東京大学教養学部教養学科卒業。ケンブリッジ大学国際関係論専攻MPhil課程修了。東京大学博士(学術)。国際交流基金、UNESCO本部勤務、静岡文化芸術大学准教授、国際日本文化研究センター准教授等を経て、2018年より現職。専門分野は、外交史・文化交流史、文化政策。日本の幕末期を中心とする「外交の文化史」の研究を軸に、国際文化政策の現場での経験を生かしながら、歴史の「公平な」語りの可能性を探していきたいと考えている。
主要著作に、『オールコックの江戸―初代英国公使が見た幕末日本』(中央公論新社、2003）、"La politique culturelle du Japon" (Philippe Poirrier (dir.), Pour une histoire des politiques culturelles dans le monde : 1945-2011, Paris : Comité d'histoire du ministère de la culture, 2011),　『万国博覧会と人間の歴史』（編著、思文閣出版、2015）、『幕末外交儀礼の研究―欧米外交官たちの将軍拝謁』（思文閣出版、2016）など。

SANO Mayuko graduated from The University of Tokyo, and obtained an MPhil in International Relations from the University of Cambridge and a PhD from The University of Tokyo. After working at the Japan Foundation and the UNESCO Headquarters, she served as Associate Professor at the Faculty of Cultural Policies of Shizuoka University of Art and Culture, and the International Research Center for Japanese Studies. She was appointed to the current position in 2018. As a historian of diplomacy focusing on 19^th-century Japan, she has been pursuing “cultural history of diplomacy”. She aims to combine her scholarly interest and practical experiences in the field of international cultural policies, and is particularly interested in considering the possibilities of truly global narrative of history.
Her major publications include Alcock's Yedo: Japan of the Last Days of the Ancien Regime Seen by the First British Minister (Tokyo: Chuokoron-shinsha, 2003), “La politique culturelle du Japon” (Philippe Poirrier (dir.), Pour une histoire des politiques culturelles dans le monde : 1945-2011, Paris : Comité d'histoire du ministère de la culture, 2011), Expos and Human History (Edited and written by Sano, Kyoto: Shibunkaku Shuppan, 2015), Diplomatic Ceremonial in the Last Decade of the Tokugawa Regime: Western Diplomats’ Audiences with the Shōgun (Kyoto: Shibunkaku Shuppan, 2016.