Izumi Sakamoto

Associate Professor, Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work

Areas of interest

Anti-oppressive practice (AOP) and intersectionality
Japanese Canadian identities, arts, activism & communities
Anti-Asian racism, Asian Canadian identities & model minority myth
Immigrants and refugees
“Canadian experience” (immigrant employment discrimination)
Community-based, participatory, arts-based research
Critical tacit knowledge
Critical consciousness and social work pedagogy
Critical international social work

Biography

Izumi Sakamoto is currently an Associate Professor at the Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work and an Academic Fellow with the Centre for Critical Qualitative Health Research. She is also a Core Faculty Member of the Asian Institute, Munk School of Global Affairs. She is a former Fulbright Scholar and brings interdisciplinary perspectives from social work, social psychology, and cultural psychology, and works transnationally.

Izumi’s research has focused on immigration, anti-oppressive practice, gender, empowerment, critical consciousness, community organizing, and the arts. She has methodological expertise in qualitative, community-based and arts-informed research methodologies. Izumi currently leads the Japanese Canadian Arts and Activism Project (JCAAP), examining the intersections of artistic practice and activism within the contemporary Japanese Canadian community, while focusing on the themes of memory, identity, emotion and accountability. She is the first author of the book on anti-oppressive practice (AOP) published in Japan (2021), the first book on AOP in that country.

Izumi’s research has been shedding light on the experiences of im/migrants and other marginalized communities for the past 20+ years. For example, she developed a Model of Cultural Negotiation for immigrant ‘acculturation’ and integration; conducted ethnographic and media analysis on the notion of “Canadian experience”; and collaboratively mobilized knowledge for employers to consider diverse talents beyond Canadian experience (Beyond “Canadian Experience” Project). In 2013, her collaborative research on immigrant employment helped the Ontario Human Rights Commission to create the “Policy on removing the ‘Canadian experience’ barrier”. Subsequently, Izumi was awarded the 2014 Pioneers for Change Award (Women in Leadership category) by Skills for Change, Toronto. Her award-winning research on homelessness explored the social networks of people who are homeless, specifically of Indigenous women and transwomen. An ensuing collaborative knowledge-synthesis project, funded by SSHRC, resulted in a joint exhibition and creative research dissemination approaches toward social change. She is a frequent invited speaker at research colloquia and conferences; for example, recently, she was a keynote and invited speaker domestically and internationally, for example, recently in Singapore, Japan, the US and Canada.

Izumi currently leads four research projects as the Principal Investigator: 1. Many faces of Japanese Canadians: remembering inter-generational trauma and renewing cultural identity through activism, art and community (SSHRC, 2017-2021); 2. Arts organizing as antidote to state-based racial violence: Imagining Japanese Canadian genealogies and relationships through the Powell Street Festival (SSHRC, 2019-2021; Community partner – Powell Street Festival Society); 3. From margins to frameworks: Praxis-ing (im)migrant/ racialized/marginalized communities’ tacit knowledge in anti-oppressive social work (Dean’s Network Award, 2019-2021); and 4. Canadian Race Relations from the Vantage Point of Chinese Canadians: A Virtual Intergenerational Storytelling Project (SSHRC 2020-2022; partner: Chinese Canadian National Council Toronto Chapter). In addition, she is a Co-Investigator of research projects focusing on anti-Asian racism in the COVID-19 era (PI: Lin Fang) and the discourse of neurodiversity (PI: Margaret Gibson).

More +

Select publications

Sakamoto, I., Chin, M., Wood, N., Ricciardi, J. (In Press). The use of staged photography in participatory action research with homeless women: Reflections on methodology and collaboration. In Diane Conrad & Anita Sinner (Eds.). Creating together: Participatory, community-based and collaborative arts practices and scholarship across Canada. Wilfrid Laurier University Press.
Allan, B. & Sakamoto, I. (Forthcoming). Helpers, not helpless: Honouring the strength, wisdom and vision of Aboriginal women experiencing homelessness or marginal housing. In M. Guergis-Younger, S. Hwang, & R. McNeil. (Eds.). Homelessness and Health in Canada. Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press.
Sakamoto, I., Jayapal, D., Bhuyan, R., Ku, J., Fang, L., Zhang, H., & Genovese, F. (2013 March). An overview of discourses of skilled immigrants and “Canadian experience”: An English-language print media analysis. CERIS Working Paper #98. Toronto: CERIS – The Ontario Metropolis Centre.
Sakamoto, I., Chin, M. & Young, M. (2010). ‘Canadian Experience,’ employment challenges, and skilled immigrants: A close look through ‘tacit knowledge.’ Canadian Social Work Journal, 10(1), 145-151.
Sakamoto, I., Chin, M. & Baskin, C. (2010). Collaborating for social change: Bringing together arts-informed research projects on homelessness. In C. McLean (ed.). Creative Arts in Interdisciplinary Practice, Inquiries for Hope and Change (pp. 21-38). Calgary, AB: Temeron Books.
Sakamoto, I., Ku, J., & Wei, Y. (2009). The Deep plunge: Luocha and the experiences of earlier skilled immigrants from Mainland China in Toronto. Qualitative Social Work, 8(4), 427-447.
Sakamoto, I., Chin, M., Chapra, A., & Ricciardi, J. (2009). A ‘normative’ homeless woman?: Marginalisation, emotional injury, and social support of transwomen experiencing homelessness. Gay and Lesbian Issues and Psychology Review, 5(1), 2-19.
Sakamoto, I., Wei, Y. & Truong, L. (2008). How do social service organizations and social policies ‘acculturate’ to immigrants?: Social service provision for Chinese skilled immigrants in Canada. American Journal of Community Psychology, 42(3/4), 343-354.
Sakamoto, I., Anastas, J., Mcphail, B., & Colarossi, L. (2008). Status of women in social work education. Journal of Social Work Education, 44(1), 37-62.
Sakamoto, I. (2007). An anti-oppressive approach to cultural competence. Canadian Social Work Review, 24(1), 105-114.
Sakamoto, I. (2007). A critical examination of immigrant acculturation: Toward an anti-oppressive social work with immigrant adults in a pluralistic society. British Journal of Social Work, 37(3), 515-535.
Sakamoto, I. (2006). When family enters the picture: The model of cultural negotiation and gendered experiences of Japanese academic sojourners in the United States. Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology Journal, 12(3), 558-577.
Pitner, R. & Sakamoto, I. (2005). Examining the role of critical consciousness in multicultural practice: Examining how its strength becomes its limitation. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 75(4), 684-694.
Zhou, Y. R., Knoke, D., & Sakamoto, I. (2005). Rethinking silence in the classroom: Chinese students’ experiences of sharing indigenous knowledge. International Journal of Inclusive Education, 9(3), 287-311.
Sakamoto, I. & Pitner, R. (2005). Use of critical consciousness in anti-oppressive social work practice: Disentangling power dynamics at personal and structural levels. British Journal of Social Work, 35(4), 420-437.