoctoral researcher focusing on comparative literature, reception, and transpacific connections. He holds a Ph.D. in the Humanities from the Pompeu Fabra University, completed cum laude; a research master in literary studies from the University of Leiden; and a degree in East Asian Studies from the Autonomous University of Barcelona.
He is editor and co-founder of Asiademica: Open Journal of East Asian Studies and member of the research groups GREGAL-UAB and STAND-UGR. He is also member of the research project INDOVIG (2022-2023), which is composing a guidebook on how to produce academic work that deals with the representation of violence against women in literature. His current research lines involve the relationship between literature, the climate crisis, memory, and protest in contemporary Japanese and Latin-American literary production.
He teaches or has taught undergraduate and graduate classes at El Colegio de México, the Open University of Catalonia and the University of Granada. He has been a Japan Foundation Fellow (2021-2022) at Waseda University and consultant of Japanese literature for the Japan Foundation Mexico.
[Updated: March 2023]
Recent publications
(2022) “Polifonía e identidades en el umbral: construcción de la crítica social en Temporada de Huracanes de Fernanda Melchor“, in Transculturación y trans-identidades en la literatura mexicana contemporánea, edited by Herlinda Flores, Vernon Press, ISBN: 978-1-64889-146-5.
(2022) “The Illegitimate Ally: The Hegemonic National Narrative of Japan in the US (1945-2020)“, in The End of Western Hegemonies?, edited by Marie-Josée Lavallée, Vernon Press, ISBN: 978-1-64889-468-8.
(2022) East Asia, Latin America, and the Decolonization of Transpacific Studies, co-edited with Chiara Olivieri, Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN: 978-3-030-74530-1.
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-74528-8
(2022) “When East is North and South“, in East Asia, Latin America, and the Decolonization of Transpacific Studies, co-edited with Chiara Olivieri, Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN: 978-3-030-74530-1.
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-74528-8_1
(2021) “El peligro de un viaje decepcionante: José Juan Tablada, Enrique Gómez Carrillo y Vicente Blasco Ibáñez visitan Japón a principios del s. XX“, TRANSMODERNITY: Journal of Peripheral Cultural Production of the Luso-Hispanic World, 9(7).
DOI: 10.5070/T49755855
(2021) “Closure in Dystopia: Projecting Memories of the End of Crises in Speculative Fiction,” Memory Studies 14 (6): 1347-1361, 2021.
DOI: 10.1177/17506980211054340
(2021) “Bodies and Economic Violences in Contemporary Japanese Fiction: Absence, Change, and Empowerment in Yū Miri, Murata Sayaka, and Kawakami Mieko“, in Narratives of Violence, edited by Teresa Iribarren, Roger Canadell, and Josep-Anton Fernández, Biblioteca di Rassegna iberistica
DOI: 10.30687/978-88-6969-460-8
(2021) “Canon Breeds Canon: Murakami Haruki, World Literature, and the Hegemonic Representation of Japan in the United States“, Archiv orientální, 89 (2), 339-363.
DOI: 10.47979/aror.j.89.2.339-363
(2021) “Decolonial Theory in East Asia? Outlining a Shared Paradigm of Epistemologies of the South,” Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais 124, 2021.
DOI: 10.4000/rccs.11430
(2021) “Fukushima Fiction: The Literary Landscape of Japan’s Triple Disaster. By Rachel DiNitto,” Monumenta Nipponica vol 75, no 2, 2021.
DOI: 10.1353/mni.2020.0044
(2020) “A Shaking Voice can Shake it All: Representing Trauma as a Political Act,” Bunron no 7, 2020.
DOI: 10.11588/br.2020.7.13587
(2020) “Who Fears the Waking Red: Review of Revolution Goes East by Tatiana Linkhoeva,” Revista Paz y Conflictos vol 13, no 1, 2020.
DOI: 10.30827/revpaz.v13i1.15478
(2020) “Parodia y crítica social en la obra literaria de Tsutsui Yasutaka [Parody and social criticism in the literature of Tsutsui Yasutaka],” in Nuevas aproximaciones a la literatura japonesa, edited by Pau Pitarch, Editorial Bellaterra.
(2020) “Reading after the Disaster: Japan’s reaction to the 3/11 events through literature,” Education About Asia, 24:3, 31-35.
(2015) “‘Droplets,’ by Medoruma Shun: Personal Guilt as Collective Responsibility,” Stanford Journal of East Asian Affairs, 15:1, 112-122.
Teaching experience
2023
- “The climate crisis represented through European art and culture”, School of Thought Lluis Vives – Centre Cultural La Nau.
- “Temas de Literatura contemporánea [Themes from Contemporary Literature],” Degree in Humanities, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya.
- “Literature y espacio [Literature and Space],” Master in Arts and Humanities, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya.
2022
- “Literatura japonesa: una visión crítica [Japanese literature: a critical overview],” MA in East Asian Studies, Universidad de Granada.
- “Temas de Literatura contemporánea [Themes from Contemporary Literature],” Degree in Humanities, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya.
- “Seminari d’estudis catalans [Catalan Studies Seminar]”, Degree in Humanities, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya.
2021
- “Literatura japonesa: una visión crítica [Japanese literature: a critical overview],” MA in East Asian Studies, Universidad de Granada.
- “Temas de Literatura contemporánea [Themes from Contemporary Literature],” Degree in Humanities, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya.
- “Japón: Literatura y pensamiento de posguerra [Japan: Postwar Literature and Thought],” MA in Asian and African Studies, El Colegio de México.
2020
- “Literatura japonesa: una visión crítica [Japanese literature: a critical overview],” MA in East Asian Studies, Universidad de Granada.
- “Temas de Literatura contemporánea [Themes from Contemporary Literature],” Degree in Humanities, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya.
- “Japón: Literatura y pensamiento de posguerra [Japan: Postwar Literature and Thought],” MA in Asian and African Studies, El Colegio de México.
Conference Papers, Symposiums, Seminars
“La recepción de la literatura japonesa contemporánea en España a través de sus premios Nobel: canon global, popularización y diplomacia cultural,” guest lecturefor the Seminario Permanente del Área de Estudios de Asia Oriental, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, January 20, 2023.
“Academic guidelines to produce thesis on the relationship between literature and violence against women,” co-authored with Teresa Iribarren, Montse Gatell, and Montserrat Clua, III CICELI, University of Valencia, July 15, 2022.
“(Un)Comfortably Numb: A decolonial comparative exercise on disasters representation in Contemporary Japanese and Mexican Literature,” Non-Western Approaches in Environmental Humanities, July 11, 2022, University of Warsaw.
“World Canon and Japanese Literature”, guest lecture for the seminar Clanes, Grupos y Tribus en la Literatura Japonesa Contemporánea, Buenos Aires University, March 14, 2022.
“East Asia, Latin America, and the Decolonization of Transpacific Studies,” organizer of panel at the LASA/Asia Congress, February 16, 2022
“Decolonial Transpacific Connections,” Workshop for the Global Japanese Studies MA program, Waseda University, January 25, 2022
“Hope in Worse Futures? A Comparative Exercise on Dystopias, the Climate Emergency, and Multicrises,” JCAS Lecture Series, Nagoya University, January 21, 2022
“Rethinking our Practices through the lens of epistemologies of the South: A tentative Methodological Approach”, TRYSPACES, October 14, 2021.
“Transmutation of the Disappeared Body: Representations of the Ayotzinapa Missing Students in the Press and Literature,” co-authored with Mireia Pérez-Carretero, LUCAS Seminar “Bodies Matter,” April 15, 2021
“Polyphony, Polychrony, Polytopy: articulating social criticism in Hurricane Season, by Fernanda Melchor,” 52nd Annual Convention of the Northeast Modern Language Association, March 12, 2021
“Ways of (re)thinking and (re)doing comparative literatura from Transpacific perspectives,” as part of the seminar Semilleros de Investig-Acción: Sures Decoloniales, Universidad de Granada, December 3, 2020.
“Trauma, representación y memoria cultural en la producción literaria post-Fukushima [Trauma, Representation, and cultural memory in the post-Fukushima literary production],” CEAA, El Colegio de Mexico, May 2020.
“Epistemologías del Sur y experiencias en Asia Oriental: ¿límites, oportunidades, encages, desaveniencias? [Epistemologies of the South and Experiences in East Asia: limits, opportunities, points in common and in dissent],” keynote speaker for the seminar Remapping Asian Studies II, University of Granda, March 2020.
“Reading Japan with Decolonial Glasses: The role of translated literature in the construction of discourses of national representation,” paper for Imagined Borders, Epistemic Freedoms, University of Colorado Boulder, January 2020.
“Literatura, discurs i hegemonia: narratives nacionals del Japó en els Estats Units i en Espanya [Literature, Discourse, and Hegemony: National Narratives of Japan in the US and Spain],” Faculty of Translation, Intepreting and East Asian Studies, Autonomous University of Barcelona, December 2019.
“Decoloniality in East Asia? Traveling concepts and experiences across borders,” paper for The Western Conference of the Association of Asian Studies 2019, El Colegio de México, October 2019.
“Modernity as Western Monopoly: The Hegemonic National Narrative of Japan in the West,” paper for The 2nd International Conference by The West Network, University of Jyväskylä, June 2019.
“The idea of Nation,” guest lecturer for the class “Theories of Culture,” Degree in Global Studies, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, May 2019.
“The idea of Nation,” guest lecturer for the class “Theories of Culture,” Degree in Global Studies, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, May 2018.
“Literatura y narrativas nacionales: discursos de representación nacional [Literature and national narratives: Discourses on National Representation],” paper for the III International Symposium EDiSo, Pompeu Fabra University, June 2017.
Organizer of the roundtable “Investigación y retos actuales de los Estudios de Asia Oriental [Research and Contemporary Challenges in East Asian Studies]” held at Casa Asia (Barcelona) on March 2015.
Organizer of the event “Discutiendo Asia Oriental… [Discussing East Asia…]” at the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters, Autonomous University of Madrid, February 2015.
Lecture “Yasuda Yojūrō y ‘Nihon no Hashi’: entre el arte y la política [Yasuda Yojūrō and ‘Nihon no Hashi’: Between the Artistic and the Political]” at the Faculty of Translation, Interpreting and East Asian Studies, Autonomous University of Barcelona, April 2013.
Roundtable participant in the international symposium “Identity and Discourse: Cultural Nationalism in Globalized Japan,” organized by Interasia, Autonomous University of Barcelona, October 2012.
Public Outreach
“Pechos y huevos”, master classes in an Instagram Live for the book club Érase una vez, May 14 and June 4, 2022.
“La Dependienta”, master class in an Instagram Live for the book club Érase una vez, March 24, 2022.
Interview (in Spanish) for the podcast Tsundoku: “La literatura japonesa de posguerra y la contemporánea“, October 27, 2021
(2019) “¿Cambio de era, cambio de narrativa? Reiwa en los medios [Change of era, change of narrative? Reiwa in media],” Revista Viento Sur.
Book presentation, Historia de los samurais by Jonathan López-Vera, Barcelona: Satori, 2016, May 2016.
Languages and Technical Skills
Spanish and Catalan, mother tongues
Proficient in English
Intermediate-advanced in Japanese
Intermediate-advanced in Chinese
Data Science and Text Mining with R Studio
Awards and Fellowships
(2021) Japan Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship
(2013 – 2015) ‘la Caixa’ International Postgraduate Fellowship
Jordi Serrano-Muñoz 