Dr. Daniel A. Metraux

Greetings! It is a pleasure to introduce you to my world, work and family. We will travel from New York to Asia, Vermont to Virginia, encountering a variety of fields of endeavor. Professionally, I am a professor and scholar of Asian Studies, but in my real life I adore my family and live and die with every rise and fall of the Boston Red Sox. My colleagues call me "Sabbatical Man" because of my addiction to constant travel, but I also love solitary walks in the woods, catching miniature trout in Vermont, visiting historical sites, and devouring books on Civil War history. I absolutely love teaching and working closely with my students. I also derive great pleasure from research, writing and editing scholarly journals. My greatest joys in life, however, are my wife Judy and grown children, Katie and David. "Success in life is helping at least one other person achieve happiness before you die. " Margaret Mead

Dr. Metraux taught History at Bentley College (1978-81) and at Anderson College (1981-83) before moving to Mary Baldwin in 1983. He has developed a highly successful major and minor in Asian Studies and is an adjunct member of the Religion and International Relations departments. He was Chair of the Dept. of World Languages, Literatures and Cultures from 2002-05. Dr. Metraux was a Visiting Fellow at Soka University in Tokyo (1992) and at The Australian National University in 2002 and an exchange professor at Doshisha Women’s College in 1999-2000.

Dr. Metraux’s major research areas focus on the modern history and new religions of Japan and Asia. He is the author or editor of fifteen books including The History and Theology of the Soka Gakkai (1988), Taiwan’s Political and Economic Growth in the Late Twentieth Century (1991), The Soka Gakkai Revolution (1994), Aum Shinrikyo and Japanese Youth (1999), The International Exopansion of a Modern Buddhist Movement: The Soka Gakkai in Southeat Asia (2001) and Burma’s Modern Tragedy (2004). He has contributed chapters to eight books including: chapters on the Japanese and South Korean economies in Japan: A Country Study (1992) and South Korea: A Country Study (1992); “The Soka Gakkai: Buddhism and the Creation of a Harmonious and Peaceful society” in King and Queen, Engaged Buddhism (SUNY , 1996); “The Soka Gakkai in Southeast Asia” and “The Soka Gakkai and the Komeito” in Bryan Wilson, Global Citizens: The Soka Gakkai Buddhist Movement in the World (Oxford, 2001), and “The Soka Gakkai’s Critical Role in the Rapidly Changing World of Postwar Japanese Politics” in Brown and Cheng, Religious Organizations and Democratization: Case Studies From Contemporary Asia (M. E. Sharpe, 2005). Dr. Metraux has contributed numerous articles to a variety of academic journals including Nova Religio, The Japanese Journal of Religious Studies, Asian Survey, the Southeast Review of Asian Studies, Journal of Global Buddhism, The American Asian Review, The Japan Studies Review and Vermont History. He is currently editor of The Southeast Review of Asian Studies and The Virginia Review of Asian Studies.