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Democracy Under Pressure: Japanese Americans and World War II (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Displacement, Evils of racism, Injustice
- Available
Documentary film on the wartime experience of Japanese Americans from the San Diego area, including their exclusion and subsequent incarceration at Santa Anita Assembly Center and Poston , as well as their return home. The story is told through the eyes of former inmates Ruth Takahashi Voorhies (born 1923) and Ben Segawa (born 1930), along with historian Don Estes.
Designing the Path: Japanese American Architect, Gyo Obata (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary, Biography
- Circle of life, Expression through art, Wisdom of experience
- Available
Japanese-produced documentary film profiling Nisei architect Gyo Obata.
The Empty Chair (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Injustice, Power of the past, Importance of community
- Available
Feature length documentary film by Greg Chaney that recounts the forced removal and incarceration of Japanese Americans from Juneau, Alaska, during World War II.
Encounter with the Past: American Japanese Internment in World War II (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Injustice
- No availability
A 1980 documentary film on the history of the World War II incarceration of Japanese Americans at Manzanar , produced and directed by Tak Shindo , a Nisei musician and composer, best known for his albums from the jazz exotica music era and television soundtrack work. The film is built around color footage of the camp taken by Aksel Nielson, the director of recreation at Manzanar. Narrated by Shindo, the film includes his own experiences at Manzanar, military service, and subsequent musical career. Though he had passed away prior to the making of the film, Nielson's voice can be heard describing scenes of sporting events and gardens at Manzanar, and his wife, Melva Nielson, a music teacher at Manzanar, is interviewed at length on camera. Among those appearing in the film are Military Intelligence Service veteran Yukio Tamura, artist Estelle Ishigo , photographer Toyo Miyatake , nursery owner Shinobu Mashiko, …
Enemy Alien (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Dangers of ignorance, Fear of other
- Widely available
Documentary film by Konrad Aderer on the post-9/11 arrest of Farouk Abel-Muhti, a New York based human right activist, and his two year odyssey of imprisonment, protest, and mistreatment. The case inspires Aderer, a Yonsei , to explore his family's World War II incarceration for the first time, journeying to Cleveland to interview his grandmother, Toyo Takayama, who had gotten married in Tanforan and bore his mother in Topaz . The making of the film as well as Aderer's personal transformation in becoming active in Abel-Muhti's case become part of the story told in the film.
A Flicker in Eternity (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary, Short
- War - glory, necessity, pain, tragedy, Loss of innocence, Coming of age
- Widely available
A short documentary film from 2013 by Sharon Yamato and Ann Kaneko about the experiences of a young Nisei named Stanley Hayami , based on his diary and letters. A Nisei teenager incarcerated with his family during World War II at Heart Mountain , Hayami kept a diary documenting his life and thoughts in camp and subsequently as a member of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team until his death while in combat in Europe just days before Germany surrendered. Filmmakers Yamato and Kaneko tell the story largely in Hayami's own words, voiced by actor Aaron Yoo, as well as those of his older sister Sach, voiced by Amy Hill. The film includes archival photographs and footage and aspiring artist Hayami's own drawings from his diary, often in animated form. The DVD release of the film included interview footage with Hayami family members including Stanley's sister-in-law Miwako Hayami, niece Dawn Hayami, …
The Floating World (book)
- Books
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Fiction
- Coming of age, Family – blessing or curse, Female roles, Working class struggles, Growing up – pain or pleasure
- Widely available
Acclaimed coming-of-age novel largely set on the road centering on Olivia Osaka and her itinerant family in the 1950s.
For the Sake of the Children (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documetary
- Change versus tradition, Communication – verbal and nonverbal, Female roles, Power of silence
- Limited availability
Documentary film on the impact of the World War II incarceration on the generation of Japanese Americans who grew up after the war. Filmmaker Marlene Shigekawa profiles several Japanese American families, interviewing both surviving Nisei and their children and grandchildren, exploring the questions of why the Nisei generally didn't tell their children about their wartime incarceration and the impact of that silence on the later generations. Much of the focus is on the varying experiences of mothers and daughters. The film uses both historical images and contemporary footage shot at Poston and other camps as well and contemporary camp pilgrimages.
Forced Out: Internment and the Enduring Damage to California Cities and Towns (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Injustice, Importance of community, Power of the past
- Limited availability
A 2003 documentary film that explores the subject of the Japanese American forced removal and mass incarceration during World War II and its economic impact on California's Japantowns through the stories of merchants and community institutions. Among the stories highlighted are Honnami Taedo, a ceramics shop in San Francisco Japantown; the Rafu Shimpo newspaper, Fugetsudo sweet shop, and the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles' Little Tokyo; a San Francisco-based quilt project by Japanese American women that documents the wartime events; and the Asahi Market in Oxnard, which was run for the Japanese American proprietors by a Mexican American family during the war.
Forgotten Valor (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Drama
- War - glory, necessity, pain, tragedy, Heroism - real or perceived
- No availability
Dramatic film about a 442nd Regimental Combat Team veteran who was among those awarded the Medal of Honor in 2000, but who refuses to attend the ceremony and subsequently disappears.
From a Different Shore: An American Identity (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Change versus tradition, Importance of community, Power of the past, Reunion
- Limited availability
Documentary film produced by Great Britain's The Open University that examines the Japanese American community by focusing on three families in Los Angeles.
From a Silk Cocoon (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Individual versus society, Injustice, War – glory, necessity, pain, tragedy
- Widely available
Documentary film recounting the wartime story of a Kibei couple, Itaru and Shizuko Ina and their two young children as reconstructed by their daughter Satsuki Ina. Ina and co-directors Emery Clay III and Stephen Holsapple tell the story largely through the couple's own words in the form of Shizuko's diary and letters to each other when they become separated in the course of their incarceration.
Gila River (play)
- Plays
Play by Lane Nishikawa, set in the Gila River , Arizona, concentration camp, that tells the story of the Wakabayashi family. Told in a flashback after Nisei daughter Mitsue revisits the site in 1972, the play incorporates the arrest and internment of the Issei patriarch, the military service (in the Military Intelligence Service ) of a baseball loving son, and relationships with Native Americans on whose land the camp had been built. The play premiered in 1999 at the Gila River Arts and Crafts Center and has been subsequently performed at the World Theater at California State University at Monterey Bay and the Japan America Theatre in Los Angeles.
Gila River and Mama: The Ruth Mix Story (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Injustice, Loss of innocence, Power of the past
- Available
Documentary film that tells the story of the mass removal and incarceration of Japanese Americans through the eyes of Ruth Mix, who as a fifteen year old, accompanied her mother Frida, a teacher, to Gila River and lived among the inmates. Filmmaker Claire Mix is the daughter of Ruth.
Going for Honor, Going for Broke (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- War - glory, necessity, pain, tragedy, Heroism - real and perceived
- Limited availability
Short 2006 documentary film that gives an overview of the 100th Infantry Battalion and 442nd Regimental Combat Team . Produced, written, directed, narrated & edited by George Toshio Johnston, he film was funded by a grant from the California Civil Liberties Public Education Program .
Forsaken Fields (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Injustice, Displacement, Necessity of work, Working class struggles
- Limited availability
Documentary film on the impact of wartime incarceration on Japanese American farming in California.
Garden of Stones (book)
- Books
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Historical Fiction
- Role of women, Motherhood, Temporary nature of physical beauty, Power of the past, Facing darkness
- Widely available
Popular novel by Sophie Littlefield centering on three generations of Japanese American women whose lives are dramatically shaped by the wartime incarceration of the elder two at Manzanar .
Gardens of Hope (book)
- Books
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Historical Fiction
- Companionship as salvation, Everlasting love, Evils of racism, Loss of innocence, Self-awareness
- Widely available
Novel about the short but life changing romance between a young white man and a Nisei man during World War II. The story begins in 2004, as the elderly Jack Henry asks his nephew to drive him to the Manzanar National Historic Site. On the way, he tells the nephew the story of his connection to the place. As the story begins in Los Angeles the fall of 1942, Jack seems to have everything: a loving family, a smart and attractive fiancée, and good prospects for a career as a teacher. However as a closeted gay man, he is confused and unhappy. Drawn to Pershing Park downtown, he has a series of furtive sexual encounters with other men before meeting Hiro, a handsome young Nisei. Their affair is immediately different and deeper than the others. When the outbreak of war separates them, Jack impulsively decides to become a teacher at …
Gasa-Gasa Girl (book)
- Books
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Adult
- Fiction, Mystery
- Family – blessing or curse, Greed as downfall, Power of the past
- Widely available
The second mystery novel in Naomi Hirahara's "Mas Arai Mysteries" series, Gasa-Gasa Girl finds the Kibei crime solver in New York where he reconciles with his estranged daughter and unravels the mysterious death of a wealthy Nisei businessman.
The Gate of Heaven (play)
- Plays
Play by Lane Nishikawa and Victor Talmadge about the lifelong friendship between a Nisei who helped liberate a Nazi death camp as a member of the 522nd Field Artillery Battalion and a Holocaust survivor. The main characters, Kiyoshi "Sam" Yamamoto and Leon Ehrlich, are based on the lives of the playwrights' fathers. The play begins in April 1945 and follows the two men over the course of their lives. It was first produced at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego on March 5, 1996. Nishikawa adapted the play into a short dramatic film titled When We Were Warriors, Part I , which he directed and starred in alongside Talmadge.
Fumiko Hayashida: The Woman Behind the Symbol (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Injustice, Role of women, Power of the past
- Available
A 2009 short documentary film about Fumiko Hayashida, a pregnant mother of two who was one of 227 members of the Bainbridge Island Japanese American community who were forced from their homes in March 1942. Hayashida—or at least her image—became immortalized in a photograph taken of her holding her young daughter. First appearing the Seattle Post-Intelligencer , the photograph became one of the iconic images of the roundup. Providing both a biographical portrait of Hayashida and telling the larger story of Bainbridge Island, the film also shows the then 97-year-old Hayashida revisiting the site of the former Minidoka concentration camp in Idaho.
Gambling Den (short story)
- Short Stories
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Historical Fiction
- Coming of age, Disillusionment and dreams, Immigrant experience, Loss of innocence, Role of women, Temptation and destruction
- No availability
Short story by Akemi Kikumura about a Japanese American family in Lodi, California, on the eve of World War II. Told in the first person voice of fifteen-year-old Peggy Tanaka, the story begins with the Tanaka family's fateful purchase of a restaurant in 1941. The restaurant soon becomes a success as migrant workers are drawn to both Mrs. Tanaka's cooking and the beauty of Ann, Peggy's eighteen-year-old sister. Mr. Tanaka's decision to open a gambling den in back further adds to profits, despite Mrs. Tanaka's disapproval and the necessary kick-backs to a corrupt local policeman. But the Tanakas' lives are soon to be complicated by Ann's romance with a young man of burakumin (Japanese outcaste) origin, a conniving neighbor, and the impending roundup of Japanese Americans after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
Ganbare Don't Give Up! (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Immigrant experience, Patriotism – positive side or complications, Rights - individual or societal, War – glory, necessity, pain, tragedy
- No availability
Documentary film that provides an overview of what happened to Japanese Americans in Hawai'i during World War II, focusing on the limited internment of Issei community leaders and the exploits of Japanese American men in the armed forces. Ganbare Don't Give Up! was produced as a part of the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawai'i's core exhibition, Okage Sama De: I am what I am because of you , which remains the only place where it can be viewed.
Gold Watch (play)
- Plays
A 1972 play by Momoko Iko that was one of the first to take up the wartime mass removal of Japanese Americans from the West Coast.
Great Grandfather's Drum (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Expression through art, Importance of community, Power of the past, Power of tradition
- Available
Documentary film that tells the story of Japanese Americans in Maui through the story of Maui Taiko and its founder, Kay Fukumoto.