SKY COUNTRY By Christine Kitano (Rochester, N.Y.: BOA Editions Ltd., 2017, 104 pp., paperback) Ithaca College professor Christine Kitano’s “Sky Country” is a thought-provoking collection of poems that speak to Kitano’s mixed Korean-Japanese background. She organizes her book of poetry thematically into five sections each interwoven with the personal and collective histories of Korean and […]
Preserving family histories for the future: Nikkei Angel Island Pilgrimage
November 8, 2018 by Leave a Comment
Although Japanese Americans now thrive across the United States, approximately 85,000 of them first stepped foot on the U.S. mainland after stopping at the U.S. Immigration Station on Angel Island. In an effort to reclaim that part of Nikkei history, the Nichi Bei Foundation held its fourth Nikkei Angel Island Pilgrimage Oct. 13 on the […]
NIKKEI ANGEL ISLAND CHRONICLES: The Angel Island story of Kane Mineta, Norman Mineta’s mother
September 27, 2018 by Leave a Comment
(Editor’s Note: The following article was published on the Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation’s Website, www.aiisf.org). Americans know Norman Mineta as the first Asian American in a presidential cabinet, when he was secretary of commerce under President Bill Clinton, secretary of transportation under George Bush, where he took decisive action after the attacks of 9/11, […]
Asian American DACA recipients await congressional action
March 15, 2018 by Leave a Comment
LOS ANGELES — Since September, undocumented adults living in America legally through the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program have been in a state of limbo. When the Trump administration last year announced March 5 as the end of the Obama-signed program that protects from deportation the so-called “Dreamer” children who entered the United States […]
Korean DACA recipient saw life uprooted in move to Canada
March 1, 2018 by Leave a Comment
LOS ANGELES — “Nobody wants to take care of DACA more than myself and the Republican Party,” President Donald Trump said Jan. 26 in a CNBC interview, referring to the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. In September, urging Congress to replace DACA, Trump announced he was ending the program that protects so-called “Dreamer” children […]
Massive crowd gathers to celebrate workers’ immigrants’ rights
May 11, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Chanting, “We want justice for our people,” waving signs and cheering, more than 1,000 people gathered peacefully in Oakland’s Fruitvale neighborhood May 1 in honor of May Day and in support of immigrant rights. A broad coalition of groups joined in the tenth annual observance of International Workers Day by Oakland Sin Fronteras, a labor […]
Local leaders praise injunction blocking sanctuary executive order
April 27, 2017 by Leave a Comment
A federal judge in San Francisco April 25 issued a nationwide preliminary injunction blocking an executive order by President Donald Trump that threatened to deny federal funding to sanctuary cities and counties. U.S. District Judge William Orrick ruled in a pair of lawsuits filed by the city of San Francisco and Santa Clara County. He […]
FAMILY REUNION: Third annual Nikkei Angel Island Pilgrimage reunites families with legacies
October 13, 2016 by Leave a Comment
“Well Grandpa, we’re all here,”? Terri Tamaru said to a carving located on the second floor of the former Angel Island Immigration Station barracks. Tamaru, along with her children and grandchildren, attended the Nikkei Angel Island Pilgrimage Oct. 1 at the Angel Island Immigration Station in the San Francisco Bay. The third annual event, presented […]
20th anniversary screenings of ‘Picture Bride’ honor pioneering Issei
October 15, 2015 by Leave a Comment
More than 100 community members gathered at New People Cinema in San Francisco’s Japantown Sept. 25 to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Kayo Hatta’s groundbreaking film “Picture Bride.” According to the film, some 20,000 young women from Japan, Okinawa and Korea journeyed to Hawai‘i between 1907 and 1924 to meet their new husbands — men […]
California chief justice on the right side of history
We applaud Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye of the California Supreme Court for taking a strong position against the Immigration and Customs Enforcement practice of stalking undocumented immigrants in California courthouses. “There is ample evidence that immigrants view such practices as a form of stalking that deters them from seeking justice for themselves or cooperating in […]