Literary Arts

Taya Mikado

Taya Mikado (she/her) is a mixed-race Japanese-Canadian Yonsei hailing from Southern Alberta but currently anchored in Tkaronto. She dabbles in poetry, prose and digital art while working towards becoming an innovative and compassionate lawyer. Losing her father to suicide at 13, and her mother to a motorbike accident at 18, has given Taya significant insight […]

Lara Okihiro

Dr. Lara Okihiro is a yonsei writer, researcher, and educator of mixed Japanese Canadian heritage. Growing up in the diverse, working-class Dixon Road neighbourhood in Toronto, she was close to her Japanese Canadian grandparents and often visited her Anglo-Irish Canadian grandmother on her rural Ontario farm. Though Lara did not like reading as a kid, […]

Eiji Yoshikawa

Writer. Fighter (professional boxer). Filmmaker. Inspirational Speaker. Film Historian. Action Instructor for Movies. Peace Activist.

Kunio Yamagishi

Born in Fukushima, Japan, and after the university education, I moved to Canada and worked at the Consulate General of Japan in Toronto as a researcher. I then worked in Toronto, Tokyo, and New York, as an investment banker and now live in British Columbia, Canada, as a Canadian citizen. My publications have included short […]

Machiko Townson

Born and raised in the birthplace of Japanese porcelain, Arita, Saga, Machiko grew up where not only her grandmother was a dish painter, but most of her neighbours were dish painters themselves. Machiko remembers watching her grandmother painting dishes at home every night after school. Needless to say, she enjoyed her art classes in elementary […]

Yukari Oyama Peerless

Yukari is a multi-talented creative based in Victoria, BC, with a passion for bridging the gap between Japanese and Canadian cultures. She is a writer, interpreter, podcaster, watercolor artist, and Japanese Cultural Consultant, and has been helping to connect the two cultures since moving from Nagasaki, Japan to Victoria in 1998. As the owner of […]

Leanne Toshiko Simpson

Leanne Toshiko Simpson is a mixed-race Yonsei writer and psychiatric survivor from Scarborough, Ontario. She is a graduate of UTSC Creative Writing and the University of Guelph’s MFA program. Currently, she is a doctoral student in Social Justice Education at the University of Toronto, studying the intergenerational impact of Japanese Canadian internment. She teaches courses […]

PJ Patten

PJ Patten is a self-taught graphic illustrator, tattoo artist, and poet whose work is influenced by the intersection of his Japanese heritage with his American military upbringing. Patten’s parents met in Japan where his father was stationed, and the family was raised in Huntington Beach, California where he started airbrushing surfboards in the popular surfing […]

Kirsten McAllister

Kirsten Emiko McAllister is a Professor in the School of Communication at Simon Fraser University. She grew up with her two brothers on the territories of Snuneymuxw Nation in what is now called Nanaimo in British Columbia. Both sides of her family, the Nakashimas / Mukai and the McAllisters / McQuarries have lived on the […]

Tamura Toshiko

Toshiko Tamura (Tamura Toshiko) was the pseudonym of early modern feminist novelist, Toshi Satō (Satō Toshi). Born in the Asakusa district of Tokyo, Tamura enrolled in the faculty of literature at Japan Women’s University at the age of seventeen. However, due to health issues she was forced to withdraw after one term. Despite no formal […]

Terrie Hamazaki

Terrie Hamazaki (she/her) is a Vancouver based writer who holds a Master of Arts Degree in Creative and Critical Writing (UK). She performed her plays at the Fringe and Women in View Performing Arts Festivals. Her writing has appeared in Swelling with Pride: Queer Conception and Adoption Stories (Caitlin Press), Sustenance (Writers from BC and […]

Chieri Uegaki

Chieri is a second generation Japanese-Canadian and writer of books for young readers. She graduated from the University of British Columbia’s Creative Writing Department with a Bachelor of Fine Arts and has written stories for Pearson Education, and the children’s magazines Chirp and chickaDEE. Her first picture book was Suki’s Kimono, followed by Rosie and […]

Laura Fukumoto

Laura Fukumoto grew up on Toronto’s East Lakeshore, but relocated to Vancouver, British Columbia in 2009, where she now works as a costume designer and wardrobe professional, graduating from the University of British Columbia with a BFA in Theatre Production and Design. She has worked with many theatre companies such as The Arts Club and […]

Kim Moritsugu

Kim Moritsugu was born and raised in Toronto. She is the author of six novels to date, including Looks Perfect, nominated for the Toronto Book Award; The Glenwood Treasure, shortlisted for the Arthur Ellis Best Crime Novel award; The Restoration of Emily, serialized on CBC Radio; and The Oakdale Dinner Club. Kim also conducts a […]

Susan Aihoshi

Susan Aihoshi is a sansei, or third generation Japanese Canadian. She was born in Toronto, a city she loves and where she has lived all her life. She studied at the University of Toronto and has two degrees in English literature. Susan has worked in publishing for most of her career. With the publication of […]