American in Disguise (book)

American in Disguise is Daniel Okimoto's account of his search for identity in America and Japan. The book was originally published in 1971 by John Weatherhill, Inc, with a foreword by James Michener.

Five years before World War II began, Okimoto's parents settled in the United States as Christian missionaries who were eager to raise a family in a Christian nation. His father began a successful ministry in California, where Okimoto and his three siblings were born. In 1942, the Okimoto family was incarcerated in camp at Poston , Arizona, and later resettled in San Diego, where his father resumed his ministry, then to Pasadena in 1956. In 1960, Okimoto studied at Princeton University (B.A. 1965), and Harvard (M.A.1967), leading to graduate studies in history and international relations at Tokyo University. He spent three years in Tokyo, searching for his place in his parents' homeland, while simultaneously encountering student protests and political strife in a changing, postwar Japan. The memoir also addresses Okimoto's personal questions and viewpoints on loyalty during the Vietnam war, identity politics and interracial marriage. Okimoto received his Ph.D in political science from Michigan in 1977 and has served on the faculty at Stanford since 1976. He is the co-founder of Asia / Pacific Research Center, specializing in the political economy of Japan.

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