Biography

Dr. Anderson received her Ph.D. from Stanford University in 1986. Her interests include traditional Japanese culture, ethnohistory, nutritional anthropology, religion and ritual, culture change, the aesthetics and technology of Japanese ceramics, and the anthropology of art. She has traveled widely in Asia and has conducted research in Taiwan, Mongolia, and Japan.

Dr. Anderson has been studying Japanese tea ritual for more than twenty years. She has been awarded the rank of assistant professor at Urasenke, a four hundred year old tea lineage headquartered in Kyoto, Japan. She teaches tea ritual weekly and enjoys making traditional Japanese sweets and ceramics for use in tea ceremonies. Her publications include An Introduction to Japanese Tea Ritual published by State University of New York Press in 1991. She is also the author of "Japanese Tea Ritual: Religion in Practice" available in Man: The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Society of Great Britain and Ireland, 22:475-498, 1987.