The Sari Kawana Student Travel Fund was established by colleagues, friends, and family to honor the memory of Sari Kawana, Professor of Japanese in the Department of Modern Languages, Literatures, and Cultures at the University of Massachusetts Boston. Inspired by Professor Kawana’s enthusiastic support for enrichment through immersion in different cultures, the endowed fund will provide crucial assistance to UMass Boston students seeking to further their education through travel to Japan.

Professor Kawana came to UMass Boston as an assistant professor in 2006. Her outstanding record of teaching, scholarship, and service to the university led to promotions to associate professor with tenure in 2012 and full professor in 2019. She was the author of two ground-breaking monographs, Murder Most Modern: Detective Fiction and Japanese Culture and The Uses of Literature in Modern Japan: Histories and Cultures of the Book, as well as numerous influential journal articles. Her emphasis on comparative approaches to literature and film yielded important contributions to her field, as well as to the curriculum at UMass Boston. 
 
As a multilingual scholar who worked in English, Japanese, and French on topics as diverse as detective fiction, publishing history, educational manga, and popular culture, Professor Kawana had a clear understanding of the rich experiences awaiting students who have the opportunity to immerse themselves in new and different linguistic environments. She encouraged students to see the study of language, literature, and culture in the classroom as an introduction to a lifetime of exploration and interaction across the bounds of nation and culture.