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18 articles

The First Battle: The Battle for Equality in War-Time Hawaii (film)

Films and Video
Grades 9-12, Adult
Documentary, Drama
Limited availability

A 2006 film by Tom Coffman about the multi-racial group of civic and military leaders in World War II Hawai'i that monitored race relations and supported Hawai'i's large Japanese American community. After Pearl Harbor was bombed on December 7, 1941 , the Committee for Interracial Unity and the Morale Section led by Chinese American YMCA Secretary Hung Wai Ching and Japanese American school principal Shigeo Yoshida , worked to protect the civil liberties of the people of Japanese ancestry living in Hawai'i, which ultimately led to the decision against a mass removal of Japanese Americans from the islands. In addition to interviews with some of the key figures and archival footage and stills, The First Battle also recreates several key scenes with actors playing key historical figures such as Ching, Yoshida, and Hawai'i FBI head Robert Shivers . Major funders included Central Pacific Bank, the Gerbode Foundation, the Hawaii Pacific …

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.

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.

442: For the Future (film)

Films and Video
Grades 7-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
Documentary
Role of men, War – glory, necessity, pain, tragedy
Limited availability

Docu-drama by Patricia Kinaga that tells the story of the Japanese American World War II experience with a focus on the exploits of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team , through the experiences of four characters.

Voices Behind Barbed Wire: Stories of Hawai'i Island (film)

Films and Video
Grades 9-12, Adult
Documentary, History
Power of the past, Injustice, Quest for discovery, Immigrant experience
Widely available

Short film that tells the story of Japanese Americans on Big Island of Hawai'i who were interned during World War II using a combination of contemporary interviews, historical photographs and footage, and historical reenactments. It is one of a series of four films produced by the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawai'i about the internment experience in each of the four counties of Hawai'i as a follow up to the 2012 film The Untold Story: Internment of Japanese Americans in Hawai'i .

Voices Behind Barbed Wire: Stories of O'ahu (film)

Films and Video
Grades 9-12, Adult
Documentary, History
Power of the past, Injustice, Quest for discovery, Immigrant experience
Widely available

Short film that tells the story of Japanese Americans on O'ahu who were interned during World War II using a combination of contemporary interviews, historical photographs and footage, and historical reenactments. It is one of a series of four films produced by the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawai'i about the internment experience in each of the four counties of Hawai'i as a follow up to the 2012 film The Untold Story: Internment of Japanese Americans in Hawai'i .

The Untold Story: Internment of Japanese Americans in Hawai'i (film)

Films and Video
Grades 9-12, Adult
Documentary, History
Power of the past, Injustice, Quest for discovery, Immigrant experience
Widely available

Documentary film produced by the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawai'i (JCCH) in 2012 that provides an overview on the internment of Japanese Americans in Hawai'i during World War II—both those held in camps in the continental U.S. and those held in Hawai'i camps—as well as contemporary efforts to preserve the Hawai'i sites today.

Why She Left Us (book)

Books
Grades 9-12, Adult
Historical Fiction
Family – blessing or curse, Motherhood, Power of the past, Role of women
Widely available

A 1999 novel by Rahna Reiko Rizzuto that follows the Okada family from the 1920s to the 1990s and includes their incarceration at the Santa Anita Assembly Center and Amache as well as the experiences of two Nisei who serve in the 442nd Regimental Combat Team . The novel is structured as a series of vignettes told from the points of view of four characters. Why She Left Us was honored with an American Book Award in 2000.

Canefields and Deserts: Japanese American Internment (exhibition)

Museum Exhibitions
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
History
Evils of racism, Injustice
No availability

Early traveling exhibition assembled by the Japanese American National Museum (JANM) and displayed in venues in Honolulu and Denver, Colorado, in 1992. As part of the 50th anniversary commemoration of Executive Order 9066 , JANM put together Canefields and Deserts , which opened at the Ala Moana Center in Honolulu on July 10, 1992. Curated by Pam Funai, the exhibition included photographs of Hawai'i internment camps Sand Island and Honouliuli , letter and sketches by artist George Hoshida , and a large scale model of Manzanar made by Robert Hasuike. After its brief ten-day run in Honolulu, the exhibition traveled to Denver in August 1992.

Journey of Honor (film)

Films and Video
Grades 9-12, Adult
Documentary
War - glory, necessity, pain, tragedy, Heroism - real and perceived
Widely available

Documentary film produced and directed by Stuart Yamane centering on a trip by a group of Hawai'i Nisei veterans of the 100th Infantry Battalion and 442nd Regimental Combat Team to Italy some fifty-five years after they fought there during World War II. In documenting the trip, Yamane reconnects with his late and estranged father Masakichi, a World War II veteran, who had served with some of the men on the trip. Led by columnist and military history buff Bob Jones, the trip includes stops at Pietrasanta, where they the men are honored in a Liberation Day ceremony and take part in the unveiling of a statue honoring Sadao Munemori ; Mt. Fologorito, where they have a reunion with the Alpini, the Italian Mountain Corps who guided Allied troops; the American Cemetary and Memorial in Nettuno; and, finally, Monte Cassino, a mountain that was the site of one of their most …

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.

Justice Betrayed (film)

Films and Video
Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12, Adult
Documentary
Injustice
No availability

Documentary film on the internment of Japanese Americans from Hawai'i produced in 1992 by the Honolulu Chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL). Justice Betrayed includes interviews with two Japanese Americans whose fathers were interned (Sandra Takahata, the daughter of artist George Hoshida , and Akira Otani, son of businessman Matsujiro Otani ); Tokushige and Mitsue Nakahara, boat builder brothers who were themselves interned; and Violet Ishii Hayashi, a woman from originally from Hawai'i who was on the West Coast at time of the mass expulsion and incarceration and ended up at Poston ; and legal scholar Eric Yamamoto and historian Franklin Odo. In addition to outlining the Hawai'i story, the film also covers Executive Order 9066 and the West Coast story as well as the issues with John DeWitt's Final Report that led to the corm nobis cases in the 1980s.

Midway (film)

Films and Video
Grades 9-12, Adult
Drama, War
War - glory, necessity, pain, tragedy
Available

Epic war movie that tells the story of the Battle of Midway, the turning point of the Pacific War, from both the American and Japanese perspectives. Made for a modest budget despite its all-star cast, Midway was successful at the box office. In addition to employing many Japanese American actors in the roles of Japanese naval officers, the movie has a subplot involving the internment/incarceration of Japanese Americans.

Nikkei Style (film)

Films and Video
Grades 9-12, Adult
Documentary
Change versus tradition, Importance of community, Power of tradition, Quest for discovery
Limited availability

Personal essay on being Japanese American by Sansei filmmaker Steven Okazaki , narrated in his first person voice. Beginning his journey at a family mochizuki event in Oxnard, California, he explores his family history, taking us to the house he grew up in in Venice, California, and telling us what he knows of his mother's and father's families, including their World War II incarceration (his mother went to Santa Anita , then Amache , his father to Heart Mountain ) and featuring a brief interview with his mother. In search of more information about his father's side, he goes to Japan to visit a distant cousin and to Hawai'i to visit one of his father's old army buddies, from whom he learns much. The film ends with footage from various bon dances in Hawai'i and the continental U.S, which Okazaki cites as a living symbol of being Japanese American. Along …

Removed by Force: The Eviction of Hawai`i's Japanese Americans During WWII (film)

Films and Video
Grades 9-12, Adult
Documentary, History
Empowerment, Injustice, Quest for discovery
Available

Documentary film by Ryan Kawamoto about Japanese Americans in Hawai'i who were excluded or removed from their homes, but not interned, along with the 1990s efforts by the Honolulu Chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League to secure redress for this group under the Civil Liberties Act of 1988 .

Hawaii, End of the Rainbow (book)

Books
Grades 9-12, Adult
Historical Fiction
Immigrant experience, Injustice, Will to survive, Working class struggles
Available

Kazuo Miyamoto (1897–1988) was a Nisei doctor and author who was interned at various incarceration camps for the duration of World War II as a result of the publication of his observations during the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945). During his incarceration at Sand Island , Miyamoto began writing Hawaii, End of the Rainbow , which took him seventeen years to complete. Although a fictional account of the experiences of Japanese immigrants spanning nearly seventy years from their arrival in the Islands to World War II, it provides key insights from a participant in these important events.

The Hawai'i Nisei Story (website)

Websites
Grades 9-12, Adult
Virtual Exhibit
Heroism – real and perceived, Role of men, War – glory, necessity, pain, tragedy
Widely available

Website developed in the mid-2000s by the University of Hawai'i built around oral histories of Nisei veterans from Hawai'i.

Hell to Eternity (film)

Films and Video
Grades 9-12, Adult
War, Drama
Evils of racism, Heroism - real or perceived, War - glory, necessity, pain, tragedy
Available

Hell to Eternity , directed by Phil Karlson and released in 1960, is a Hollywood war film that dramatizes the real-life story of Guy Gabaldon (played by Jeffrey Hunter), an American Marine who singlehandedly captured over 1,500 Japanese soldiers and civilians on the Island of Saipan during the fighting there in mid-1944. In addition to its portrait of Gabaldon's wartime heroism, Hell to Eternity is notable as the first Hollywood film to portray the wartime confinement of Japanese Americans.