Themes In Farewell To Manzanar

Farewell to Manzanar, a book written by Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston and James D. Houston highlights Jeanne and her family's experience of 3 years in Manzanar under executive order 9066. Jeanne’s experience in the camps takes place during America's role in WW2 (1942-1945) when 120,000 Japanese Americans were forced into internment camps due to their race. Throughout the book Jeanne writes about struggles in her family and highlights the short term and long term consequences of internment. During the beginning of the book readers can observe the up-front struggles of Jeannes family's internment. First of all, Papa was the head of the family, and without him the Wakatsukis were “like councilors in absence of a chief”. Papa’s absence from the Family created a disarray. (14). Second of all, there was very little privacy at Manzanar. The Latrines in the camp were “back to back, with no partitions” extinguishing any hopes of privacy along with the close living quarters. With very little privacy the Wakatsukis felt exposed and on

First of all Jeanne's family stopped eating together. Before the war they used to eat at the same table, but during internment, Jeanne and her family “stopped eating as a family”. Eating separately started the separation of their family(32). Second of all Papa became an alcoholic. When papa came back from fort lincoln he was labeled an inu which added to the shame of being interned. Papa “exiled himself, like a leper, and he drank.” Papa's drunkenness cut his life short and caused him to physically and mentally harass his family, tearing them apart even more(61). Third of all, many Wakatsukis moved to the East Coast while some stayed west. As much as others tried to persuade Papa to come to New Jersey, “Papa would never move back east.” With the family separated Papa felt a lack of purpose or responsibility which led him back to