American Incarceration Research Articles

Cleansing the modern heart

J ohn Selden, a seventeenth-century English jurist and scholar, warned: "The reason of a thing Is not to be inquired after, till you are sure the thing itself be so. We commonly are at, what's the reason for it? before we are sure of the thing" (cited in Keith Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic, p. 435). We know what physics is: the study of matter and energy. What biology is: the study of living things. But what is psychoanalysis? Who speaks for psychoanalysis? We are familiar with Freud's many contradictory teachings and the diverse practices he engaged in, calling them all "psychoanalysis." We know that the term is used to refer to a method of diagnosing and treating mental illnesses, detecting mental illness in famous dead persons and in characters invented by poets and writers, explaining and influencing human behavior, and interpreting the "meaning" of works of art. Here are two current examples of what persons officially authorized to speak for psychoanalysis say about it. In an essay titled, "Will the real psychoanalyst please stand up?" Richard Fox, president of the American Psychoanalytic Association in 2001, declares: "Psychoanalysis today is a far cry from what it was thirty to forty years ago .... We lobby in Washington .... We work with other groups such as the ACLU to further our goals" (The American Psychoanalyst, 2001, p. 27). Are these activities we ought to applaud? At present, the ACLU is engaged in formulating commitment laws, the better to justify incarcerating innocent Americans accused of mental illness. During World War II, it was engaged in supporting and justifying the incarceration of innocent Americans of Japanese ancestry (see Charles L. Markmann, 1965, and Thomas Szasz, The Therapeutic State, 1984, pp. 58-66). The American Psychoanalytic Association, Fox proudly reports, no longer bars psychologists from membership: "We have extended our membership .... We have shed our medical orthodoxy and have become more egalitarian." This is not good enough. For its past policies, the American Psychoanalytic Association owes a collective apology to psychologists and homosexuals as well. It would be a mistake to conclude that psychoanalysts have finally acknowledged that they do not treat diseases, because problems in living are not diseases and because listening-and-talking is not a medical procedure. On the contrary, analysts join psychiatrists in expanding the concepts of disease and t r e a t m e n t , assert tha t "psychotherapy changes the brain," and then use that claim to prove that they treat brain diseases. According to Glenn Gabbard, M.D. , professor o f p sych i a t ry and director, Baylor Psychiatry Clinic and editor of the International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, "behavior therapy and drug therapy [ate] affecting the same brain areas and in the same manner . . . . Psychotherapy seems capable of favorably influencing the minds and bodies of persons with bodily diseases and perhaps is even capable o f c o u n t e r i n g those diseases .... l i t is important] to get scientific results that lend credibility to psychotherapy as a real treatment" (cited in Joan Arehart-Treichel, "Evidence is in: Psychotherapy changes the brain," Psychiatric News 2001, 36 (July 6), p. 33). Why is it important to claim that conversation with a psychoanalyst changes the client 's--but presumably not the analyst's--brain? In order to qualify as loyal agents of the therapeutic state and be paid by the state for one's services to it.

The cure of souls in the therapeutic state.

What is psychoanalysis? Who speaks for psychoanalysis? We are familiar with Freud’s many contradictory teachings and the diverse practices he engaged in, calling them all “psychoanalysis.” We know that the term is used to refer to a method of diagnosing and treating mental illnesses, detecting mental illness in famous dead persons and in characters invented by poets and writers, explaining and influencing human behavior, and interpreting the “meaning” of works of art. Here are two current examples of what persons officially authorized to speak for psychoanalysis say about it. Richard Fox (2001), president of the American Psychoanalytic Association in 2001, declares: “Psychoanalysis today is a far cry from what it was thirty to forty years ago. . . . We lobby in Washington. . . . We work with other groups such as the ACLU to further our goals” (p. 27). These activities are not specific to psychoanalysis, nor is it self-evident, as Fox implies, that they are praiseworthy. During World War II, the ACLU supported and justified the incarceration of innocent Americans diagnosed as

Incarceration of the Japanese Americans: A Sixty-Year Perspective

I FINISHED THE ORIGINAL VERSION of this essay in late August 2001.1 In the aftermath of September 11th it became clear to me that something else had to be added. Although I do not believe, as many do, that everything changed or that there are many parallels with December 7, 1941, there are some obvious similarities and differences. The 1982 report of the presidential Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians found that three broad historical causes shaped the wartime incarceration of Japanese Americans:2 race prejudice, war hysteria, and a failure of political leadership. It is clear that today prejudice and hysteria are again all too present, but, at the top at least and beginning from the oval office, there has been a clear distinction between Arab/Muslim terrorists and Arab Americans. It also became clear to me, despite cynics who insist that we never learn from history, that a heightened awareness of what was done to Japanese Americans almost sixty years ago, has had a sobering effect on today's policy makers. We can credit some of this to the long chain of scholarship that stretches back to Eugene V. Rostow's courageous 1945 articles,3 and to the Japanese American activists who finally got an apology and symbolic compensation for their wartime ordeal from the government in 1990. However, we should not be overly congratulatory yet. It must be noted that, however tolerant the words at the top have been-and words do

Citizenship Education in the Seattle Schools on the Eve of the Japanese American Incarceration

The Seattle Public Schools' tradition of steering a moderate and progressive course in citizenship education through tolerance underwent a severe test with the news of the Executive Order 9066, calling for the incarceration of Japanese residents and citizens on the West Coast United States. Organized around two sets of primary sources – a 1930s curriculum guide for citizenship and character education in the Seattle schools, and a collection of classroom composition by 7th and 8th grade students of Washington School in Seattle from 1941–1942—this article brings to life the lived experiences of Japanese American students who grappled with the dissonance between citizenship and exclusion during World War II.

Public health in World War II assembly centers for Japanese Americans.

Public Health in World War II Assembly Centers for Japanese Americans Louis Fiset (bio) In the spring of 1942, the U.S. Army began a forced evacuation of 110,000 residents of Japanese ancestry from their homes in Washington, Oregon, California, and Arizona. More than 90,000 Nikkei 1 were herded into public facilities converted from racetracks and fairgrounds, so-called assembly centers. There men, women, and children waited out the construction of more permanent “relocation centers” in sparsely populated regions of the arid West, where they would eventually be dispersed. 2 Only weeks or months earlier, these focal points had sheltered racehorses, show animals, or other livestock; in their place, humans representing a hated minority now found themselves hidden away behind barbed-wire fences and locked gates, to be guarded by soldiers in watch towers armed with rifles and powerful searchlights. The months-long sojourn in these unsanitary and crowded habitats posed a great challenge [End Page 565] to the U.S. Public Health Service (USPHS) and to Nikkei resident physicians and nurses charged with preventing epidemic outbreaks and providing general medical care for the imprisoned population. The incarceration of Japanese Americans and their immigrant elders during World War II followed President Roosevelt’s Executive Order 9066 of 19 February 1942, a validation of the Army’s argument that evacuation was a military necessity because it was impossible within this population to distinguish the loyal from the disloyal. The president authorized the secretary of war and his military commanders to identify military areas from which “any or all persons may be excluded.” 3 Although the order was silent on which group or race should be excluded, or which geographic locations should become exclusion zones, its interpretation soon focused specifically on the Japanese American population residing on the West Coast, representing 90 percent of the entire Nikkei population in the country, two-thirds of whom were U.S. citizens by birth. The first phase involved removing residents from their homes and confining them in nearby holding pens under military control. Eventually, the Army would turn over its jurisdiction to a civilian bureaucracy, the War Relocation Authority, once the Nikkei reached the relocation centers. The Army took over fifteen preexisting public facilities abutting main-line transportation connections, which lay adjacent to Japanese communities in urban and rural settings, and constructed the sixteenth from scratch. Each had in place an infrastructure, including power, light, and water. One site, the Portland Pacific International Live Stock Exposition grounds, became temporary home to four thousand Japanese Oregonians and central Washingtonians, who no doubt believed the facility was aptly named. The owners of eleven racetracks and fairgrounds signed leases with the government. The larger buildings were converted to mess halls, recreation halls, and other large gathering areas. To supplement them, the Army Corps of Engineers constructed barrack housing for most of the inmates, allotting approximately three hundred square feet of living space for families with children. 4 But many unlucky families were shoved into whitewashed stalls that still reeked of manure, thereby exposing themselves as well as those with whom they came into contact to public health risks with potentially serious consequences. One interpreter of the experience at the Tanforan racetrack in San Bruno, California, a poet, later wrote: [End Page 566] Hay, horse hair & manure are whitewashed to the boards. In the corner a white spider is suspended in the shadow of a white spider web.5 Compounding the health risks of the unsanitary living quarters, the mess halls became potential breeding grounds for epidemic outbreaks. All were staffed by inexperienced workers with little knowledge of sanitation and proper food-handling methods. Although this phase of the incarceration was expected to last only a few weeks, life in the transitory facilities dragged through the long, stifling months of summer and well into fall. Only tiny Mayer Assembly Center, on the site of an abandoned Civilian Conservation Corps camp in Arizona, closed after four weeks of operation; the majority remained open for more than four months (see Table). The largest—the former Santa Anita racetrack, at Arcadia, California, now the Santa Anita Assembly Center—remained operational for seven months and did not close its gates until...

Professional Health Care and the Japanese American Incarceration: An Introduction to the Symposium

Professional Health Care and the Japanese American Incarceration: An Introduction to the Symposium

Why Are U.S. Incarceration Rates So High?

Most explanations of the unprecedented increase in American incarceration rates are inadequate. Crime rate increases, more punitive public attitudes, postmodernist angst, and cynical politics are all only part of the explanation. Those things characterize all Western countries; in some of these countries, imprisonment rates have long been stable or declining, and, where they are rising, absolute levels and rates of increase are dwarfed by those in America. The scale of the phenomenon is distinctly American. It arises partly from American moralism and partly from structural characteristics of American government that provide little insulation from emotions generated by moral panics and longterm cycles of tolerance and intolerance.

Understanding Prison Policy and Population Trends

American incarceration numbers increased fivefold between 1973 and 1997. Changes in penal policies and practices, not changes in crime rates, are the primary explanation, but there is disagreement about the causes of penal policy changes. Two prevalent explanations are that rising crime rates led to public demand for harsher policies and that politicians used crime policy to exacerbate public fears and win electoral favor. Both have merit but either is too simple. More likely the causes are some combination of crime policy's broad public appeal in an era of fractionated politics, unintended consequences of the war on drugs, and the increased reflexivity of the justice system that, with improved accountability and efficiency, becomes a major source of demand for its penal services.

The Geopolitics of Eugenics and the Incarceration of Japanese Americans

Both geopolitics and eugenics as political/scientific theories emerged during the late‐nineteenth and early‐twentieth centuries. Although in the literature these remain largely disparate areas of inquiry, many parallels exist. Both reflected a concern over the security of the state and both emphasized the identification of foreign threats and likewise intimated viable solutions to counter these threats. This paper seeks to uncover a geopolitics of eugenics. Specifically, I contend that a eugenically informed geopolitical discourse—and not solely a racist ideology—greatly informed the decision during the Second World War to incarcerate in the United States 120,000 persons of Japanese ancestry. The liberties and human rights of those incarcerated were violated because, according to this discourse, their sacrifices were necessary for the preservation of a (white) race and nation.

Captivating memories: museology, concentration camps, and Japanese American history

Captivating Memories: Museology, Concentration Camps, and Japanese American History David Yoo (bio) Japanese American National Museum. 369 East First Street. Los Angeles, California 90012. 213-625-0414. Hours: Tuesday–Thursday, Saturday and Sunday, 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.; Friday, 11:00 a.m.–8:00 p.m. As a prominent icon in United States history, Pearl Harbor evokes images of war and how those years deeply affected the lives of Americans. Recent commemorations of the fiftieth anniversary of World War II have not only called forth memories but also underscored the issue of historical memory—how it is that we remember. In particular, the controversy over the Enola Gay exhibit at the Smithsonian (1994–1995) exposed a disturbing political trend against anything that might detract from a “patriotically correct” version of the past. 1 At stake in this episode, as with all of history, is the question of how to interpret the past. Clearly reflected in the struggle to shape memories of World War II are present fears about undermining the “good” war. Yet, only by critically exploring [End Page 680] a wide range of events can we strive to make sense of World War II and its lasting influence on the United States. 2 Until recently, full recognition of one episode of the war remained largely suppressed by the federal government and in the memories of its survivors. The incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II highlights an underside of U.S. history, illustrating how race relations at home stood in stark contrast to the fight for democracy abroad. The campaign waged by former internees and their children to acknowledge and to correct a wartime injustice has shed light on how Pearl Harbor and subsequent events carried special significance for one group of Americans, pitting the affections of ancestry against strong ties to an adopted homeland. For over five decades now, Japanese Americans (or Nikkei) have carried with them the legacy of the camps as an integral and painful part of their life histories. As part of the process of coming to terms with the past, the Japanese American National Museum (JANM), located in Los Angeles, recently hosted an exhibit, “America’s Concentration Camps: Remembering the Japanese American Experience.” In reviewing the exhibit and the JANM itself, this essay examines issues of memory and the shifting politics of identity that have been embedded in the construction, interpretation, and presentation of the camps. Internment continues to shape and re-shape the ways that Japanese Americans individually and collectively understand their place in America. As with the war itself, the contests over the meaning of wartime incarceration have drawn many constituencies into the fray. The perspectives of Japanese Americans, U.S. government officials, community activists, museum staffs, academics, and others have demonstrated that the management of memories is a complicated affair. 3 Only in the past twenty years or so have Nikkei been willing to resurrect memories of the most painful collective experience of their history. The influence of the Asian American movement and the successful drive to achieve redress and reparations from the federal government can obscure the fact that Japanese Americans for many years rarely spoke about the war at all, even to their own children and grandchildren. Burdened by shame and guilt, despite their innocence, many survivors chose to bury the past and wanted to protect their children from the stigma of the camps. As sandstorms slowly erased traces of the desolate camps themselves, internees tried to forget their past. Since most Americans knew very little about the plight of Japanese Americans during the war, the end of internment went largely unnoticed. [End Page 681] For Nikkei, the year 1945 signalled a release from confinement and with it, most men and women focused on rebuilding their lives and went on to finish school, to find work and to start families. The war had accelerated the transition between the immigrants and the second generation (Nisei), and consequently, many Nisei bore responsibility for taking care of their elderly parents as well as providing for their own children. Slowly, Japanese Americans found increased opportunities in post-war America, as the war temporarily boosted the economy and also...

Review: American Concentration Camps: A Documentary History of the Relocation and Incarceration of Japanese Americans, 1942-1945, by Roger Daniels

Book Review| November 01 1991 Review: American Concentration Camps: A Documentary History of the Relocation and Incarceration of Japanese Americans, 1942-1945, by Roger Daniels American Concentration Camps: A Documentary History of the Relocation and Incarceration of Japanese Americans, 1942-1945Roger Daniels Yuji Ichioka Yuji Ichioka Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Pacific Historical Review (1991) 60 (4): 563–564. https://doi.org/10.2307/3639894 Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation Yuji Ichioka; Review: American Concentration Camps: A Documentary History of the Relocation and Incarceration of Japanese Americans, 1942-1945, by Roger Daniels. Pacific Historical Review 1 November 1991; 60 (4): 563–564. doi: https://doi.org/10.2307/3639894 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentPacific Historical Review Search This content is only available via PDF. Copyright 1991 The Pacific Coast Branch, American Historical Association Article PDF first page preview Close Modal You do not currently have access to this content.

American concentration camps: a documentary history of the relocation and incarceration of Japanese Americans, 1942-1945. v.1: July, 1940-December 31, 1941

American concentration camps: a documentary history of the relocation and incarceration of Japanese Americans, 1942-1945. v.1: July, 1940-December 31, 1941

Japanese Americans: From Relocation to Redress

This revised and expanded edition of Japanese Americans: From Relocation to Redress presents the most complete and current published account of the Japanese American experience from the evacuation order of World War II to the public policy debate over redress and reparations. A chronology and comprehensive overview of the Japanese American experience by Roger Daniels are underscored by first person accounts of relocations by Bill Hosokawa, Toyo Suyemoto Kawakami, Barry Saiki, Take Uchida, and others, and previously undescribed events of the interment camps for enemy aliens by John Culley and Tetsuden Kashima. The essays bring us up to the U.S. government's first redress payments, made forty eight years after the incarceration of Japanese Americans began. The combined vision of editors Roger Daniels, Sandra C. Taylor, and Harry H. L. Kitano in pulling together disparate aspects of the Japanese American experience results in a landmark volume in the wrenching experiment of American democracy.

Reflections on the Limits of Science and Technology

SYNOPSIS. Exuberance over insights gained in the infant field of genetics early this centuryled scientists to extrapolate beyond their data to heredity of behavioral traits in people. Oneof the direct consequences was the incarceration of Americans and Canadians of Japanese ancestry during World War II as enemy aliens. Drawing on this personal experience of the misapplication of science, I describe the process of scientific indoctrination and blindness to the limitations of this way of knowing. This led to my attempt to demystify science through the electronic media. Only recently have I come to understand that two assumptions that impelled me to use television in the first place are wrong. The first was that with access to more information about science, the general public would be in a position of making better informed decisions on issues involving science and technology. The problem is that we are overwhelmed with information and most people lack the ability to distinguish meaningful “signal” ( i.e. , credible information) from background “noise” ( i.e. , garbage). We believe in phantoms created by the acceptance of anything because it exists as print or television programs. My second assumption had been that we need a mechanism to do an in-depth “cost/benefit” analysis of new technologies before they are actually made available. But history reveals that the benefits of new technologies are immediate and obvious while the costs are usually hidden and completely unpredictable. But in the rush to exploit new scientific insights we ignore the fact that science must lookat nature in isolated bits and pieces. Knowledge gained in fragments does not yield an understanding of the greater context from which the pieces are taken. With each new discovery, we itch to apply it, forgetting how much we have yet to learn. Our attempts to manipulate nature are often illusions of control created by our ability to overpower nature by brute strength. In the area of genetic engineering, this could be truly disastrous.

Eric Muller, Colors of Confinement: Rare Kodachrome Photographs of Japanese American Incarceration in World War II (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2012).

Eric Muller, Colors of Confinement: Rare Kodachrome Photographs of Japanese American Incarceration in World War II (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2012).

The Politics of Prejudice: The Anti-Japanese Movement in California and the Struggle for Japanese Exclusion

This classic study offers a history of anti-Japanese prejudice in California, extending from the late nineteenth century to 1924, when an immigration act excluded Japanese from entering the United States. The Politics of Prejudice details the political climate that helped to set the stage for the incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II and reveals the racism present among middle-class American progressives, labor leaders, and other presumably liberal groups.