Prof. Stephen Sumida speaking at the faculty development program "The Colloquy"

Jagran Lakecity University organised for its members of the faculty a one of its kind orientation program. This orientation lineup saw 10 distinguished speakers, over a span of 10 days, delivered expert and inspiring sessions from the area of teaching, learning and research, and interact with the members of the wider JLU academic fraternity. One such session featured Prof. Stephen Sumida. Before returning to the University of Washington where he earned his PhD in English in 1982, Stephen H. Sumida taught in the Department of English Language and Literature and Program in American Culture, at the University of Michigan (1990-1998), the Departments of Comparative American Cultures and English, the American Studies Program at Washington State University, and the English and American Studies Departments of the University of Hawaii. He committed his scholarship and teaching to Asian American literary studies in 1975, when he became the coordinator of the Pacific Northwest Asian American Writers' Conference, held at the University of Washington in 1976. He went on to be a co-founder of Talk Story Inc., a cultural organization for developing research, creativity, and study in Hawaii's literature and arts. He has participated in American Studies projects and given lectures widely around the world, in tune with his American Studies Association presidential themes of a respect for international scholarship in the field and constant attention to how internationalism and US ethnic studies impact each other. In 2011 he was honoured with the James Dolliver Visiting Professorship in the Humanities at the University of Puget Sound. Stephen Sumida's recent stage acting credits include roles in the theatrical adaptation of Jamie Ford's novel, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet, and in Nikki Nojima Louis's Breaking the Silence, performed in Hiroshima during Peace Memorial Week, in August 2013.