James Peoples is professor of Sociology/Anthropology and Director of East Asian Studies at Ohio Wesleyan University, where he has been teaching courses in anthropology since 1988. He has also taught in the anthropology departments of the University of California at Davis and the University of Tulsa. His geographic area of specialty is Micronesia, where he studied the impact of American subsidies on the island agricultural and cash economies. His first book, ISLAND IN TRUST (1985), summarized the results of this field research. Since becoming Director of East Asian Studies in 2004, Dr. Peoples has journeyed to Korea and Japan for seminars and workshops. He recently published a chapter, translated into Chinese, in a book used in cultural anthropology courses in the People's Republic of China. He has published most of the results of a comparative analysis of political evolution in Micronesia.

Dr. Peoples also has co-authored ESSENTIALS OF CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY and INTRODUCTION TO CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY.