Participant Info

First Name
Nyri
Last Name
Bakkalian
Affiliation
Freelance Scholar
Website URL
www.riverside-wings.com
Keywords
japan, military history, tohoku, tohoku region, sendai, bakumatsu, american civil war, boshin war, yokai, shinto
Additional Contact Information
Follow me on Twitter at @riversidewings -- I'm most active there.

Personal Info

Photo
About Me

Dr. Nyri A. Bakkalian is an Armenian-American queer woman by birth and a military historian by training. She is a staff writer for Unseen Japan, and the author of Grey Dawn: A Tale of Abolition and Union, which received the 2021 NYC Big Book Award Distinguished Favorite award. She hosts the podcast Friday Night History and co-hosts Cleyera: Conversations on Shinto.

She is proud to have called the American and Japanese northeasts her home. She has produced nonfiction, fiction, and photography content for more than a dozen publications, including two newspapers and five anthologies, as well as for Eisner Award-nominated author Magdalene Visaggio’s Kim & Kim. What’s her secret, you ask? Garlic and Turkish coffee (but really mostly Turkish coffee). Come say hi to her on Twitter, Twitch Patreon, and Facebook, at riversidewings

Recent Publications

Books:

  • Grey Dawn (Balance of Seven Press, 2020)
  • Confluence (Balance of Seven Press, 2022)

Publications:

Podcast Appearances

Public Lectures and Stage Shows

  • “The Armenians of Pittsburgh” (WordPlay, 2017)
  • “Get Your History the Anime Way” (Tekko 2018)
  • “Animal-Person Caricatures” (Anthrocon 2019)
  • “Grey Dawn” (WPAFW 2020)
  • “Shunga” (WPAFW 2021)
  • “Tohoku Krampus: Get to Know the Namahage of Northern Japan” (Anthrocon 2022)
Media Coverage
Country Focus
Japan
Expertise by Geography
Japan, United States
Expertise by Chronology
3, 4, 5, 6
Expertise by Topic
American Civil War, Gender, Government, Military, Politics, Religion, Women