Irmela Hijiya-Kirschnereit is professor of Japanology (chair) and director of the Friedrich Schlegel Graduate School of Literary Studies at Freie Universität Berlin. She was awarded the Leibniz Prize 1992. Series Editor: 1990–2000 – Japanische Bibliothek (Japanese Library), 34 volumes; 1994–present – Iaponia Insula (Studies on Japanese Culture and Society), 27 volumes. Her monographs include: Rituals of Self-Revelation: Shishosetsu as Literary Genre and Socio-Cultural Phenomenon. Cambridge, MA. 1996 (German version 1981, expanded ed. 2005, Japanese version 1992); ed.: Canon and Identity: Japanese Modernization Reconsidered: Trans-Cultural Perspectives. (2000).