Japanese American Research Articles

Japanese American Confinement Sites Grant Program (DOI)

Japanese American Confinement Sites Grant Program (DOI)

The Winds of Minidoka: Preserving the Japanese American Past

The Winds of Minidoka: Preserving the Japanese American Past

Cripping the Archive: Analyzing Archival Disorder in the Yamashita Family Archives and Karen Tei Yamashita’s Letters to Memory

This article outlines a crip archival analysis of Karen Tei Yamashita’s creative family memoir Letters to Memory (2017) and the separate Yamashita Family Archives; the analysis revolves around the concept of disorder. The book and digital archives move the daily lived experience of incarceration out of chronological order, encouraging new connections across a massive collection of materials: letters, photographs, federal surveillance documents, paintings, sermons, and other ephemera surrounding World War II Japanese American incarceration. Their respective acts of assembling and retelling destabilize the dominant narrative of a resolved family or national trauma to reflect divergent embodied experiences of distress and disability effected by racial debilitation. Offering concentric analysis of textual and archival reordering via Asian American studies, disability studies, and digital humanities, this article adds alternative dimensions to the ongoing legacy of incarceration by inviting readers to create new constellations of meaning through examining temporal and embodied disorder. Reading the physical book and digital archives together also acts as a model for how literary studies scholars might complicate our attention to embodiment beyond narrative analysis, by thinking about disability and madness in the design and structure of texts and digital media. Through cripping the archive, the author calls for a reconceptualization of mad and disabled bodyminds as not only content to be examined, but also users and creators whose disorder animates alternative ways of knowing personal and state violence.

Art and the City Fiction in Japanese American Internment Camps: Sequels for Resiliency

This article delves into the creation a fictional city solely for the development of Japanese American internment camps and the way in which sustainable arts and crafts played a significant role in ensuring survival in such a hostile environment. To this aim, we searched the literature and reviewed archives, primarily from the American West Coast. We demonstrate that beyond adaptation to the circumstances, the visual representation of the new city’s settlement, founding, and daily activities, instead of adding to the typical panoptic or sombre prison imagery, remains inscribed in the images selected by the inmates, and that the use of such images precisely fostered the inmates’ resiliency. This leads us to deduce that such ’city fiction’ was necessary in this case for survival and endurance, and that its artistic representation was primarily incorporated into the State’s ideological apparatus. On the other hand, occasional fissures subtly seethed with the violence exerted in the camps. In this way, we conclude that the artistic activity itself justified the city fiction, among other situations, revealing the conditions of systemic violence and oppression faced by the internees. Within this framework, we deem that the artworks hereby generated constitute a paramount historical document for resiliency’s sake. The arguments contained herein are still relevant, because everywhere around the world, situations of exclusion and confinement of displaced immigrants, or simply those considered misfits, are repeated time and time again. Nor have we alleviated the issue in any way today, since we disregard the lessons learned from the past.

Portrait

My BA was a double major in anthropology and what was then called ‘Oriental languages’, and my MA and PhD were in anthropology, all at the University of California, Berkeley. Berkeley instilled in me a strong sense of politics and power dynamics and a penchant for social critique in my work. My PhD advisers were Jack Potter, a cultural Marxist who had done fieldwork on peasants in rural Hong Kong and Guangdong Province in China; Paul Rabinow, a philosophical anthropologist and early science and technology studies scholar who hosted Michel Foucault at Berkeley and introduced me to the world of French theory; and Robert Bellah, a sociologist of Japanese religion and American civil religion. As an immigrant originally born in Taiwan but who had grown up in multiple countries, I was very drawn to knowledge about Mainland China, the land from where both my parents fled the Communists. In the late 1970s, there was still very little knowledge about China in the outside world, but I was lucky to go there on a new graduate student exchange program between Berkeley and Beijing universities in 1981.

Abstract P387: FOXO3 Longevity Genotype Mitigates The Risk Of Coronary Heart Disease In Men With Hypertension

Background: We have shown that the FOXO3 longevity genotype moderates the mortality risk in men with hypertension. This study aimed to test whether the FOXO3 longevity genotype moderates the risk of incident coronary heart disease (CHD) in men with hypertension. Methods: The study included 6,312 Japanese American men who were free of CHD at the baseline examination of the Kuakini Honolulu Heart Program (1965-1968, age 53.9±5.4, range 45-68 years), and had been genotyped for the FOXO3 SNP rs2802292 ( FOXO3-292 ). The minor G allele, i.e., TG or GG (TG / GG) genotype is associated with longevity vs. the common TT genotype, which is not . Hypertension was defined as systolic/diastolic BP ≥ 140/90 mmHg or taking antihypertensive medication. Incident CHD was diagnosed from hospital records and follow up examinations to 12/31/2000 (35 years of follow-up). The date of the first coronary event was defined as onset date of CHD, including myocardial infarction, coronary insufficiency, angina, coronary bypass, coronary angioplasty, silent myocardial ischemia, and CHD death. Cox proportional hazard models were used to assess the association of FOXO3-292 genotype and hypertension with incident CHD. Results: During follow-up, 1,629 men developed incident CHD. The age-adjusted incidence rate of CHD was 8.99, 8.31, and 8.62 per 1,000 person-years ( p =0.62) for FOXO3-292 genotypes TT, TG, and GG , respectively. The Cox model, adjusting for age and CVD risk factors, showed hazard ratio (95%CI) for CHD with FOXO3-292 genotypes TG / GG compared to genotype TT was 0.91 (0.82-1.00; p =0.058). The full Cox model, adjusting for age and CVD risk factors, showed a significant interaction effect of FOXO3-292 genotypes TG / GG with hypertension on incident CHD (β= -0.22, p =0.03). After stratifying for hypertension, FOXO3-292 genotypes TG / GG had no effect on incident CHD in those without hypertension HR=1.01 (0.88-1.17; p =0.84) but had a protective effect on incident CHD HR=0.82 (0.74-0.95; p = 0.0064) in those with hypertension. Conclusion: We found the longevity associated FOXO3 genotype may not independently affect the risk of CHD in all men but was associated with protection against incident CHD in men with hypertension.

Circulating 27-hydroxycholesterol, lipids, and steroid hormones in breast cancer risk: a nested case–control study of the Multiethnic Cohort Study

BackgroundLaboratory studies have indicated that a cholesterol metabolite and selective estrogen receptor modulator, 27-hydroxycholesterol (27HC), may be important in breast cancer etiology and explain associations between obesity and postmenopausal breast cancer risk. Epidemiologic evidence for 27HC in breast cancer risk is limited, particularly in multiethnic populations.MethodsIn a nested case–control study of 1470 breast cancer cases and 1470 matched controls within the Multiethnic Cohort Study, we examined associations of pre-diagnostic circulating 27HC with breast cancer risk among African American, Japanese American, Native Hawaiian, Latino, and non-Latino White postmenopausal females. We used multivariable logistic regression adjusted for age, education, parity, body mass index, and smoking status. Stratified analyses were conducted across racial and ethnic groups, hormone receptor (HR) status, and use of lipid-lowering drugs. We assessed interactions of 27HC with steroid hormones.Results27HC levels were inversely related to breast cancer risk (odds ratio [OR] 0.80; 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.58, 1.12), but the association was not statistically significant in the full model. Directions of associations differed by racial and ethnic group. Results suggested an inverse association with HR-negative breast cancer (OR 0.46; 95% CI 0.20, 1.06). 27HC interacted with testosterone, but not estrone, on risk of breast cancer; 27HC was only inversely associated with risk among those with the highest levels of testosterone (OR 0.46; 95% CI 0.24, 0.86).ConclusionThis is the first US study to examine circulating 27HC and breast cancer risk and reports a weak inverse association that varies across racial and ethnic groups and testosterone level.

“Other” and Nature: A Postcolonial Ecocritical Reading of “Yoneko’s Earthquake”

“Yoneko’s Earthquake” is a masterpiece among the short stories by Japanese American writer Hisaye Yamamoto, and it reflects the plight and tragedy of Japanese American women. The plot of the short story is seemingly simple but profound, especially the design of the underlying text, which is full of ingenuity. From the perspective of postcolonial ecocriticism, Hisaye Yamamoto’s “Yoneko’s Earthquake” reflects the complicity of colonialism and ecologism in many aspects. Take a close look at the natural images (the dog, the field and the earthquake) in the short story. This paper tries to find an interconnected identity between the “other” and nature. The dog and the animalized human are both put in the position of the “other” under the colonial discourse; the field as a domain of colonization also nurtures the power of resistance from the “other”,; and the subversive nature of the earthquake makes the identity of “self” and “other” briefly displaced. The theory of postcolonial ecocriticism injects new vitality into this short story; meanwhile, it helps to provoke new thinking about racism and speciesism.

Review: Citizens, Immigrants, and the Stateless: A Japanese American Diaspora in the Pacific, by Michael R. Jin

Review: <i>Citizens, Immigrants, and the Stateless: A Japanese American Diaspora in the Pacific</i>, by Michael R. Jin

The impact of COVID-19 on cancer screening and treatment in older adults: The Multiethnic Cohort Study.

The Coronavirus Disease of 2019 (COVID-19) has impacted the health and day-to-day life of individuals, especially the elderly and people with certain pre-existing medical conditions, including cancer. The purpose of this study was to investigate how COVID-19 impacted access to cancer screenings and treatment, by studying the participants in the Multiethnic Cohort (MEC) study. The MEC has been following over 215,000 residents of Hawai'i and Los Angeles for the development of cancer and other chronic diseases since 1993-1996. It includes men and women of five racial and ethnic groups: African American, Japanese American, Latino, Native Hawaiian, and White. In 2020, surviving participants were sent an invitation to complete an online survey on the impact of COVID-19 on their daily life activities, including adherence to cancer screening and treatment. Approximately 7,000 MEC participants responded. A cross-sectional analysis was performed to investigate the relationships between the postponement of regular health care visits and cancer screening procedures or treatment with race and ethnicity, age, education, and comorbidity. Women with more education, women with lung disease, COPD, or asthma, and women and men diagnosed with cancer in the past 5 years were more likely to postpone any cancer screening test/procedure due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Groups less likely to postpone cancer screening included older women compared to younger women and Japanese American men and women compared to White men and women. This study revealed specific associations of race/ethnicity, age, education level, and comorbidities with the cancer-related screening and healthcare of MEC participants during the COVID-19 pandemic. Increased monitoring of patients in high-risk groups for cancer and other diseases is of the utmost importance as the chance of undiagnosed cases or poor prognosis is increased as a result of delayed screening and treatment. This research was partially supported by the Omidyar 'Ohana Foundation and grant U01 CA164973 from the National Cancer Institute.

Citizens, Immigrants, and the Stateless: A Japanese American Diaspora in the Pacific by Michael R. Jin (review)

Citizens, Immigrants, and the Stateless: A Japanese American Diaspora in the Pacific by Michael R. Jin (review)

Japanese American Incarceration: The Camps and Coerced Labor during World War II

Japanese American Incarceration: The Camps and Coerced Labor during World War II

Heather Hathaway, That Damned Fence: The Literature of the Japanese American Prison Camps

Heather Hathaway, <i>That Damned Fence: The Literature of the Japanese American Prison Camps</i>

“Nothing but My Own Whole Body”: Revisiting Radical Haiku Through Violet Kazue de Cristoforo’s Life and Work

ABSTRACT This essay reflects upon the continuing significance of the freestyle Kaiko haiku movement documented by poet, editor, and translator Violet Kazue de Cristoforo in the anthology May Sky: There Is Always Tomorrow (1997). A vivid, rule-breaking, highly social form that thrived in specialized clubs, Kaiko haiku began in Tokyo in the early 1900s and was brought by young emigrant writers to California, where it was transformed and almost erased by Japanese American incarceration. The essay revisits the poetic form and de Cristoforo’s literary work and activism in light of settler-colonialism, ecological change, and the essayist’s experience living in California’s Central Valley.

Hard History: Teaching the Japanese American Experience in American Concentration Camps

How should “hard history” be confronted to understand the incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II? This article shares a way of teaching this topic that not only confronts directly the real experiences of Japanese Americans in concentration camps but also humanizes the story. Encouraging students to learn the history experientially, the author uses two different sets of historical primary sources, offering both an “outsider” and “insider” perspective. First, the author explains that he focuses on the biographies and objectives of different photographers who took photos at Manzanar, highlighting how this context helps illuminate students’ perceptions and understanding of these photographs, revealing a larger story about the experience of Japanese Americans. Second, he describes how he incorporates the diary of Stanley Hayami, a Japanese American teenager interned at Heart Mountain who used his diary to retain agency within an oppressive system. Through an analysis of the diary with students, the author demonstrates how this diary captures the complexity of the Japanese American experience in American concentration camps.

Interethnic Differences in Bladder Cancer Incidence and the Association between Type 2 Diabetes and Bladder Cancer in the Multiethnic Cohort Study.

Research on the association between type 2 diabetes (T2D) and bladder cancer (BCA) risk among non-European ancestry populations is sparse to nonexistent, and most prior studies rely on a single baseline assessment of T2D status. We estimated the T2D-BCA association using the Multiethnic Cohort Study of 185,059 men and women in California and Hawaii. Participants were African American, European American, Japanese American, Latin American, and Native Hawaiian, ages 45-75 years at enrollment (1993-1996). T2D was assessed by self-report at baseline, follow-up surveys, and Medicare claims. Cases were identified using Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results Program cancer registries through 2016. Associations were estimated by race/ethnicity using Cox proportional hazards regression. Adjusted attributable fractions (AAF) and cumulative absolute risk of bladder cancer were estimated across groups. Over an average 19.7 years of follow-up 1,890 incident bladder cancer cases were diagnosed. Time-varying T2D was associated with bladder cancer in the multiethnic sample (HR = 1.17; 95% confidence interval, 1.05-1.30); however, the HR did not differ by race/ethnicity (P = 0.85). The AAF was 4.2% in the multiethnic sample and largest among Native Hawaiians (9.8%). Absolute risk of bladder cancer among European Americans without T2D was higher than all other groups with T2D. T2D is significantly associated with bladder cancer risk in a multiethnic sample. Those with T2D have higher incidence of bladder cancer, regardless of racial/ethnic group. Reducing T2D prevalence could substantially lower bladder cancer incidence among Native Hawaiians due to T2D being more common in this group. High absolute risk of bladder cancer among European Americans, regardless of T2D status, indicates that elevated bladder cancer risk in this group may be due to factors other than T2D. Future studies must explore reasons for this difference in incidence.

Back to the Future: Time Traveling to 1942

Abstract Japanese new media artist Masaki Fujihata's exhibition and groundbreaking accompanying public augmented reality (AR) installation “BeHere/1942: A New Lens on the Japanese American Incarceration” remind us that even after eighty years, the ghost life of World War II Japanese American internment continues to haunt us. “BeHere/1942” revisits the War Relocation Authority's photographic history of the Japanese American incarceration experience using digital technology, including AR, which allows contemporary spectators to immerse themselves in the events of “relocation day” in the spring of 1942. Fujihata provides a new way of seeing, remembering, and experiencing photographs of the Japanese American wartime past in the present—empowered with contemporary media tools that are distinctly from what he calls “our own time”: AR.

Healthful Plant-Based Dietary Pattern and Risk of Hepatocellular Carcinoma in a Multiethnic Population: A Cohort Study

BackgroundPlant-based dietary patterns assessed by a priori indices are associated with various health outcomes, but have rarely been examined in relation to liver cancer. ObjectivesThis study investigated the associations between plant-based diets and risk of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and evaluated whether the associations vary by sex and race and ethnicity. MethodsData were from a total of 170,321 African American, Japanese American, Latino, Native Hawaiian, and White adults aged 45–75 y who completed a food frequency questionnaire in the Multiethnic Cohort Study. Cox models with adjustment for potential confounders were used to estimate hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) for HCC according to 3 plant-based diet scores: overall plant-based diet index (PDI), healthful plant-based diet index (hPDI), and unhealthful plant-based diet index (uPDI). ResultsDuring a mean follow-up of 19.6 y, 722 incident HCC cases were identified. Multivariate-adjusted HR (95% CI) per 10-point increase was 0.82 (0.71–0.94) for PDI, 0.84 (0.74–0.96) for hPDI, and 1.08 (0.95–1.23) for uPDI. We found no significant differences by sex (all Pheterogeneity ≥ 0.53) or race and ethnicity (all Pheterogeneity ≥ 0.31). ConclusionGreater adherence to plant-based diets rich in healthy plant foods and low in less healthy plant foods is associated with a reduced risk of HCC in a multiethnic population.

Japanese American Women's Self-Definition Facing Identity Crisis Through Intersectional Lenses

This essay examines the self-definition of Japanese American women through anintersectional lens, recognizing the intricate interplay of multiple identities shaped by factorssuch as race, gender, ethnicity, religion, and more. While the portrayal of minority women bymainstream media as a homogenous group has resulted in damaging stereotypes that underminethe complexity and diversity of their experiences, the intersectional theory—whichacknowledges the complex interplay of social forces, identities, and ideologies that legitimizepower and disadvantage in society—offers a more nuanced understanding of the experiences ofJapanese American women. Incorporating historical context and Western feminist theories, thispaper argues that the adoption of an intersectional approach is necessary to better understand thediverse experiences of Japanese American women and their self-definition, also stressing thatpromoting diversity and intersectionality can advance research and support individuals, creatinga society that celebrates and embraces all of its members.

Social networks and community features: Identifying neighborhoods in a WWII Japanese American incarceration center

Socially defined neighborhoods develop through frequent face to face interactions among residents and their self-identification as neighbors. While archaeological evidence of neighborhoods is usually dependent on artifact frequencies, boundaries, or shared features, this paper explores how effectively communal features act as proxies for social interactions. Network data drawn from historic newspapers published by incarcerees at Amache, a WWII Japanese American Incarceration Center, is used to recreate networks of interaction between residents of a block – a spatial unit generally viewed as a neighborhood, that housed between 200 and 350 individuals. Within a sample of surveyed residential areas, these interpersonal networks of published social events are compared to the frequency of community landscape features to see how well archaeological remains correspond to historic network data in identifying socially defined neighborhoods archaeologically. All blocks exhibit neighborhood-like social interaction within one or the other dataset, but not always in both suggesting that archaeological research should test multiple datasets to make more robust interpretations about neighborhoods in the past.