#Japanese American

[thebi-acenerd]

"people having trouble with vocalizations not found in their native language actually racism and victimization of you personally if there's a weird sound in your name" tell the French

For context, I think this is about a couple of comments i made in response to someone complaining under a post by @doberbutts about racism surrounding marijuana that they were upset about OP “reminding them of racism and marginalization” and that it ruined their day. (I suspect this ask comes from the person I responded to)

The comments were generally about micro-aggressions and how they manifest for me, as a biracial East Asian. My last name, that I complained about people pronouncing incorrectly, entirely contains vocalizations found in English. It is perfectly translatable into the latin alphabet. It’s rude of you (and kind of racist tbh) to assume my last name isn’t that, because most Japanese words are.

Even then, I mentioned that once I tell people how to pronounce my name, they grossly mispronounce it. I don’t want to put my full surname here, but it ends in “gai”. A common thing I get is people who pronounce it “gi” or “ji”, or emphasize the wrong parts of my name even when I tell them how to properly pronounce it.

It is also, frankly, racist of you to call Japanese names weird by saying they contain weird sounds. Most Japanese names are easily written and pronounced in English, and even if they weren’t, those sounds wouldn’t be “weird”. They’d just be from a different culture.

This is full of the type of micro-aggression I was talking about. Do better.

#asian american #asian #racism #japanese #japanese american

[hauntedbystorytelling]

Taizo Kato ~ Woman in a Kimono with a Birdcge, ca. 1920 | Laurence Miller Gallery : Taizo Kato & The Korin

#taizo kato #pictorialism #pictorialist portrait #kimono #birdcage #1920s #japanese american #pictorial portrait #pictorialisme #pictorialismo #piktorialismus #oriental costume #japanese costume #traditional costume

[holy-ghost-fire]

A group of Japanese American soldiers in France, December 1944. Nisei soldier's caption: "Mule skinners. Charlie Co. were really in the hills. All supplies being brought up by mules went up to operate our radio and lead one of these critters. But halfway up I had the mule drag me. Lucky that my animal was tame enough not to mind."

#history #japanese american #world war ii #military history #nisei

[todaysdocument]

"Loyalty towards a Country or a Nation...is a covenant..."

Record Group 21: Records of District Courts of the United StatesSeries: Criminal Case FilesFile Unit: United States of America vs. Kiyoshi Okamoto, et. al.

Loyalty towards a Country or a Nation is a m[a]tter of the sentiment. It is nurtured from a knowledge of justice received. It is a covenant of faith between the party of the People on the one hand and the Party of the Government on the other. Under this understanding, the People maintain the inviolability of our Instruments of Government. For this service, the Government assume the responsibilities of justice, freedom, liberty and security to It's Inhabitants. Under such an interpretation, the President terminated the agreement when he caused to be evacuated 112,000 People without due process of law. In so doing, he violated the very fundamentals of our democratic form of government. He disregarded the guarantees of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. He caused us into Citizens without a Country. By these acts, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights become of doubtful value as Instruments guaranteeing Life, Liberty, Justice, Freedom and Security. With these conditions, where does our Country need us the most--on the home front where justice, freedom, democracy and liberty are slapped on the face or, on foreign battlefields to uphold dubious ideals and Principles? We believe a correct understanding must be had at this time between true patriotism and loyalty on the one hand and from regimented concept of misguided interpretations on the other. We believe the first duty of every true and loyal Citizen is the protection of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. The cornerstone of these Instruments of our Government are Justice, Liberty, Security, Freedom, and the protection of Humane Rights. These are flagrantly violated in the various procedures of our evacuation, deportation and detention. We believe the issue forced upon us is sufficently vital as to warrant a decided attitude...not only for our benefit but, as a safeguard to our hitherto free and democratic form of government. It is vital as an issue of National defense if Democracy is to exist. [STRIKETHROUGH] If we are loyal and patriotic Citizens, we must keep an eagle eye on ten cent leaders who are unable to see beyond the 12-16-19 dollars paid them by the W. R. A.[END STRIKETHROUGH] Thus, to be drafted or not to be drafted or, to be loyal or not to be loyal as Citizens with suspended Rights are not the questions at issue. To us, the fundamentals of Democracy is at stake. In the preservation of the ideals and principles of freedom, justice and democratic practices as guaranteed by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights within our own home front lie any hope to validate and justify any utterances of freedoms and democracies. We must rectify the breaches made upon the guarantees of justice, freedom and democratic practices by the Roosevelt Administration. THEREBY, AS TRUE AND LOYAL CITIZENS OF THIS NATION, WE ASK A FIRST CLARIFICATION OF OUR STATUS AND RIGHTS AS FORCED[full transcription at link]

#archivesgov #1940s #world war ii #February 15 #1944 #japanese internment #japanese american

[fokikowest]

Think reparations are impossible? The story of Japanese Americans proves otherwise

#remember japanese american internment camps #japanese american internment #japanese american #japanese #japanese internment #reparations #black americans #reparations for black americans

[ya-world-challenge]

YA Pacific WW2 Books

Today marks the 78th anniversary of the bombing of Nagasaki, 3 days after the bombing of Hiroshima.

I've had a list of WW2 books in a file for a while. I noticed the Pacific side of the war is much less represented in fiction, but there are still many promising-looking books out there. These range from stories in Japan-occupied territories, to Jews in Shanghai, bombs in Australia, and stories of the atomic bombs in Japan and internment of Japanese-Americans.

Let me know if you've read any of these!

When My Name Was Keoko by Linda Sue Park (Korea) The Hundred Choices Department Store by Ginger Park (Korea) The Songbird and the Rambutan Tree by Lucille Abendanon (Indonesia) [releases in 2024] Anya's War by Andrea Alban Gosline (China) Little Paradise by Gabrielle Wang (Australia - China) The Forgotten Pearl by Belinda Murrell (Australia) The Sky We Shared by Shirley Reva Vernick (Japan - United States) Barefoot Gen by Keiji Nakazawa (Japan) [manga] The Girl with the White Flag Tomiko Higa, Dorothy Britton (Japan) The Last Cherry Blossom by Kathleen Burkinshaw (Japan) Hunt for the Bamboo Rat by Graham Salisbury (United States - Philippines) [more in the series] Beneath the Wide Silk Sky by Emily Inouye Huey (Japanese-American) They Called Us Enemy by George Takei (Japanese-American) [graphic novel] Weedflower by Cynthia Kadohata (Japanese-American) We Are Not Free - Traci Chee (Japanese-American) Climbing the Stairs by Padma Venkatraman (India)

🕊️🕊️ Prayers for peace. 🕊️🕊️

#book list #ww2 #historical fiction #booklr #japanese american #japan #korea #indonesia #china #australia #philippines #india #war #historical 20th century

[wildbeautifuldamned]

Takahashi Style Japanese Internment Pin, Handpainted, Vintage ebay lisapapotto

#japanese #japan #japanese american #bird #interment camp #relocation camp #ww2 #jewelry #brooch

[retropopcult]

"Los Angeles, California. Street scene in Little Tokyo. Businesses represented here on East First Street include the Hotel Mikado, Sho-Fu-Do confectionery, Ten-Gen restaurant, Sato Book Store, Hotel Empire, Sumida & Son hardware, Angel Cake Shop, Moon Fish Co., Eagle Employment Agency, Kawahara Co. and Dr. C.K. Nagao, dentist.”  Photographed spring 1942 by Russell Lee for the Office of War Information.

#vintage #1940s #war time #Japanese American #OWI #WWII #cars #homefront #wartime #World War II

[importantwomensbirthdays]

Kazue Togasaki

Dr. Kazue Togasaki was born in 1897 in San Francisco, California. Dr. Togasaki received her medical degree in Philadelphia in 1933, and returned to San Francisco, where she opened her own practice. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Dr. Togasaki was one of more than 100,000 Japanese Americans sent to internment camps. She was placed in an "assembly center", an interim holding facility with poor conditions. At the Tanforan Assembly Center, Dr. Togasaki set up the medical facilities and led other healthcare professionals. In her first month, she delivered more than 50 babies. She provided care at every facility she was sent to thereafter. Dr. Togasaki continued to serve her community for 40 years after she was released. Over the course of her career, she delivered more than 10,000 babies.

Dr. Kazue Togasaki died in 1992 at the age of 95.

#medicine #women in medicine #asian-american #japanese american #doctors #history #women's history

[vmatsuko-art]

Figured I should probably post this on here cause I never remember to but here’s what I’ve been working on for the past two weeks!

I’ve been calling it my insanity project and you’ll be able to see why in a sec-

That is a list of names, specifically the names of every person that was interned at Amache, the Japanese Internment camp that my family was imprisoned in during WWII. There were just over 10,000 people that were there at one point or another in the three years it was in operation with a peak population of over 7,000 at one time. Keep in mind Amache was the smallest of the camps and over 125,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned by the US government

I have been hand writing out every single name of those that were imprisoned at Amache

This project was inspired by the Ireizō book that has been at the JANM in Los Angeles that I got the privilege of visiting with my mom and aunt and stamping the names of our relatives

My project is organized by birth year like the Ireizō is and I’ve gotten up to halfway through 1892 so I’ve still got quite a bit to go

You can read more about the monument here, it’s truly amazing- the website also has a searchable database of everyone interned

Here’s more closeups on my project so you can see just the sheer scale of how huge this is- I crashed procreate at least 3 times while pasting in the list of names

Eventually when I get to the kanji characters the lettering will be red on the black so I think it’ll look cool but I still have a ways to go.

#art #my art #japanese american #amache #wish me luck #ive spent 25 hours on this so far and its only 1/5 done

[jasonraish]

Infinity! A Japanese-American dance duo must choose between their passion or their lives as WWII concentration camps begin to rise in the U.S. Based on a real life dance duo Toy and Wing. A sad story forcing us to look at the shameful Japanese concentration camp history in the US. Director Benjamin To contacted me to make the key art poster for his short film and we settled on an American in Paris inspired vintage poster treatment. One Sheet size 27x40″. Staring Olivia Cordell and Jonathan Tanigaki

INFINITY! has been officially selected to make its world premiere at one of the biggest short film festivals in the world, the LA Shorts International Film Festival July 19-27, 2023. Congrats to the cast and crew.

#toy and wing #infinity! #benjamin to #jonathan tanagaki #concentration camp #japanese concentration camp #japanese internment #japanese internment camp #dance duo #ballroom dance #wwii #world war 2 #sanfrancisco bay bridge #bay bridge #san francisico #japanese american #japanese americans #key art #la shorts international film festival #movie poster #film poster #short film #artists on tumblr #fyiart #illustration #poster design #poster illustration #poster art #jonathan tanigaki #olivia cordell

[hauntedbystorytelling]

Taizo Kato (Japanese-American, 1887 - 1924) ~ Untitled, before 1924 | src Getty Museum

A tree growing beside a pond. The tree and its branches are reflected in the surface of the water.

#Taizo Kato #pictoralism #pictorial motive #pictorialist photographer #Japanese American #1920s #soft focus #landscape #waterscape #Piktorialismus #pictorialismo #pictorialisme #Japanese American pictorialists #foliage #pond #reflection

[holy-ghost-fire]

A group of Japanese American soldiers and a white soldier pose with captured Japanese bolt-action rifles on Okinawa, July 1945. The soldiers are T/3 Akira Nakamura, 1st Lt. John Flagler, T/3 Shigeru Sato, T/3 Frank Mizuno, T/3 Harry Okano, T/3 Robert Oda.

#japanese american #nisei #world war ii #world war 2 #wwii #military history #history #442nd #442nd rct

[todaysdocument]

Gila River Relocation Center, Rivers, Arizona. Kindergarten class in Canal.

Record Group 210: Records of the War Relocation Authority Series: Central Photographic File of the War Relocation Authority

This black and white photograph shows Japanese-American children sitting on benches at long tables in a room decorated for Halloween.  Several Japanese-American women assist the children who appear to be making crafts.

#archivesgov #1940s #world war ii #October 25 #1943 #japanese internment #japanese american #war relocation

[100gayicons]

“I became involved in a lot of human rights activities, which all stemmed from my sexual orientation as much as anything.”

Kiyoshi Kuromiya was a true hero who devoted his life to the struggle for social justice. Whether it’s was for civil right for Black Americans, the injustice of the Viet Nam War, Gay Rights, or effective treatment for people with AIDS - Kuromiya was there fighting for the cause.

Perhaps Kuromiya passion to fight oppression stems from the fact he was born at the World War II–era Japanese American internment camp (Heart Mountain, Wyoming).

At a very young age, Kuromiya was aware he was homosexual, although he didn’t know the term for it. At the age of 9 he found a copy of The Kinsey’s report on sexual behavior on open shelves in Public Library. It explain his nature to him. He soon “came out” to his parents. But later he was arrested for lewd behavior in a public park with a 16 year old teen boy. They were both detained and placed in juvenile hall for three days as punishment.

”… the judge or whatever he was told me and my parents that I was in danger of leading a lewd and immoral life.”

The arrest made Kuromiya feel like a criminal. The sense of shame forced him to keep his sexual identity a secret.

But those repressed feelings drove him to fight oppression. While attending the University of Pennsylvania in the early 1960s Kuromiya got involved with the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) in their efforts to desegregate Maryland diners. Then in August 1963, he attended the March on Washington (along with 250,000 others) to demand justice for all citizens. At the end of the march Martin Luther King Jr. made his famous "I Have a Dream" speech.

That evening Kuromiya had the opportunity to meet King and other Civil Rights leaders. He formed a friendship with King and became his assistant. He participated in the March on Washington and in the voter registration campaign with Black Students in Montgomery, Alabama.

As part of his anti-war efforts Kuromiya designed the “Fuck the Draft” using the pseudonym Dirty Linen Corp.

As a gay man, Kuromiya also sought equality and freedom for other gay people. In 1965 he participated in the “Annual Reminder” at Independence Hall, one of the earliest rallies to remind the public that LGBT people did not have basic civil rights protections. He used the occasion to publicly announce he was Gay.

After the Stonewall riots in 1969, Kuromiya helped to organize the Philadelphia chapter of the Gay Liberation Front. With the advent of the AIDS crisis he was involved with the creation of ACT-UP and was the editor for the organization’s “Standard of Care”, the first medical treatment and competency guidelines for people living with HIV/AIDS.

Kuromiya was diagnosed with AIDS in 1989. Then he suffered a recurrence of lung cancer that he had survived in the 1970s. But that didn’t stop him. He insisted on receiving the most aggressive treatment for his cancer and it’s impact on his HIV drug regimen. And participated in every treatment decision. Kuromiya died of complications from cancer in May 2000.

“I'm a twenty-year metastatic lung cancer survivor and a fifteen-year AIDS survivor. And I really believe that activism is therapeutic.”

#gay icons #Kiyoshi Kuromiya #Japanese American #Martin Luthor King Jr #civil rights #gay rights #ACT-UP #Fuck the Draft #stonewall riots #AIDS Standards of Care

[themichigangayly]

“Tomorrow is tomorrow. Over there is over there. And here and now is not a bad place and time to be, especially when so much of the unknown is beautiful.” - Ryka Aoki

Who is Ryka Aoki?

• A Japanese-American transgender woman, professor, poet, composer, martial arts instructor, and Executive Director of Dissonance Press.

• She creates an intimate multi-genre collection of poems, stories, and essays with “Seasonal Velocities.” The book journeys through love and abuse in the trans experience and what it is to be human.

#ryka aoki #aapi #asian american pacific islander #asian american authors #Asian American #japanese american #Japanese #the michigan gayly #lgbtq+ #lgbtq pride #the michigan gayly: lgbtq+ issues #trans woman #asian trans #trans woman of color #transgender women #trans women #poetry #poem #poems #poet #writer #lgbtqia #trans