Browse > Genre > Documentary
262 articles
Guilty by Reason of Race (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Injustice, Evils of racism, Power of the past
- Widely available
Documentary film produced by NBC and shown nationally on September 19, 1972, as part of the NBC Reports series. It was the second major network documentary on the wartime removal and incarceration of Japanese Americans after The Nisei: The Pride and the Shame , which aired on CBS in 1965.
Truth of the Matter (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Good versus bad, Injustice, Manipulation
- Widely available
Short film by Steve Nagano that juxtaposes the rosy portrayal of the roundup and incarceration of Japanese Americans as presented by the 1942 film Japanese Relocation produced by the War Relocation Authority and Office of War Information with testimony by Japanese Americans from the Los Angeles hearings of the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians in 1981. The film cuts back and forth between clips from Japanese Relocation and testimony that directly contradicts the claims espoused in the film. The final clip, from Grace Nakamura, emphasizes that such a mass roundup and incarceration could happen again.
Rabbit in the Moon (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Convention and rebellion, Injustice, Power of the past, Role of women
- Widely available
Documentary film written and directed by Emiko Omori and produced by Omori with her sister Chizuko on Japanese Americans in American concentration camps during World War II that highlights resistance and other lesser told stories. Winner of many awards and screened nationally on public television in 1999, Rabbit in Moon has become one of the most acclaimed and widely viewed feature length documentaries on this topic.
Legacy of the Barracks (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 7-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Power of the past, Quest for discovery, Wisdom of experience
- Limited availability
Locally produced 1994 documentary by Los Angeles TV station KABC hosted by Tricia Takasugi about a project to bring two barracks from Heart Mountain , Wyoming, back to Los Angeles for display at the Japanese American National Museum (JANM). We see volunteers in Wyoming carefully dismantling the barracks, numbering them, and loading them onto trucks, then putting one back together in a parking lot across the street from JANM, where it will accompany the exhibition, America's Concentration Camps . The second barracks was used in the core exhibition in the museum's new building that opened six years later. Several volunteers who worked on the project are interviewed, as are some JANM staffers. (Some of the interview footage with Bacon Sakatani —as well as some footage and narration—is recycled from an earlier KABC documentary, Memories of the Camps [1992].)
Lawson Fusao Inada: What It Means to Be Free (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Expression through art, Importance of community, Power of words
- Limited availability
Documentary film featuring poet Lawson Fusao Inada . In the film, Inada reads ten of his poems, while also providing brief introductions or background information on each of them. The filmmakers incorporate archival and contemporary footage—including visits by Inada to Tule Lake , the site of the Fresno Assembly Center , and Japanese American Historical Plaza in Portland, Oregon—as well as archival and family photographs into the readings.
Fort Sill Protest (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Immigrant experience, Injustice, Power of the past
- Widely available
Video documentary of the 2019 Fort Sill protest coordinated on June 22, 2019, by a coalition of progressive organizations including Tsuru for Solidarity, American Indian Movement (AIM) Indian Territory, Dream Action Oklahoma, Black Lives Matter OKC, and the Autonomous Brown Berets. This documentary includes interviews with activists, community members, and former incarcerees; news coverage of the event; highlights of speeches from the protest; and footage of their interactions with the military police. Speakers and interviewees highlight the significance of Fort Sill as a historic site of oppression, first with Native Americans imprisoned in a boarding school and prison camp, then as an incarceration site for Japanese Americans during WWII, and most recently as a detainment center for immigrant and refugee children. The documentary connects the incarceration of Japanese Americans with current immigration detention policies that have led to the separation of children from their families. The film urges solidarity amongst …
Yae Wada: 45 Years of Anger (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 6-8, Grades 7-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Immigrant experience, Injustice, Power of the past
- Widely available
Video documentary produced by "What Does It Mean To Be American?" as part of the Mineta Legacy Project, which features an interview with former Japanese American incarceree, Yae Wada . [1] At the age of 99, Wada recounts her memories of being placed in concentration camps during World War II, and how she overcame her anger towards the experience.
History and Memory (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary, Experimental
- Injustice, Power of the past, Role of women
- Widely available
Experimental documentary film by Rea Tajiri that explores the collective memory of Japanese American incarceration through the act of remembering and forgetting. History and Memory (1991) has been frequently studied by academics and film critics for its cultural impact on the topic of Japanese American incarceration and memory.
Act of Faith: The Rev. Emery Andrews Story (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Circle of life, Family – blessing or curse, Heroism – real and perceived, Love and sacrifice
- Widely available
Documentary film on Rev. Emery Andrews , a Baptist priest who went beyond the call of duty to aid Japanese Americans from Seattle incarcerated at the Minidoka , Idaho, concentration camp.
Right of Passage (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Empowerment, Female roles, Importance of community, Power of the past
- Available
Documentary film by Janice D. Tanaka that chronicles the convoluted twenty-year history of the Redress Movement .
The Nisei: The Pride and the Shame (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Adult
- Documentary
- Injustice, War - glory, pain, necessity, tragedy
- Widely available
Documentary film centering on the Japanese American wartime experience that was part of CBS television's weekly The Twentieth Century series. The half-hour episode was the first retrospective documentary on the wartime exclusion and incarceration experience.
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 .