Browse > Interest Level > Adult
574 articles
Fred Korematsu: All American Hero (book)
- Books
- Grades 7-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Grades 7-8
- Comics
- Convention and rebellion, Heroism – real and perceived, Injustice, Patriotism – positive side or complications, Power of the past
- Widely available
Comic book by two University of California at Davis law professors that tells the story of exclusion challenger Fred Korematsu through the eyes of a young Muslim American girl in post-9/11 America.
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.
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 Goes to Camp (book)
- Books
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir, Art
- Coming of age, Expression through art, Growing up – pain or pleasure, Immigrant experience, Oppression of women
- Widely available
Concentration camp memoir by a Nisei artist. Ten years old at the time of the wartime incarceration, Lily Yuriko Nakai Havey was sent to Santa Anita Assembly Center and Amache with her older brother and Issei parents. Evolving from captions that accompanied displays of the author's postwar paintings, Gasa Gasa Girl intersperses stories of life in the camps with recollections of happier days with her parents, brother, and aunts in Hollywood, California, before the war. The book is illustrated by twenty-eight color reproductions of her watercolor paintings that depict both her external and internal lives during the war, as well as a like number of family photographs, archival photographs, and photographs of key objects mentioned in the text. Published by the University of Utah Press, the book includes an foreword by historian Cherstin Lyon.
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.
Dusty Exile: Looking Back at Japanese Relocation during World War II (book)
- Books
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Memoir
- Evils of racism, Role of women, Progress – real or illusion
- Available
Memoir of the forced removal and incarceration and its aftermath by a sympathetic white schoolteacher at Poston .
Eagle Against the Sun (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Drama
- Loss of innocence, Coming of age, Evils of racism
- Limited availability
A dramatic short film by John Akahoshi centering on a 17-year-old Japanese American high school girl and the impact the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor has on her life.
East of Occidental: The History of Seattle's Chinatown (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Change versus tradition, Rebirth
- Widely available
Documentary film on Seattle's Chinatown/ International District that outlines the history of the area and argues that pan-Asian Americanism makes it unique among American ethnic enclaves. The film includes the story of the mass removal of Japanese Americans from the area and their subsequent incarceration during World War II.
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.
From Bullets to Ballots (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Quest for power, Role of men, War – glory, necessity, pain, tragedy, Working class struggles
- Widely available
Documentary film on Japanese Americans from Hawai'i as part of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team and their role in the political realignment of Hawai'i after the war. From Bullets to Ballots was one of three short films directed by Robert A. Nakamura and produced by Karen L. Ishizuka in conjunction with From Bento to Mixed Plate: Americans of Japanese Ancestry in Multicultural Hawai'i, an exhibition produced by the Japanese American National Museum in 1997.
From Hawaii to the Holocaust: A Shared Moment in History (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Evils of racism, Facing darkness, War – glory, necessity, pain, tragedy
- Widely available
Documentary film on the men of the 522nd Field Artillery Battalion and their encounter with Jewish victims of the Nazi death camps at the end of World War II. The 1993 film was a production of the Hawaii Holocaust Project.
The 442nd: Duty, Honor and Loyalty (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- War - glory, necessity, pain, tragedy, Heroism - real and perceived
- Limited availability
Documentary film on the 442nd Regimental Combat Team . The 442nd: Duty, Honor & Loyalty is a English language version of a 1996 Japanese language documentary produced by Bungei Shunju, Ltd. titled Amerika Dai-442 Hohei Rentai: Nikkei Niseitachi no Dainijin Seikai Taisen . The English language script was by John Dobovan, who also narrated.
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.
Gaijin: American Prisoner of War (book)
- Books
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Graphic novels
- Coming of age, Displacement, Isolation
- Widely available
Gaijin: American Prisoner of War by Matt Faulkner is the story of a hapa teenage boy's struggle living in post December 7 San Francisco, California. 13-year-old Koji Miyamoto discovers that life being biracial (his mother Adeline is white and his father Ichiro is Japanese) is just as difficult inside an incarceration camp as it was outside in the city after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Written for 5th through 8th grade readers, this graphic novel has a distinctive style of elongated caricatures colored with dark reds, yellows, blues, and browns.
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.
Good Luck Soup (film)
- Films and Video
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Documentary
- Coming of age, Growing up – pain or pleasure, Importance of community, Individual versus society, Power of tradition
- Widely available
Autobiographical documentary film by Matthew Hashiguchi that explores his and his family's experience growing up as mixed-race Japanese Americans in Cleveland, Ohio. Hashiguchi draws inspiration from his Nisei grandmother and family matriarch Eva Hashiguchi, who settled in Cleveland after leaving the Jerome , Arkansas, concentration camp during World War II and chose to remain there. In addition to the feature length film, the Good Luck Soup project also includes an interactive website that serves as an "participatory storytelling" platform.
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, …
Floating Home (short story)
- Short Stories
- Grades 7-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
- Historical Fiction
- Facing reality, Growing up – pain or pleasure, Reunion, Working class struggles
- Widely available
Short story about a family returning to Little Tokyo from Rohwer . When fourteen-year-old Mari returns home with her parents, she expects to go to their old house, but is dismayed when they go to a run down residential hotel instead. Her father explains to her that they had rented the house they had lived in before the war, and they it was now being rented to someone else. Mari decides to walk to the house to take a last look. She finds an African American girl about her age on the swing in front. Initially suspicious, the girl becomes friendlier when Mari tells her why she and her family had to leave and invites her inside.
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.
Death Rides the Rails to Poston (short story)
- Short Stories
- Grades 9-12, Adult
- Mystery
- Power and corruption, Quest for discovery
- Widely available
Short story murder mystery by Hisaye Yamamoto that takes place on the train taking forcibly removed Japanese Americans to the Poston , Arizona, concentration camp. Death Rides the Rails to Poston first appeared in serialized form in the Poston Chronicle newspaper in 1943.
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.