With sudden disregard to law and principle, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt ordered military personnel to detain all Japanese-Americans west of the Mississippi. However, Miné Okubo objected to the President’s decision. Her graphic novel, “Citizen 13660,” underscored the human condition in these interment camps. Her work had spoken of the true fallacies that contaminated American culture. Thus, Miné Okubo had not only challenged American wartime policy, but the entire zeitgeist of the 1940s by identifying the humanity in the Japanese-American population.
Mary Matsuda Gruenewald tells her tale of what life was like for her family when they were sent to internment camps in her memoir “Looking like the Enemy.” The book starts when Gruenewald is sixteen years old and her family just got news that Pearl Harbor was bombed by the Japan. After the bombing Gruenewald and her family life changed, they were forced to leave their home and go to internment camps meant for Japanese Americans. During the time Gruenewald was in imprisonment she dealt with the struggle for survival both physical and mental. This affected Gruenewald great that she would say to herself “Am I Japanese?
Their “Dual” endeavor is to win the war, not only with the enemy abroad but also with the racism at the home front. Takaki’s use of anecdotal narratives does much to illustrate the America in the 1940s, demonstrating the degree to which America was a white man’s country. In addition to this, Takaki shows the wartime responses from a variety of ethnic groups: Koreans, Japanese, Jewish, Filipinos, African Americans, and Italians. Among these groups, Takaki discusses about Japanese Americans in a full chapter, concluding with an examination of Hiroshima as a clear expression of racism.
In When the Emperor Was Divine by Julie Otsuka (Otsuka). we see how five different Japanese Americans live through times of Internment and the struggles they face. An interview with Julie Otsuka and Gene Oishi helps us learn more about her and her family’s experiences during internment and personal connections to the book. “The Public “I” of Julie Otsuka” by John Streamas (Streamas).
Davis paints a clear picture of the events leading up to the Internment of Japanese Americans and describes their time during internment. To begin the book Davis, through events and quotes, explains the view that the Internment of Japanese Americans was not just caused by Pearl Harbor and World War 2 but stemmed from a racial tension between the Japanese Americans and white Americans. He then points his focus on how the Japanese Americans came to be interned, and how Japanese Americans in Hawaii and German and Italian Americans were not interned on a massive scale. Another point he makes is that the Japanese Americans that were forced to live in poor conditions with little to no furniture, privacy, and other basic living essentials. Many families were forced to live in one room buildings and single males and females had to live together in large barracks.
Here, Julie Otsuka shows how the family members' personality, way they treat others, and how they treat themselves change from the alienation and isolation they experience from close family friends all the way up to the United States government. The two children of the family are very young when they are sent to the internment camp and don’t fully understand what is happening. Once they are let out of the camp and they return home, all of their school friends start to ignore them. The children say that, “Not a single one of our old friends from beforeー friends who had once shouted ‘Your house
The West Coast housed a large number of Japanese-Americans, but it was turned into militarized areas with internment facilities. Japanese Americans in these camps lived a military-style life, being required to stay in barracks or cramped living spaces with no running water, dine in large mess halls, and have little privacy. This change demonstrated how Executive Order 9066 greatly affected the lives and well-being of Japanese Americans, emphasizing the loss of civil rights during this troubling time. Even though the National Archives document includes the precise document of Executive Order 9066, it fails to illustrate the day-to-day challenges faced by Japanese-Americans in the internment camps. This restriction necessitates the use of a second source to achieve a more profound perception of the individual repercussions of these camps.
Farewell to Manzanar, a touching memoir written by Jeanne Watkatsuki Houston and James D. Houston, provides a perspective look into the lives of Japanese Americans who were forcibly interned during World War II. Through its narrative, the book points out the significance of family and community in navigating the harsh realities of the internment camps. Through the lens of the Watkatsuki family and their interactions with the extensive community of interned Japanese Americans, we grasp the crucial role of unity and familial bonds in enduring and overcoming adversity. One of the many striking examples of families sticking together in the face of hardship is seen through the Watkatsuki family’s efforts to maintain a resemblance of normality despite their cramped living space, and bleak conditions. Jeanne’s father, George Watkatsuki, takes it upon himself to create a mini garden and craft furniture for their barrack, attempting to create a home in an unwelcoming environment.
Derek Duncan Martica Rogers Period 6 L202 1 March 2023 A Ten Year-Old Preconceived Anomaly In 1942, the United States issued an executive order that resulted in the coerced relocation and internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II. Julie Otsuka’s novel, When the Emperor was Divine, provides an intimate and affecting portrayal of the internment experience through the eyes of a Japanese-American family. Otsuka’s novel offers a poignant exploration of the long-term impact of historical trauma on individuals. The novel heeds the experiences of a mother, father, son, and daughter as they are forcefully obligated to leave their home in Berkeley, California and are sent to an internment camp in the Utah Desert.
During the last three years of World War II approximately 120,000 Japanese-American people were forcibly detained and put in internment camps. The stories of the people put in these camps aren’t well known despite this being an extremely important part of the U.S past. But the novel When the Emperor was Divine tells a fictionalized version of the camps based on the experiences of people in the camps. The characters in this novel were alienated from the outside world and this took a toll on them. All of the characters reacted to this differently but in the end the trauma was long-lasting.
Many Americans saw the internment camps through the government’s persuasion. The United States made the internment camps sound enjoyable and humane, they made documentaries showing the camps showing nothing but happy individuals when there was really a hidden fear. Matsuda opened the eyes of many Americans showing how hard it was to live in the camps and how mentally cruel it could be. Matsuda reveals what it is like during World War II as a Japanese American, through family life, emotional stress, long term effects of interment, and her patriotism and the sacrifices she had to make being in the internment
The graphic novel “They Call US Enemy” written by George Takei serves as a vehicle for social change because it shows to its audience the damage that blind resentment could cause, and to educate individuals on the perspectives of the Second World War. When we think of the United States during the Second World War, we think of ourselves as heroes that helped save the world from the terror of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan. That statement is not necessarily wrong, but this memoir, based on the true story of George Takei, shines light on a different, darker side of American history. Despite expressing loyalty to the United States and faith in the American dream, the Takei family and the rest of Japanese American population were incarcerated.
"Response to Executive Order 9066" by Dwight Okita and "Mericans" by Sandra Cisneros are two thought-provoking literary works that delve into the common theme of injustice and identity. Through the use of various literary devices and techniques, both authors effectively develop this theme, albeit in distinct ways. While Okita emphasizes the emotional impact of forced relocation and its consequences on Japanese Americans during World War II, Cisneros explores the theme of cultural assimilation and its effect on the protagonist's self-identity. This essay will compare and contrast the development of the theme in each work, highlighting the specific literary devices and techniques employed by the authors.
The other article “Japanese American Incarceration” by the National WWII Museum, shows the perspective of American leaders who initiated the act. The poem “Children of Camp” by Lawson Fusao Inada, portrays how the living conditions of Japanese Americans affected their views on life.
After the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, U.S. citizens feared another Japanese attack. They began to believe false rumors that Japanese Americans were sabotaging the United States by mining coastal harbors and poisoning vegetables. A wave of prejudice against Japanese Americans had risen from U.S. fear and uncertainty, eventually resulting in the internment, or confinement of Japanese Americans, where they were rounded up and shipped to “relocation centers” (Danzer et al. 800). Pearl Harbor paranoia from the United States caused Japanese Americans to struggle for change and
