Eriko Sato received her Ph.D. degree in linguistics from the State University of New York at Stony Brook. She is currently Associate Professor in the Department of Asian and Asian American Studies. She is also the Executive Director of the Japan Center as well as the Founding Director of the Pre-College Japanese Language Program at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. Sato has written other Japanese titles, including the best-selling Japanese for Dummies and Japanese Phrases for Dummies. She lives and teaches on Long Island.