Areum (Ally) Seo (서아름 / ソ アルム) is currently working as a freelance translator/reviewer for Korean, English, and Japanese at Lionbridge Technologies, Inc., TransPerfect, MoGi Group, and Flitto Inc., and Dragonbaby. She is also a freelance in-house interpreter/translator at kakaopiccoma Corp., and an interpreter at AlphaSights. Before then, she worked as Project Manager at Amazon Japan, Publicis Sapient, Flitto Inc., Defined.ai, Lionbridge Translation Units (TUs), and Social Media Strategist/Analyst at relativ*.
Her expertise lies in linguistics, technical documents, gaming (UI, patch notes, marketplace, in-game conversation), customer services, marketing, and entertainment.
She was born in Seoul. She moved to Tokyo as a MEXT scholar where she studied as a research student at the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies in 2009. She completed her master’s degree in Japanese language education there, and her master’s thesis was entitled “On the creation of writing assessment standards for intermediate-level Japanese learners’ essays in the field of Japanese language education – based on the JF Standard.” She began her Ph.D. in 2012 and finished her coursework in 2015 at the same university.
She has taught Japanese as a foreign language at the Center for Japanese Language, Waseda University from 2013 to 2015 and from 2016 to 2017. She also taught Korean at the Japan College of Foreign Languages from 2014 to 2015.
She is currently based in Seoul, South Korea, and has a permanent resident visa in Japan.
Education
2012-2015 Ph.D. ABD Language and Cultural Studies, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
2010-2012 M.A. Applied Linguistics, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
2009-2010 Research Student Japanese Linguistics, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
2005-2006 Exchange Student English Literature, Ritsumeikan University
2003-2007 B.A. English Literature/Japanese Interpretation for Tourism, Kyung Hee University
2012-2015 Ph.D. ABD Language and Cultural Studies, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
2010-2012 M.A. Applied Linguistics, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
2009-2010 Research Student Japanese Linguistics, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
2005-2006 Exchange Student English Literature, Ritsumeikan University
2003-2007 B.A. English Literature/Japanese Interpretation for Tourism, Kyung Hee University
Awards and Scholarships
2018 Customer Obsession Award, Amazon Japan G.K.
2012-2015 Grant for Excellent Graduate Schools
The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, and Technology (MEXT) of Japan
2009-2015 Japanese Government (MEXT) Scholarship
The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, and Technology (MEXT) of Japan
Research Projects Participated
2012-2015 Research Assistant in the Grant-In-Aid for Scientific Research (KAKEN) (B) Comprehensive Study on Language Education Policies and Cross-Linguistic Proficiency Evaluation Methods for Asian Languages (Principal researcher: Nobuo Tomimori)
2012-2015 Research Assistant in the World Language and Society Education Centre, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies (Principal researcher: Nobuo Tomimori)
2018 Customer Obsession Award, Amazon Japan G.K.
2012-2015 Grant for Excellent Graduate Schools
The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, and Technology (MEXT) of Japan
2009-2015 Japanese Government (MEXT) Scholarship
The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, and Technology (MEXT) of Japan
Research Projects Participated
2012-2015 Research Assistant in the Grant-In-Aid for Scientific Research (KAKEN) (B) Comprehensive Study on Language Education Policies and Cross-Linguistic Proficiency Evaluation Methods for Asian Languages (Principal researcher: Nobuo Tomimori)
2012-2015 Research Assistant in the World Language and Society Education Centre, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies (Principal researcher: Nobuo Tomimori)
Completed Courses and Certificates
Google Project Management: Project Planning: Putting It All Together (License B776CDB7BVUU) Coursera, May 2023
Google Project Management: Project Initiation: Starting a Successful Project (License XR53WH2L83GY) Coursera, April 2023
Google Project Management: Foundations of Project Management (License UZGGFEA9NHDS) Coursera, February 2023
DevOps on AWS: Specialization (License WFBYX7KTRWAU), Coursera, October 2022
DevOps on AWS: Operate and Monitor (License 7TD7LSH2W9XH), Coursera, October 2022
DevOps on AWS: Release and Deploy (License MTNLY26DRHGN), Coursera, October 2022
DevOps on AWS: Code, Build, and Test (License 72MFKSR4G8B9), Coursera, September 2022
AWS Cloud Essentials (License Z55J7AGSXHYB), Coursera, September 2022
SDL Trados Studio 2021 New Features, SDL, October 2021
Google Analytics Individual Qualification, Google, August 2020
Advanced Google Analytics, Google, August 2020
Google Analytics for Beginners, Google, August 2020
SDL Post Editing, SDL, February 2020
Budgeting and Scheduling Projects (License 7BMRHLK9KJ6H), University of California, Irvine, Coursera, March 2019
Initiating and Planning Projects (License 567ALP8QBG4D), University of California, Irvine, Coursera, March 2019
The Data Scientist’s Toolbox (License LQUEM2RHVGGR), Johns Hopkins University, Coursera, January 2019
Python for Everybody Specialization (License DSKSD8JLCS72), University of Michigan, Coursera, October 2018
Introduction to Data Analysis, Codecademy, April 2018
Korean Teacher Training Course, Seoul National University Extension College, September to December 2012
Google Project Management: Project Planning: Putting It All Together (License B776CDB7BVUU) Coursera, May 2023
Google Project Management: Project Initiation: Starting a Successful Project (License XR53WH2L83GY) Coursera, April 2023
Google Project Management: Foundations of Project Management (License UZGGFEA9NHDS) Coursera, February 2023
DevOps on AWS: Specialization (License WFBYX7KTRWAU), Coursera, October 2022
DevOps on AWS: Operate and Monitor (License 7TD7LSH2W9XH), Coursera, October 2022
DevOps on AWS: Release and Deploy (License MTNLY26DRHGN), Coursera, October 2022
DevOps on AWS: Code, Build, and Test (License 72MFKSR4G8B9), Coursera, September 2022
AWS Cloud Essentials (License Z55J7AGSXHYB), Coursera, September 2022
SDL Trados Studio 2021 New Features, SDL, October 2021
Google Analytics Individual Qualification, Google, August 2020
Advanced Google Analytics, Google, August 2020
Google Analytics for Beginners, Google, August 2020
SDL Post Editing, SDL, February 2020
Budgeting and Scheduling Projects (License 7BMRHLK9KJ6H), University of California, Irvine, Coursera, March 2019
Initiating and Planning Projects (License 567ALP8QBG4D), University of California, Irvine, Coursera, March 2019
The Data Scientist’s Toolbox (License LQUEM2RHVGGR), Johns Hopkins University, Coursera, January 2019
Python for Everybody Specialization (License DSKSD8JLCS72), University of Michigan, Coursera, October 2018
Introduction to Data Analysis, Codecademy, April 2018
Korean Teacher Training Course, Seoul National University Extension College, September to December 2012