Yoko Chiba

Dear Laurentian Community,

I write today to share the sad news that Yoko Chiba, Associate Professor Emerita of Modern Languages and Literatures, passed away on April 14.

Yoko joined the St. Lawrence faculty in 1994 and taught for 18 years, playing a central role in shaping the study of Japanese language and culture on campus. She created the Japanese minor program and served as coordinator for the study abroad and exchange program in Japan, opening meaningful global learning opportunities for students. Her teaching extended beyond language to include literature in translation and courses on Japanese culture, film, drama, and theatre, reflecting her wide-ranging intellectual interests.

Yoko’s scholarship spanned comparative literature and drama, Japonisme, and the work of Irish poet and playwright W. B. Yeats, with significant international publications in these areas. She also enriched campus life by bringing groups from Canada to share Japanese culture and co-led a year-long faculty seminar in 2004–05 that culminated in a trip to Japan. In 2011, she was invited by the University of Hull in the United Kingdom to lecture on the Japanese playwright Kori Torahiko. She retired from St. Lawrence in 2012.

She earned her B.A. from Tsuda College in Tokyo, her M.A. from University College Dublin, and her M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Toronto.

Yoko is survived by her husband, John Maisonneuve, with whom she lived in Nepean, Ontario, Canada.

Please join us in honoring Yoko’s life by sharing your memories of her on the St. Lawrence University website. You can read the remembrances of others here.

Sincerely,
Kate Morris