Selfa A. Chew. Uprooting Community: Japanese Mexicans, World War II, and the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands .

Abstract

In Uprooting Community: Japanese Mexicans, World War II, and the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands, Selfa A. Chew examines the relocation and internment of Japanese Mexicans from the northern border during World War II. She presents a relatively understudied episode in Mexico’s wartime history and offers a view of the ways race played a role in the nation’s era of “national unity” in the 1940s. As Mexico formally entered the war in June 1942, President Manuel Ávila Camacho signed a decree suspending constitutional rights for all citizens. But already in January of that year the government had been relocating Japanese Mexicans from the border region to the nation’s interior—primarily Mexico City. Many had their bank accounts frozen, but were still required to pay travel and living expenses. Those who remained in Mexico City faced severe restrictions of movement and limitations on the types of employment they could seek. Others were sent to concentration camps—erroneously characterized by the news media as “farming communities.” Chew points out that some individuals were granted an exemption by state governors, but few high-level politicians seemed willing to intervene on behalf of Japanese Mexicans, particularly in the height of national security concerns after the attack on Pearl Harbor. Neighbors and local mayors often supported their Japanese acquaintances and tried to protect them. But the case studies presented in Uprooting Community suggest that exemptions were difficult to obtain and often required lengthy appeals based on poor health and other hardships. The author places the treatment of relocated and interned individuals within the context of citizenship rights as well as international rights. She explains that since the Mexican government did not consider them prisoners of war or spies, they were not protected by the Geneva Convention.