The Author

Kristine Michelle “Khursten” Santos is a graduate student in History at Ateneo de Manila University, Philippines and Assistant Program Coordinator for The Nippon Foundation Fellowships for Asian Public Intellectuals. Her area of study is in gender social history, particularly in the influence of comics in creating a gendered social memory. Other topics that she has researched on is the hyperreal identity of Japan as seen through English Scanlations.

She has been actively writing about manga in her website, Otaku Champloo, since 2006. Her endless rambling about manga has made her contribute to websites such as mangabookshelf.com (Banana Fish Roundtable), and in the now defunct Mangacast. She has also written about manga for one of the national broadsheets, Manila Bulletin.

In the last few years, she has spoken about comics and otaku subculture for various conferences. The papers she presented to various conferences are as follows:

Welcoming Otaku: History and Transformations of Otaku in the Philippines
3rd JSA-ASEAN International Conference
(University of Malaya – MAJAS, February 2012)

The Warping of Japanese Youth Culture through English Fan Scanlations
2011 International Comic Arts Forum
Center for Cartoon Studies, October 2011)

More than just Boys: A History of the Changing Images of Gender in Weekly Shōnen Jump.
2010 Singapore Toy, Game, & Comic Convention
(National University of Singapore, December 2010)

The Pinoy in Kenkoy: A Hilarious Formation of National Identity from 1929-1941
15th Graduate Student Philippine Studies Forum of Japan
(Osaka University, July 2010)

Looking at Changes: A Study of Women in Japan from 1897-1912 through Yoshitoshi’s Fūzoku Sanjūniso
Ateneo and UA&P Asian Studies Convention
(Ateneo de Manila University, February 2006)

You may view a PDF of her Curriculum Vitae here.

When Khursten is not studying manga, she challenges her palate by hunting for awesome restaurants or cooking a new recipe. When called for a conference, she takes time to enjoy her travel a bit before jetlag disrupts her body rhyhthm altogether. She also loves BL. She is a fujoshi.