FEATURE
When Interpreting Resistance Becomes an Act of Resistance
This memorial, built to honor Japanese Americans who were incarcerated during World War Two, is located close to the United States Capitol. It serves as a reminder to lawmakers and citizens of what “we must not allow to happen again to any group.” Photo Courtesy of Amanda Roper.
It was the height of summer in Washington D.C., in 2016. Thousands of tourists flooded the National Mall and the air crackled with tension as it always does in a presidential election year. Some candidates for the nation’s highest office proposed banning people from the country based on their race, religion, or ethnicity. Words I read every day carved in granite struck me as particularly relevant:
We must scrupulously guard the civil rights and civil liberties of all citizens, whatever their background. We must remember that any oppression, any injustice, any hatred, is a wedge designed to attack our civilization.
Ironically, these remarks were drafted by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1940. Only a short time later, Roosevelt would enact one of the most infamous executive orders in American history, which led to the forced removal and incarceration of Japanese Americans in concentration camps during World War Two.
As a young seasonal park ranger on the National Mall, I felt compelled to create an interpretive program around this history of removal and incarceration to help visitors understand how fear and prejudice led to such an act of injustice. Utilizing the theme of resistance, my program highlighted the different ways Japanese Americans bravely fought for their rights and dignity. And I purposely chose to share their stories at the memorial to the man who authorized their incarceration.
For me, the history was also personal. My father’s side of the family comes from Gunma, a mostly mountainous prefecture in Japan located roughly fifty miles north of Tokyo. During the Second World War, my grandmother recalled, even from that distance, seeing the night sky lit up by Tokyo burning. She came to America with my two-year-old father in the 1950s after the restrictions on Japanese immigration had been lifted. The need to prove their loyalty and their “Americanness” was still palpable within the Japanese American community. My grandmother learned how to make apple pie. My dad stopped speaking Japanese.
However, as I shared in my program, discrimination against Japanese Americans did not begin when the United States and Japan went to war in 1941. The roots of discrimination can be traced back to the very founding of the country. The Naturalization Act of 1790 limited naturalization to immigrants who were free and white. In the mid-nineteenth century, immigrants began to come to America from Asia, first from China and later from Japan. When the Naturalization Act of 1870 extended naturalization to people of African descent, Asian immigrants were still barred from citizenship. Japanese people began immigrating in increasing numbers during the 1880s, with most settling on the west coast where they worked as farm laborers and fishermen. They encountered resentment from the local population and were labeled as “unassimilable.” But the second generation, born on American soil, were citizens.
I shared this family photo of my grandparents and infant father in Japan taken in 1956, before my grandmother immigrated to the United States. She would never return to her native country. Sharing my personal connection to the history created a moving interpretive experience for participants and for me as an interpreter. Photo Courtesy of the Takahashi Bush family.
These words were delivered in a 1940 speech by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt for the American Committee for Protection of the Foreign-born. They are inscribed on the memorial to Roosevelt on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Photo Courtesy of Amanda Roper.
A wall, inscribed with the names of the ten concentration camps where Japanese Americans were held during World War Two, encircles a bronze statue of two cranes. They are struggling to free themselves from barbed wire. The crane is an important symbol of hope and peace in Japanese culture. Photo Courtesy of Amanda Roper.
Prejudice against Japanese Americans came to an ugly head after Japan attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor in December 1941. Leaders of the robust Japanese communities in Hawaii and along the west coast of the United States were immediately arrested, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 in February 1942. Over 120,000 Japanese American immigrants and citizens were forced to leave their homes, businesses, and most of their belongings behind. Jeanne Wakatsuki described her mother, who was one of these Japanese American citizens forced to leave, deliberately smashing her wedding dishes, piece by piece, rather than suffer the insult of trying to sell them for far less than they were worth.
Japanese Americans were sent to concentration camps constructed in parts of the country that were isolated and harsh. Survivors of Manzanar, one concentration camp in the extreme climate of the Californian desert, shared vivid memories of the frequent, choking dust storms. Men, women, and children were forced to live in hastily built shelters that provided little protection from the extreme changes in temperature. Beyond the physical discomforts, though, were the emotional and psychological traumas. The whole process not only disrespected people’s rights and humanity, but it also was deeply insulting to Japanese culture which valued honor, privacy, and family.
Resistance to incarceration came in many forms. Improvements made to the camps by the people held inside were a testament to their resilience as they rebuilt their lives and maintained their cultural traditions. Places of worship, schools, baseball fields, and gardens were a few of the spaces where they strengthened community bonds, created beauty, and fostered hope under difficult circumstances.
Others decided on more confrontational action. Young Japanese American citizens, in particular, felt a deep sense of betrayal by their President and their country. A few of them decided to fight this injustice in court. Four separate “internment cases” were brought before the Supreme Court by Gordon Hirabayashi, Minori Yasui, Fred Korematsu, and Mitsuye Endo. Endo’s 1944 decision found that U.S. citizens who were shown to be loyal could not be lawfully detained. This case effectively marked the end of incarceration.
Some young Japanese Americans decided to prove their loyalty through military service by joining the segregated 442nd Regimental Combat Team, which included the 100th Infantry Battalion. The regiment was organized in 1943 in the midst of the war. These soldiers risked their lives fighting for a country that still held many of their family members in concentration camps. The 442nd served in the European theatre and became one of the most highly decorated military units during the Second World War.
By focusing on these stories of resilience and resistance, I found participants in my program were more open to learning about this painful chapter in America’s past and empathized with those impacted by it. I was surprised by how many visitors I initially spoke with who were unfamiliar with this history. The setting of the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial, which does much to celebrate and little to challenge FDR’s legacy, created striking moments to ponder how we remember or choose not to remember parts of our collective past that challenge us.
This inscription on the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial provoked many conversations around how we remember and memorialize our nation’s past. The memorial was dedicated in 1997 and was built along the Tidal Basin where the cherry blossoms, a gift from Japan, bloom every spring. Photo Courtesy of Amanda Roper.
The Japanese American Memorial to Patriotism during World War II was dedicated in 2000. It honors Japanese Americans who were incarcerated and those who served in the US military during the Second World War. Photo Courtesy of Amanda Roper.
The famous cherry blossoms along the tidal basin, planted as symbols of friendship between Japan and the United States, still bloom at the FDR Memorial every spring. I ended my tour beside these trees and shared my own personal connection. I showed a photo of my grandparents and young father standing under a cherry blossom tree in Japan and spoke about my grandmother immigrating to America in the 1950s. While I have always believed it is important to be open with my own emotions when sharing painful and challenging history, I had never before incorporated my own story into an interpretive program. There were times that I felt vulnerable and uncertain about how people would respond, but I chose to share my family’s experience as a way to further humanize this part of history and its legacies. It is harder to see people as “others” when you have taken the time to listen to each other and embrace different perspectives. One older couple, who appeared visibly moved when they found out my family connection, shared with me: “We had learned in school and always assumed that the internment of Japanese Americans was justified because of national security, but now we have a completely different view.”
This program felt different from others I have led, in part due to the personal element, but also because of the topic and its relevance to that particular moment of divisive political clamor. Sharing this history with the public was my own act of resistance. I was adding to the civic conversation by providing historical context that was timely and important. It was not about telling people how to feel or what to believe, but letting them experience empathy and draw connections for themselves.
My experience in the summer of 2016, sharing the history of people resisting an injustice perpetrated by their own government, is a reminder that good interpretation can also be its own powerful act of resistance. National debates still rage over who is defined as “American” and who qualifies for the rights and protections of citizenship. There is also increasing concern over the censorship of American history. Now is the time for interpreters to utilize their unique skills, knowledge, ability to communicate, and even personal perspectives to help the public understand the important lessons we can learn from looking to the past.
Over 120,000 Japanese Americans were incarcerated by the United States government during World War Two. Almost forty years later, in 1983, the Federal Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians found there had been no military necessity for the mass imprisonment of Japanese Americans and a grave injustice had been committed. Photo Courtesy of Amanda Roper.
After my program, I encouraged participants to visit another memorial located just steps away from the U.S. Capitol building—the Japanese American Memorial to Patriotism During World War Two. Sadly, it is a site that few residents and even fewer tourists visit. In the center of the memorial, two bronze cranes, symbols of hope, struggle to free themselves from barbed wire. The names of the ten concentration camps where Japanese Americans were incarcerated encircle the statue. On one panel, the words of Daniel K. Inouye, who served as a Captain in the 442nd Regimental Combat Team and later as a Congressman and Senator, reveal why this memorial is so important:
“The lessons learned must remain as a grave reminder of what we must not allow to happen again to any group.”
Inouye’s statement empowered me to stand up and speak up about the past through good interpretation. My hope is that these words, also carved in granite, encourage my fellow interpreters to continue to engage in challenging conversations and believe in the relevance and impact of our work, especially during times of national turmoil.
