Justin B. Stein

Justin B. Stein, PhD, is an historian of religion who considers modern Japanese spiritual and religious practices in transnational perspective. His first monograph, Alternate Currents: Reiki's Circulation in the Twentieth-Century North Pacific, analyzes the development of the Reiki healing system as an "alternate current" circulating between Japan, Hawai'i, and North America. It also posits a category of "transnational spiritual therapies." which can be applied to other practices, such as yoga and mediation. He has also published about Buddhist medicine and Buddhist politics in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

He is the chair of the Asian Studies program at Kwantlen Polytechnic University in British Columbia, Canada, where he also teaches in the Department of Language and Cultures. In his free time, he enjoys funky and soulful music, cycling, hiking, and skiing.