WEEK 8: END OF WAR TO REDRESS
week eight schedule
FILMS OF THE WEEK
SUNDAY - august 2, 2020
Rohwer Reconstructed: Interpreting Place through Experience
Courtesy of the Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies
https://risingabove.cast.uark.edu/
19 min, 45 sec
reunited after arkansas: Elder Session
Courtesy of Tessaku and Japanese American Memorial Pilgrimages
Anna Hasegawa and Rinko Enosaki went to high school together in Jerome, but haven’t seen each other since. We will reunite them after 75+ years in this panel!
How to record your family’s stories using Saga
Save a loved one’s life story in their voice.
amache elder panel
documenting history: making the cwric la hearing tapes
Courtesy of Visual Communications and Nikkei for Civil Rights and Redress
As part of TADAIMA! A Community Virtual Pilgrimage, Visual Communications hosts a one-hour online program that recounts the production of taped documentation of the Los Angeles Hearings of the Commission on Wartime Relocations and Internment of Civilians (CWRIC), which were held on August 4-6, 1981. The CWRIC Hearings, which were held in multiple cities throughout the United States in 1981, afforded the Japanese American community a crucial first opportunity to tell the full story of relocation and incarceration during WWII, and was a catalyst in uniting the community in its fight for monetary redress from the U.S. government.
Weaving excerpts from its 26-plus hour collection of gavel-to-gavel coverage of the Los Angeles CWRIC Hearings with a brief history of how the Commission was formed, the program will include select members of then-National Coalition for Redress & Reparations who played a vital role in soliciting testifiers and organizing the event. Additional perspectives will include members of the production crew from VC who documented the entire L.A. Hearings, and archival images of the event from VC’s Asian Pacific Photographic Archive as well as select images from individuals who captured the action through still images.
Sunday Supper - Sweet & Sour Spareribs "Pakui" with the Higas
Courtesy of Friends of Minidoka and Densho
“My sansei father Warren Higa, cooks this dish because of his father, James, who called this recipe "pakui". We're still unsure about the meaning of "pakui" but we know it's sweet and sour pork spareribs. It's delicious with any meat or tofu too. My grandma, Hatsumi "Hats" Kosai, was born in Tacoma, WA in 1927 and later incarcerated as a teenager during WWII at Pinedale, Tule Lake and Minidoka, where she graduated from high school. My grandma Hats was a great cook and my fondest memories were her food and her sassy fun loving attitude. Growing up, I would often hear about my Grandpa who was also amazing in the kitchen but he passed away at a young age the year before I was born.
In Seattle, Hats met my grandpa Kamato (went by James or Jimmy) Higa in 1947 when he was stationed at Fort Lewis. Grandpa Higa was born in Paauhau, HI in 1926 on a sugar plantation and then grew up in Honolulu. When I interviewed my Grandma on August 26, 2005 after coming home from the Minidoka pilgrimage, she shared painful memories of camp as a young teenager but also held onto the happy memories of dances, block parties and making friends from Seattle and California. Post war, my Grandparents were very busy with multiple jobs and raising three children but stayed social at the Buddhist Temple, bowling leagues and loved to go dancing on South Jackson Street in Seattle. This recipe represents my grandparents and love of dance because when it all simmers together you can see the pork, pineapple, onion and green peppers dancing in the sweet and sour sauce.”
-Danielle Higa
monday - august 3, 2020
Curator’s Corner: End of war to redress
Courtesy of the National Park Service
9 min, 50 sec
4 min, 58 sec
Unboxed: Conserving History
Courtesy of the Japanese American National Museum
JANM’s Collections department provides a glimpse into the conservation process of one of its most cherished artifacts: Bob Uragami’s Boy Scout drum. Learn of the drum’s storied history, and uncover some of the work that happens behind-the-scenes to care for the unique artifact.
Contested Histories: Building a Traveling Pop-Up Display
Courtesy of the Japanese American National Museum
People often ask how do we travel delicate and fragile artifacts from the WWII incarceration experience around the country. In this short video, we show how we built the crates for the traveling pop-up display of Contested Histories.
3 min, 54 sec
10 min, 35 sec
bag by the door
Courtesy of 50 Objects, 50 Stories
In the early months of 1942, six-year-old Amy Iwasaki would wake up each morning and go to the front door to see if her father’s packed bag was still there.
Her father had bought a leather satchel just big enough to hold belongings for a short trip. It loomed large in Amy’s life.
Genichiro had packed the bag and placed it by the door of their home in East Hollywood in case the FBI came to take him away. He was not guilty of anything other than being an immigrant from Japan, but in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor, he was a potential spy in the eyes of the U.S. government.
“I woke up each morning afraid that he was gone,” Amy told a government commission some 40 years later.
The trauma of not knowing if her father would be taken away while she was asleep became a permanent childhood memory.
norman mineta and his legacy: an american story director q&a
Community Archives
This is a space to share photos, stories, artifacts, and memories from your family, your community, and your own life. Click HERE to enter.
tuesday - august 4, 2020
2 min, 7 sec
Gilbert's Garden
Courtesy of the National Park Service
JAPANESE BONSAI DURING WWII
Courtesy of the Pacific Bonsai Museum
WWII brought immense hardships to the people of Japan as resources were redirected to support the war effort. One bonsai professional, Kyuzo Murata, was granted an official exception by the government to continue bonsai activities.
13 min, 6 sec
14 min, 11 sec
speak out for justice
Courtesy of Steve Nagano and Visual Communications
Edited from the Los Angeles Hearings of the CWRIC in 1981, where 153 testified about circumstances and ramifications of the 1942 force removal and incarceration of Japanese in America.
voices of early redress activists captured in 1980 audio archive
Courtesy of Frank Abe and KRAB-FM
https://resisters.com/2020/07/28/voices-of-early-redress-activists-captured-in-1980-audio-archive/
KRAB Audio Archive Japanese America: Contemporary Perspectives on the Internment
14 min, 4 sec
Recalling William Minoru Hohri's Contribution to Redress
Courtesy of Diane Morita Cole and Densho
Former Mindoka incarceree and author, Diana Morita Cole, talks about the endearing qualities of her mentor, William Minoru Hohri—the civil rights activist who inspired Japanese Americans to seek justice through a class action lawsuit he filed in 1983. Hohri's complaint against the United States government argued there was no military rationale for the imprisonment of Japanese Americans during World War II and that the exclusion was based solely on racism, hysteria, and failed leadership. Today, Hohri, et al., Appellants v. United States of America is studied by students at the Harvard and Yale law schools.
legacy of redress
Courtesy of the National Association of Japanese Canadians
For Japanese Canadians, the legacy of Redress is to work towards the elimination of racial discrimination and intolerance, and work with other Canadian groups and Indigenous peoples for justice and equity for all people.
Both Indigenous and Japanese Canadian stories have been left out of the historical narrative of Canada for too long.
Speakers will share their perspectives of their communities and the intersection of Indigenous peoples and Japanese Canadians in their fight for their rights, their communities, and their environment.
Judith Sayers is a member and former chief of the Hupacasath First Nations. She is a strategic advisor on First Nations issues and an assistant professor in the Faculty of Law and Business at the University of Victoria. In 2019, she was appointed to the Order of Canada for her work on sustainable energy initiatives in Indigenous communities.
Paul Kariya comes from a Japanese Canadian commercial fishing family. He is a senior policy advisor with Coastal First Nations in pursuit of a sustainable coastal economy. He represented Canada as a Commissioner on the Pacific Salmon Commission and was Executive Director of the BC Treaty Commission.
Lorene Oikawa is president of the National Association of Japanese Canadians, and a fourth generation Japanese Canadian. Her father’s side of the family were fishers and boat builders. Her uncle Tatsuro “Buck” Suzuki was a fisher and fought to protect water from industrial dumping and sewage and he worked with Canada’s first NGO, the Society Promoting Environmental Conservation.
Wednesday - august 5, 2020
10 min, 19 sec
Sadako's Origami Cranes: A Message of Peace
Courtesy of National Park Service
In commemoration of the 75th bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Manhattan Project National Historical Park will be presenting a virtual ranger program titled, Sadako's Origami Cranes: A Message of Peace. Sadako Sasaki was two years old on August 6th, 1945, when the United States Air Force dropped the Little Boy atomic bomb over the city of Hiroshima, Japan. Sadako survived the bombing of Hiroshima but passed away ten years later from leukemia. At the end of Sadako's life she folded 1,300 origami cranes in hopes her wish to be well again would be granted. Japanese folklore says that a crane can live for a thousand years, and a person who folds an origami crane for each year of a crane’s life will have their wish granted. The story of Sadako folding 1,300 origami cranes and her message of peace has inspired generations around the world.
internment of japanese in hawai’i
Courtesy of Kanji Sahara and Kristen Tang
25 min, 40 sec
12 min, 12 sec
Seattle NPS Japanese American Remembrance Trail: higo variety store
Courtesy of Wing Luke
heart mountain tour
Courtesy of Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation and Japanese American Memorial Pilgrimages
See how Heart Mountain looks today. Take a tour with HMWF Executive Director, Dakota Russell and Museum Manager, Cally Steussy.
33 min, 30 sec
40 min, 23 sec
the continuing fight for justice for japanese latin americans
Courtesy of Campaign for Justice and the Japanese Peruvian Oral History Project
Under the historic Civil Liberties Act of 1988, the U.S. government declared over 2200 men, women, and children of Japanese ancestry from 13 Latin American countries "ineligible" for redress because they were “illegal aliens.” And yet it was the U.S. government that orchestrated an international hostage exchange program and their imprisonment in US concentration camps. Almost 80 years after these war crimes were committed, the U.S. government still refuses acknowledgment and proper redress. Learn about this ongoing fight to hold the U.S. government accountable, its relevance today, and the significance of the latest development in this struggle for justice.
redress talk with bill yoshino
Courtesy of JACL Chicago
Chicago JACL President, Lisa Doi, discusses redress with former JACL Midwest District Director, Bill Yoshino.
1 hr, 6 min
thursday - august 6, 2020
Densho Rebroadcast-Preserving your family papers/artifacts/photos
link available at 1:00 pm pacific time
Courtesy of Densho
Under A Mushroom Cloud: Sadako's Crane
Courtesy of the Japanese American National Museum
To commemorate the 75th anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Japanese American National Museum presents "Under a Mushroom Cloud: Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and the Atomic Bomb," organized in partnership with the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Clement Hanami, JANM VP of Exhibitions, talks about an origami crane folded by Sadako Sasaki, one of the artifacts included in the exhibition.
Yon-say podcast: Ep. 8
ONE ON ONE GENEALOGY CONSULTATIONS
Brought to you by California Genealogical Society, Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation, NPS and JAMP
Space is limited. Consultations will be scheduled for Thursdays from June 18 - August 13. Each session will be 20 minutes, so preparation is key!
#DEARANCESTORS
By Brynn Saito
Week 8: End of the War to Redress
Prompt: Letters to Justice, Letters to Peace. “Peace, I have feared you, hated you… where are the stone lists who have died in your name?” These lines are from a poem called “To Peace” by Suzanne Gardinier (scroll down here for the full poem). The invitation: write a letter to an abstract concept like justice, peace, power, forgiveness, etc. In the face of these histories, what will you say? What do you want to say to power, to justice, to peace?
75th memorial of hiroshima “peace + art + music” global broadcast
5:00 am to 3:00 pm pacific time
Courtesy of Midheaven Network and the City of Hiroshima
Shadows For Peace: The Hiroshima & Nagasaki Experience
Courtesy of Shadows for Peace
When most Americans hear the words Atomic bomb their point of reference is above the bomb. They envision the mushroom cloud, the “Enola Gay” and might know the cities targeted during WWII, but what was the experience for those below the bombs? Shadows For Peace: The Hiroshima & Nagasaki Experience” features Hibakusha (Bomb affected people) who share their stories of survival, compassion and their hope for all of us, that there are no more “bomb affected people” in this world. This presentation includes survivor testimonial and historical footage and a Q&A with Robert M. Horsting, President of Shadows For Peace.
friday - august 7, 2020
topaz toddler art project
Book Club: They Called Us Enemy-story time with uncle george
Courtesy of George Takei
9 min, 52 sec
book club: farewell to manzanar
Moderated by Hanako Wakatsuki with Mika Kennedy.
ARTISTS AS WITNESS: THREE SEATTLE ISSEI ARTISTS | Kamekichi tokita, “i put down my pen”
Courtesy of Barbara Johns
Once called “the leader of Seattle’s Japanese [Issei] artists,” Kamekichi Tokita was a sign-painter and a hotel manager, who pictured the streets and shops of Nihonmachi in award-winning paintings. In grief and anxiety after Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor, he began a diary the night of December 7, 1941, that richly details his experience of the months leading to incarceration, and continues at Minidoka. The diary provides rare insight into the events of early 1942 from an Issei perspective. Art historian Barbara Johns introduces the artist, followed by a program produced by the Seattle Channel about his diary and artwork.
Seattle Channel recently premiered a program, I Put Down My Pen: The Wartime Reflections of an Issei Artist, which tells the inspirational story of Kamekichi Tokita, a first-generation Japanese immigrant. Tokita was an artist who left behind oil paintings of early Seattle cityscapes and a diary detailing the months before Japanese Americans living on the West Coast were forced into internment camps.
Tokita’s reflections leave a rare history that captures his experience of wartime Seattle as the United States entered World War II.
9 min, 7 sec
17 min, 49 sec
ARTIST TALK WITH emma nishimura & teresa tamura
Emma Nishimura uses media as diverse as traditional etchings, pigment prints, drawings, sudio pieces and installations to address ideas of memory and loss that are rooted within family stories and inherited narratives. Her work exhibits a micro/macro dichotomy-the perceptions of the objects change depending on if viewed as a whole or isolated details.
Beginning in 2001, Sansei photographer and photojournalist Teresa Tamura documented Minidoka, a Japanese American incarceration camp in southern Idaho along with artifacts associated with the site.. Her 11 year project culminated in her book: Minidoka: An American Concentration Camp, published in 2013. Born and raised in Nampa, Idaho, only 150 miles from the Minidoka site, she was unaware of its existence until she learned about it from a college professor. Her black and white infrared photographs are at once a historical document of the contemporary conditions of the site and a glimpse into the lives of those who were forced to live there.
karaoke with kanji and friends
saturday - august 8, 2020
DIYONSEI | how to record oral histories
stop repeating history: wwii incarceration and the parallels to today
Moderated by Wendy Tokuda with panelists Jon Ozaki, Karen Korematsu and Lorraine Banai.
directors talk with the co-directors of fall seven times, get up eight
This conversation with co-directors of the short documentary Fall Seven Times, Get Up Eight will discuss the experiences of Japanese war brides who immigrated in the postwar era, and the unique challenges their mixed race children have faced.
Nikkei Block Party!
Poetry reading by Larry Matsuda
Taiko with Hitoshi Sugiyama
”Never Again is Now” by DC Kaze Jones
Line Dancing with Fujiko
Choreographer Yayoi Kambara in conversation with Sharon Uyeda and Thomas Oshidari, San Jose JACL, and Miya Sommers, Nikkei Resisters and Community Organizers, on the creative journey of her project IKKAI means once: a transplanted pilgrimage . This project is commissioned by the Japanese American Citizens League of San Jose and will premier in 2023.