LOS ANGELES — Professor David K. Yoo, director of UCLA’s Asian American Studies Center, announced that the endowed chair and professorship of the Asian American Studies Center has been renamed The George and Sakaye Aratani Professor of the Japanese American Incarceration, Redress and Community. “After considerable consultation, Dr. Lane Hirabayashi, who is the current holder […]
A DAY OF INFAMY INCITES LIFETIMES OF ACTIVISM: Two iconic Nisei recall the event that changed the fate of the community
December 1, 2011 by Leave a Comment
The lives of Japanese Americans would forever be changed following Dec. 7, 1941, the date that President Franklin D. Roosevelt said, “will live in infamy.†For many Nisei, that fateful day left an indelible memory of lives disrupted and changed forever. For two women who grew up in Southern California, this major event in U.S. […]
Microsoft Alumni Foundation awards Densho’s Tom Ikeda $25K
November 25, 2011 by Leave a Comment
SEATTLE — Bill and Melinda Gates announced the Microsoft Alumni Foundation’s 2011 Integral Fellows winners Nov. 16. at the third annual celebration to honor former Microsoft employees for making a meaningful difference in the daily lives of others. The Foundation, which was established in 2007, aims to make a difference in the world through the […]
SUS ITO: The life of an American soldier and noted biologist
November 11, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Susumu “Sus†Ito is renown within the medical field for his work with the gastronomical tract. Despite retiring as a professor from Harvard Medical School in 1990, the 92-year-old continues to go into the lab in Boston a few times a week to study. His work has won him recognition around the world and has […]
Petition launched to rename Arizona park to commemorate wartime incarceration
October 27, 2011 by Leave a Comment
CHANDLER, Ariz. — The city of Chandler, Ariz. drafted plans for “Nozomi Park†in 2005, but has since suspended indefinitely its plans due to budgeting shortfalls. The 70-acre park was meant to honor those of Japanese descent who were incarcerated in the state during World War II. The park’s name, which means “hope†in Japanese, […]
RABBIT RAMBLINGS: A question of loyalty and ‘Conscience’
October 13, 2011 by Leave a Comment
It is a wonderful thing that my friend, Frank Abe, took the time and effort to expand on his very good documentary, “Conscience and the Constitution†(originally released in 2000). He has produced a two-disc Collectors’ Edition DVD, and because we now have the technology to add material, Abe’s story of the draft resisters during […]
CSU films recognize honorary degree recipients
October 13, 2011 by 1 Comment
The California State University (CSU) Office of the Chancellor announced in an Oct. 7 statement that it had completed six videos to honor Nisei who had received honorary bachelor’s degrees from the university’s board of trustees. The former students were forced to leave CSU campuses during World War II, and were among the some 120,000 […]
COMMENTARY: What IS the future of SF’s Japantown?
September 16, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Dear Editor: San Francisco’s Japantown is one of three recognized Japantowns left in the United States. San Francisco’s Japantown in the Western Addition area of the City was decimated twice — first during WWII when Japanese Americans and Japanese nationals were sent to concentration camps; and second in the 1960s when the Redevelopment Agency declared […]
LETTERS: ‘American concentration camp’
September 8, 2011 by Leave a Comment
Dear Editor: We were recently made aware that the American Jewish Committee (AJC) had requested that the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL) disapprove a proposal to utilize the term “American concentration camp†to describe the World War II incarceration of over 120,000 persons of Japanese ancestry. In a June 30, 2011, e-mail to the JACL, […]
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Why all the fuss over language?
“At what point are we, as Americans of Japanese ancestry, going to resist having our history written for us by others?†Aiko Herzig-Yoshinaga, a Nisei survivor of the World War II incarceration, asked this question. She is revered as the researcher who found the document that proved the government claim of “military necessity†as the […]