DEPARTMENT OF ASIAN LANGUAGES AND CULTURES

Yumi Shiojima brings extensive experience in Japanese language instruction, curriculum development, and teacher education in both the United States and Japan. Her teaching appointments have included Rhodes College, the Japanese School at Middlebury College, the Summer Intensive Program at the Japan Center for Michigan Universities in Hikone City, and the University of Missouri’s Language, Culture, and Performing Arts (Ningyō Jōruri) Program in Iida City.

At Northwestern, Shiojima has developed and taught courses across all levels of the Japanese language curriculum. Her fourth-year course, Japanese Essay Writing, strengthens students’ academic writing skills while encouraging them to engage with topics from their own disciplines. She also developed a fifth-year course, Food for Thought: Japanese Society, Culture, and Identities, which examines contemporary Japanese society through the lens of food culture, drawing on interdisciplinary perspectives such as history, sustainability, labor, and education. In recognition of her teaching excellence, Shiojima received the Arts and Sciences Alumni Teaching Award from the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences in 2011. In 2025, she was awarded the University Teaching Awardand appointed Charles Deering McCormick Distinguished Professor of Instruction. 

Her scholarly interests include second language writing instruction, study abroad, and teacher development. She is co-author of the IES Abroad MAP (Model Assessment Practice) for Language & Intercultural Communication (2011, first edition). From 2008 to 2011, she served as Co-Chair of Northwestern’s Council on Language Instruction, which supports language pedagogy and the professional development of language instructors. 

Shiojima is also a Faculty Fellow of the International Studies Residential College. In 2020, she received the T. William Heyck Awardfor her outstanding contributions to the residential college program.