Ronald Takaki

Ronald Toshiyuki Takaki (1939–2009) was an American historian and leading scholar of ethnic studies and multicultural American history. Born and raised in Oahu, Hawaii, he was the descendant of Japanese immigrant field workers and became the first member of his family to attend college, graduating from the College of Wooster before earning a PhD in history from the University of California, Berkeley. He later taught at UC Berkeley, where he helped found the nation’s first ethnic studies department and established its PhD program in ethnic studies.

Takaki authored and edited more than twenty books on race, immigration, and ethnicity in the United States, including A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America (1993), the work on which A Different Mirror for Young People: A History of Multicultural America is based. His other major titles include Iron Cages: Race and Culture in 19th Century America (1979), Strangers from a Different Shore: A History of Asian Americans (1989), and Double Victory: A Multicultural History of America in World War II (2000). Recognized as one of the foremost scholars of American ethnic history, Takaki’s work has been widely used in classrooms and scholarship to broaden understanding of the multicultural dimensions of the American past.