Most of Dr. Stevens' work falls into two categories: social marginality or popular culture. Her first major project was on social marginality, volunteerism and social welfare.On the Margins of Japanese Society: volunteers and the welfare of the urban underclass (Routledge, 1997). This research monograph represents the first academic research conducted by a non-Japanese woman in a yoseba (gathering place for day labourers).
More recent publications include work on the public health and welfare of foreign mothers and their children in Japan. Current research is on disability in both Japan and in Australia. Dr. Stevens is working on a Melbourne based project entitled ‘Disability, Caregiving and Interpellation: migrant and non-migrant families of children with special needs in urban Australia’.
Her other main research interest is Japanese popular music. Dr. Stevens worked for several years in the 1990s as a consultant to a Japanese entertainment management agency and this experience in the industry led to publications on Japanese rock fans, rock video analysis and concert souvenir consumption. Recent research includes the use of language in Japanese pop music; her book, Japanese Popular Music: Culture, Authenticity and Power, was published by Routledge in 2008. Its cover features an exclusive design by the lead guitarist of the Alfee, TAKAMIZAWA Toshihiko.
Select Publications on Social Marginality
- On the Margins of Japanese Society: Volunteers and the Welfare of the Underclass
- (Forthcoming) “Life on the Margins: Homeless People and Migrant Day Laborers”, in Routledge Handbook of Japanese Culture and Society, Theodore C. Bestor and Victoria Lyon Bestor (eds), New York: Routledge.
- Undocumented Migrant, Maternal and Child Health Care in Yokohama (pdf)
- Living with Disability in Japan (ppt)
Select Publications on Popular Culture
- Rocking the Bomb: A Case Study in the Politicization of Popular Culture, Japanese Studies, 18(4), 1999, pp. 49-67. (pdf)
- I quit my job for a funeral: The mourning and empowering of a Japanese rock star, in JF Hopgood (ed.) The Making of Saints: Contesting Sacred Ground. University of Alabama Press, 2005, pp.143-151.
- ‘Translations: “Internationalizing” Language and Music in Japan’. Society for Linguistic Anthropology, Anthropology News, February 2007 (pdf).