Ella Fukushima

A fter Monday’s presentation that showed us how to utilize the USC Libraries Research Guides and Digital Library for our primary sources, I found the USC Digital Library’s Japanese American Relocation Digital Archive that captured Japanese American incarceration during World War II. These images “document scenes of: 1) the mass removal and incarceration process; 2) life in camps at Manzanar, Santa Anita, Tanforan, and Tule Lake; 3) post-war repatriation to Japan”. Additionally, “[i]t features newly digitized photographs, documents, manuscripts, paintings, drawings, letters, oral histories, and inventories of archival collection”. From my personal experience, my history classes only would project pictures of the incarceration camps but Japanese Americans were never in these photographs. By excluding images of these Japanese American, it neglects to acknowledge the moral injustice of forcing American citizens to leave their homes and live in deserted areas. For this reason, I believe tha...

While history teachers often gloss over or mention the Japanese internment camps, such as the one at Manzanar or White Heart Mountain, many fail to go much further in depth on the subject or even mention key Japanese American figures who worked to ensure that Japanese Americans received due justice for the American government’s wrongful mistreatment. This topic resonates deeply with me mainly because all of my great grandparents on my Japanese side were affected by President Roosevelt’s Executive Order 9066 that forcefully removed my family from their homes, properties, and lives. As a result of the racial discrimination towards Japanese Americans, my great grandparents and their families all decided to react in various ways. One of my great grandfathers decided to join the 442nd Infantry Regiment of the American army, my other great grandfather and his family were sent to Manzanar, my great grandmother was sent to Japan, and the other great grandmother spent her adolescence in White H...