Browse > Genre > Memoir
79 articles
Journey to Washington (book)
- Books
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Self-reliance, Patriotism - positive side or complications, Empowerment
- Limited availability
Ghostwritten autobiography by Senator Daniel K. Inouye of Hawai'i, authored with Lawrence Elliott and published in 1967. One of the first autobiographies by a Nisei , Journey to Washington was published as Inouye was finishing his first term as a U.S. Senator from Hawai'i and preparing to run for reelection. The book covers his life up to that time, beginning with his grandfather leaving Japan to come to America to pay off a debt and ending with his father visiting the White House to visit President John. F. Kennedy. A success story that established a template for many Nisei memoirs to come, the book reinforced the " model minority " narrative then current. Reader's Digest also excerpted the book in its February 1968 issue. The book includes three forewords, by President Lyndon Johnson, Vice-President Hubert Humphrey, and Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield.
Kubota (short story)
- Short Stories
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Power of silence, Wisdom of experience
- Available
Short story/essay centering on the author's maternal grandfather, whom everyone called by his last name, Kubota. A Kibei from Hawai'i, Kubota had graduated high school in Hiroshima before returning to become a successful shopkeeper and community leader—as well as an avid fisherman—on Ō'ahu's North Shore prior to the war. Arrested by the FBI on the day after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Kubota was one of the relatively fortunate ones, having been taken to Honolulu for questioning, but released after just a few days. Years later, Kubota lives with the author's family in Gardena, California, and repeatedly tells the teenager his World War II story, urging him not to forget it and to be his chronicler. The author is puzzled to find that other Japanese Americans not only didn't care to hear this story but were very reluctant to talk about their wartime exclusion and incarceration. After his grandfather's death, …
The Legacy of a Cemetery (short story)
- Short Stories
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Reunion, Wisdom of experience
- Limited availability
First person reflections on a trip back to his hometown of Los Angeles by a man who had settled in New Jersey after leaving the Jerome , Arkansas, concentration camps some thirty years earlier. A visit to Evergreen Cemetery east of downtown Los Angeles brings back memories of his forced removal in 1942, remembrances of Nisei soldiers he knew who are buried there, and memories of his deceased family members.
Letters to Memory (book)
- Books
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Circle of life, Family – blessing or curse, Optimism – power or folly, Power of the past, Quest for discovery
- Widely available
Incarceration-centered history of one Japanese American family told through short vignettes inspired by letters, photographs, and other objects in the family archive, as written by acclaimed novelist Karen Tei Yamashita.
Life behind Barbed Wire: The World War II Internment Memoirs of a Hawaii Issei (book)
- Books
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Facing reality, Immigrant experience, Nationalism – complications, Role of men
- Widely available
Internment memoir by Honolulu Issei publisher and community leader Yasutaro Soga . Originally published in 1948 as Tessaku seikatsu , it was translated into English by Kihei Hirai and a team of volunteers at the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawai'i (JCCH) and published by the University of Hawai'i Press in 2008.
The Little Exile (book)
- Books
- Grades 7-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Grades 7-8
- Memoir
- Evils of racism, Family – blessing or curse, Female roles, Immigrant experience
- Available
Memoir by Jeanette A. Arakawa covering her wartime incarceration at the Stockton Assembly Center and Rohwer , Arkansas, concentration camp and postwar resettlement in Denver. Though written in the first person, her name and those of others in the book have been changed.
Lone Heart Mountain (book)
- Books
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Displacement, Evils of racism, Hazards of passing judgment, Injustice
- Limited availability
Illustrated memoir of life at Heart Mountain by artist Estelle Ishigo , a white woman married to a Nisei .
Looking After Minidoka: An American Memoir (book)
- Books
- Memoir
- Change versus tradition, Coming of age, Displacement, Female roles, Growing up - pain or pleasure, Immigrant experience, Love and sacrifice, Overcoming - fear, weakness, vice, Power of tradition, Will to survive
- Available
A third-generation Japanese American shares the multi-generational story of both sides of his family, from immigration to the aftermath of Pearl Harbor and wartime incarceration, to resettlement and his own childhood.
Looking Like the Enemy: My Story of Imprisonment in Japanese-American Internment Camps (book)
- Books
- Grades 7-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Grades 7-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir, Children's
- Evils of racism, Facing darkness, Family – blessing or curse, Injustice, Loss of innocence, Power of the past
- Widely available
Incarceration memoir of life at Pinedale Assembly Center , Tule Lake , and Minidoka , by Mary Matsuda Gruenewald, a seventeen-year-old Nisei at the time of her and her family's forced removal from their Washington state farm. First published in 2005 by NewSage Press, it was followed by a young reader's edition in 2010.
Mackerel Sky (short story)
- Short Stories
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Communication – verbal and nonverbal, Immigrant experience, Will to survive, Working class struggles
- No availability
Short story by Jeff Matsuda in which a young Sansei man recalls various stories about his Issei grandfather: visiting him and his grandmother when he was a child; recreating the old man talking about his youth in Japan and his early years as a laborer in the U.S.; and visiting him with his mother when he was in college, and his grandfather was a nearly deaf old man. In the process, the narrator recalls his grandfather's internment: as a fisherman on Terminal Island , he was arrested a week after Pearl Harbor and sent to Bismarck and then to an unspecified camp in New Mexico, while the rest of his immediate family spent the war years in Japan.
Made in Japan and Settled in Oregon (book)
- Books
- Memoir
- Coming of age, Displacement, Evils of racism, Facing reality, Growing up - pain or pleasure, Isolation
- Available
An Oregon-born Nisei woman shares her family's story, including her parents' efforts to establish a farm in Hood River, her childhood, and the impact of being taken from their home and incarcerated during World War II.
Manzanar and Beyond (book)
- Books
- Memoir
- Coming of age, Disillusionment and dreams, Displacement, Importance of community, Injustice, Rights - individual or societal
- Available
Prominent Nisei attorney recounts his life, including his experiences as the administrator of the hospital at Manzanar concentration camp and his role in landmark legal battles advocating for redressing injustices experienced by Japanese Americans.
Manzanar Daze and Cold Nights (book)
- Books
- Grades 7-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Desire to escape, Importance of community, Reunion
- Available
Posthumously published memoir by a Nisei man about his years at Manzanar during World War II.
Memoirs of a Certain Nisei (book)
- Books
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Empowerment, Patriotism – positive side or complications, War – glory, necessity, pain, tragedy
- Available
Posthumously published memoir by Kibei war hero Thomas Taro Higa , translated from its original Japanese and published in 1988. The vast majority of the book covers events taking place during World War II.
Nisei Odyssey: The Camp Years (book)
- Books
- Memoir
- Displacement, Facing reality, Injustice, Patriotism - positive side or complications, Rights - individual or societal, War - glory, necessity, pain, tragedy
- Limited availability
Nisei's recollections of his experiences incarcerated in an assembly center and concentration camp during World War II as well as a recounting of various stories he remembers hearing from others both before and during the war.
"Iwao-chan!" (short story)
- Short Stories
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Everlasting love, Motherhood
- No availability
Short story by Yachiyo Uehara about a Nisei woman's bond with her deceased Issei mother in the years after the war. As the story begins, Yachiyo is on a plane from New York to San Francisco around 1950 with her two-year-old son Andy, the first time since the war years that she would be returning to her hometown. She will be moving there, initially staying with her Issei father. She is saddened that Andy will never meet her mother, whom she last saw in 1944 when she left Heart Mountain for New York and who subsequently died after they returned to San Francisco. She is relieved that her father, who dislikes children, tolerates Andy and even seems to like him. But she is also concerned about the dangerous stairs leading to the small house. She finds that despite her death two years prior, her mother's presence permeates the house. One …
My Life with a Thousand Characters (book)
- Books
- Memoir
- Coming of age, Expression through art, Overcoming - fear, weakness, vice
- Available
The creator of numerous Hanna-Barbera characters including those from Scooby Doo tells his life story, including his childhood as a Nisei in Los Angeles and his experience incarcerated at Manzanar concentration camp.
My Name Is Yoshiko (book)
- Books
- Grades 7-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Names – power and significance, Optimism – power or folly, Role of women, Working class struggles
- Available
Memoir of an ordinary Nisei woman that includes her wartime incarceration in American concentration camps. Yoshiko Kawaguchi (born in 1921) was the eldest daughter in a farm family in Downey, California. After attending sewing school, World War II hits and the family ends up in the horse stalls of Santa Anita , then in the Rohwer , Arkansas, concentration camp. Resettling in Michigan, she eventually gets a job at a fancy restaurant. She meets and marries a Nisei from Kaua'i and settles in Chicago, where her sisters and parents also eventually settle. Her husband becomes a mail carrier, and they adopt a girl. Later, they move to back to Downey and retire in Kaua'i.
Passing It On--A Memoir (book)
- Books
- Memoir
- Coming of age, Overcoming - fear, weakness, vice, Rebirth, Rights - individual or societal
- Available
Leading human rights activist reflects on her life, including her insulated childhood and the wartime incarceration experience that awakened her lifelong commitment to advocacy for all marginalized peoples.
Pleasure of Plain Rice (short story)
- Short Stories
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Desire to escape, Self-awareness, Working class struggles
- Limited availability
Essay/story by Hisaye Yamamoto on racial identity that focuses on her month-long stint as a domestic in Springfield, Massachusetts, during World War II. She begins the piece by noting various white Americans she knows who have changed their ethnic-sounding last names to less ethnic sounding ones, noting the futility of her doing such a thing as a Japanese American, citing the mass incarceration during World War II. Anxious to leave Poston , where she and her family ended up, she and two of her younger brothers are allowed to leave for Massachusetts in the summer of 1944. While her fifteen-year-old brother Yuke is placed in a summer camp in the Berkshires, the War Relocation Authority office in Boston assigns her and her seventeen-year-old brother Jemo to become domestic servants for a wealthy widow in Springfield. Both initially dislike the stern and formal family and the job duties that had to …
Out of the Frying Pan: Reflections of a Japanese American (book)
- Books
- Memoir
- Heroism - real and perceived, Injustice
- Available
A prominent journalist reflects on his life and career, including the difficult years during World War II during which he and his family were incarcerated because of their Japanese ancestry.
Nurse of Manzanar: A Japanese American's World War II Journey (book)
- Books
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Non Fiction, Memoir
- Displacement, Facing reality, Importance of community, Overcoming - fear, weakness, vice, Role of women
- Available
Edited diary of Toshiko Eto Nakamura (1910–94), a nurse who volunteered to work at the hospital in Manzanar during World War II.
A Century of Change: The Memoirs of Nellie Yae Sumiye Nakamura from 1902 to 2002 (book)
- Books
- Memoir
- Coming of age, Death - inevitable or tragedy, Disillusionment and dreams, Displacement, Facing reality, Family - blessing or curse, Immigrant experience, Injustice, War - glory, necessity, pain, tragedy
- Available
The recollections of a Nisei woman, from her childhood in the Santa Clara Valley, to her marriage, her family's incarceration at Santa Anita and Heart Mountain , and their efforts to rebuild their lives back in California after the war ended.
Farewell to Manzanar (book)
- Books
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Coming of age, Displacement, Evils of racism, Family – blessing or curse, Working class struggles
- Widely available
Popular memoir that tells the story of one family's forced removal and confinement at Manzanar through the eyes of a young girl. First published in 1973, Farewell to Manzanar has sold over one million copies and is one of the most widely read accounts of Japanese American incarceration and its aftermath.
Jinan: A Japanese American Story of Duty, Honor, and Family (book)
- Books
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Capitalism – effect on the individual, Family – blessing or curse, Overcoming – fear, weakness, vice
- Available
Memoir of a Kibei man whose story takes him from Los Angeles to Hiroshima and back, to " voluntary evacuation " in Colorado, and postwar business success back in Southern California.