March 12, 2026 • 17 mins
Huge thanks to Susan Kamei for her interview explaining the Japanese and Japanese experience Pre-WWII.
In this addenda episode, we go over some of the terms (Japanese and English) you'll hear throughout this season that you're probably unfamiliar with.
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:01):
This is History for the Reckoning, a podcast that
dives deep into the historythat's hard to hear but critical
to understand.
Season one, AmericanConcentration Camps, the story
of World War II JapaneseIncarceration.
Welcome to the addenda episodefor episode one of the podcast.
I'd like to start out with ahuge thanks to Susan Kame for
(00:24):
coming on the show.
She has years and years ofexpertise.
She's a big figure in thisfield.
I was honored to be able tointerview her.
And uh a little story about her.
When I first joined the JACL orthe Japanese American Citizens
League, an organization thatyou're going to hear a lot about
over this podcast, they had awelcome call for all of the new
members for that month.
And when I came on it, she wason it.
(00:44):
She was there introducing theorganization, and she was also
the voice for at least one ofthe videos from a video series
that JACL has put out, sharingthis history as well.
So I encourage you to go to theJACL's website and to find it
there.
So over this series, you'regoing to hear a lot of terms
that you're not going to befamiliar with.
A lot of them are going to be inJapanese.
(01:05):
So the Japanese Americans thatimmigrated to the United States
brought their language, theirculture, and even across
generations, many of the wordsfrom the Japanese language have
stuck around, especially forthose first and second
generations that were here inthe 1940s.
So I'd like to share some ofthose with you that are going to
be used in the podcast so thatyou'll be up to speed no matter
(01:26):
what.
So the first thing that youalready heard is the system of
naming the generations.
So this is based on the numbersystem in Japanese.
So big disclaimer, all theseJapanese terms I'm going to be
saying in this addenda episodeare not going to be pronounced
correctly because I am notJapanese.
Or I don't speak it at all.
So let me give it my best shotand try to explain these as best
(01:48):
I can in my terrible accent.
So in the Japanese numbersystem, counting one through
five is Ichi, Ni, San, Yon, andGo.
And that corresponds with thegenerations.
So if you happen to look up howto count one through five in
Japanese, you'll be able tounderstand the names of the
generations.
So our first generation is theIsei.
(02:08):
This is the immigrantgeneration, those who were not
born in the United States, butcame here some point in their
lives.
So, as it's important to knowfrom the history that Susan
shared with us, they were notable to legally become
naturalized or become citizensin the United States.
So a lot of their status wasseen as uh aliens, as foreign
(02:30):
peoples, people who did not havethe same rights and privileges
as citizens, and they were oftentreated as such.
Important distinction that theydidn't even have the option to
become citizens.
Another thing that's kind ofinteresting about the history
that we'll be covering, Imentioned how we're going to
hear a lot about the JapaneseAmerican Citizens League down
the road.
The Japanese American CitizensLeague was composed of the
(02:51):
generation right beneath theIsei or the Nisei.
So the Isei did not make up theJapanese American Citizens
League.
The Japanese American CitizensLeague are those who kind of
filled the vacuum after many ofthe community leaders who would
have been Isei, those whoimmigrated to the United States,
were arrested, were removed fromtheir homes by the FBI very
shortly after Pearl Harbor.
(03:13):
So the second generation is theNisei.
They're the children of theimmigrants.
These are citizens.
So they were born in the UnitedStates, and therefore, because
the United States has birthrightcitizenship, they had all the
rights and privileges ascitizens, even though often they
were not treated the same way asother American citizens.
So these are those that filledthe gap after the Isei were many
(03:34):
of the community leaders amongthe Isei were arrested, were
removed, and the Nissei, many ofthem were already into adulthood
at this time.
So they were able to step up asthe community leaders as part of
the JACL and as part of manyother organizations.
So when we get to the campexperience, we'll often hear the
term, we'll often hear it saidthat some two-thirds of those
(03:54):
who were incarcerated werecitizens.
So these were Nisei or the thirdgeneration Sansei.
So speaking of the Sansei.
The Sansei are the thirdgeneration.
And when we get into futureepisodes, you'll hear a lot
about them because they'reoften, their generation is often
credited as those who pushed forreparations.
So the entire camp experience,the forced removal, the
(04:14):
incarceration, the confinementinto concentration camps was
very clearly illegal,unconstitutional.
After the war, this reparationscampaign was undertaken largely
by the Sansei, who had adifferent cultural outlook than
their Nisei parents andespecially their Isei
grandparents.
It's often said, or many of thestories in these families will
(04:36):
talk about how the Isei andNisei chose not to talk about
the camp experience at all afterthey were able to leave, to go
home, to restart their lives.
And that extended to the factthat many of the Sansei did not
learn this history from theirNisei parents.
So many times there are storiesof they're sitting in class, it
comes up as, oh, all theJapanese were arrested in the
(04:58):
United States, and it was fortheir own good or something else
that was not accurate.
And the Sansei would get curiousand they'd look it up.
And in looking it up, askingtheir parents, asking their
grandparents, they'd learn more,they'd get activated, you might
say, and they got politicallyactive.
And that's how the reparationsmovement that progressed from
the 1970s came to be.
So now the fourth generation isthe Yonsei.
(05:21):
They're the people that uh oftenI'm interacting with.
So so many of the people that Iinteract with are Sansei and
Yonsei.
They're the people that areengaging with this history
today.
So as the generations have goneon, the Sansei fought for those
rights, and as many of theYonsei that I see as the
leaders, the new emergingleaders in the community today
(05:41):
who are sharing this history,who are spreading awareness, and
who are doing great activism.
And the final generation thatI'm talking about today is
fifth, the Gose.
There are many Gose that I knowas well.
They're in my generation,sometimes even younger, and
they're also picking up themantle and they're doing their
best as American citizens tomake the world a better place.
Be able to be.
(06:02):
The next Japanese word I'd liketo share is Nikke.
So this is a blanket term forall those who are ethnically
Japanese that live outside ofJapan.
So I'm told that it also appliesto those who live not in the
United States, anywhere in theworld, but are not living in
Japan.
So perhaps in your communitythey'll have things that are
like Nikkei events.
I know in Salt Lake City we havewhat are called Nikkei lunches
(06:25):
now and then, which is just forall the community that have
ancestry from Japan.
The next one is Inu or Dog.
So you'll hear many of thestories of those who were in the
camps and how they interactedwith different political
ideologies, all confined in oneplace.
So there were some people whowere thought of, and history
(06:46):
will show demonstrably werereporting on their fellow camp
in inmates.
They were uh reporting on theiractivities to the governments or
to the camp authorities.
Uh many of them were part of theJACL, and sometimes they would
be referred to as Inu or dogs bythose who thought that they were
bending to the camp's whims, tothe government's whims, were
(07:08):
spying on their fellowincarcerees.
Alright, the next Japanese wordis kibei, which is a reference
to those who were educated inJapan.
A kibei is someone who was bornin the United States, but
because their parents had themeans and felt that it was
important that their childrenhad a piece of their culture,
learn the Japanese language, orjust as a chance to interact
with their Japanese family backhome, back home for these
(07:31):
immigrant parents, uh they wouldsend their children all the way
over to Japan, and so they wouldbe educated in language and
manners and customs, so thatwhen they came back, they would
know all of these things andhave strong ties to the country
of their parents' home.
These are referred to as thekibay.
Alright, so the next one are afew just phrases that you might
hear just a couple times in theseries.
(07:51):
Well, I guess this next one isvery common.
So it's Shikata Ganai.
So I've often seen it translatedas can't be helped.
When I'm watching anime, itcomes up.
If something bad happens, acharacter might say shikata
ganai, which is just likenothing you can do about it.
Uh but even though for me as anoutsider in passing, when I hear
that phrase and I see ittranslated, it seems like such a
(08:12):
simple thing.
It is a deep and residingconcept, especially for these
Japanese and Japanese Americanswho were incarcerated during
World War II.
So it's this whole philosophy ofdo not struggle against the
things that you cannot changeand embrace the ways in which
you can affect good in your lifeand your community's life in the
world.
So when they say Shakata Ganai,sometimes it can be seen as
(08:35):
defeatist, like, oh, thegovernment's locking us up,
shakata ganai, there's nothingwe can do about it.
But it's also embracing thethings that you can do about it.
So when these people wereincarcerated, often they would
improve their surroundings, theywould plant gardens, they would
beautify their space, they'dmake furniture.
There was this real sense of thecommunity working together to
make it as beautiful aspossible, despite these awful
(08:58):
circumstances that they feltthey couldn't help.
Alright, so the next term, whichI don't think will come up a
lot, but Hakujin.
This refers to white Americans.
So sometimes those in camp wouldrefer to white Americans and
they'd use the Japanese termhakujin.
Uh, next one I want to say isthe Shimpo, a word for
newspaper.
So in the first days after PearlHarbor, many of those who ran
(09:21):
the Shimpo or newspapers, theJapanese language newspapers
especially, were arrested by theFBI.
We're going to hear about thatin the next episode.
One special shimpo that I wantto talk about is the Rocky
Shimpo.
So during the incarceration,many people were confined into
camps.
There were some groups thatchose to protest this treatment,
this unconstitutional actionthat the government had taken.
(09:43):
One way they might do that is byresisting the draft that would
come later.
So the government decided weneed more soldiers, we can get
them from these giantconcentration camps where we've
locked up all of these people,many of them uh young, strong
men.
So they would try to draftJapanese Americans from the
camps.
Uh and sometimes there arepockets of resistance and
organized resistance, even,particularly in one of the camps
(10:06):
called Heart Mountain inWyoming.
And as that was happening, we'regoing to share a little bit of
that story later, but there wasa Shimpo, a newspaper in
Japanese in Colorado, I think itwas in Denver, where there was
an editor named James O'Mora whochose to share that story.
So as this resistance washappening inside of the camp in
Wyoming, James O'Mora lived inColorado where people had not
(10:28):
been forced to relocate, had notbeen forced into the
concentration camps.
So he was free to use hisfreedom of speech, freedom of
the press, to share the story ofwhat was happening in the camp,
of these people resisting thedraft.
And it turns out that he wasvery brave to do so because in
the end, all those people whodid resist the draft were
rounded up, were arrested, weretried and convicted, and James
(10:50):
Omora was included with them.
So by using his freedom ofspeech, by using his shimpo or
newspaper, he was spreading themessage of resistance, of
freedom, and he suffered thesame consequences as those who
chose to do the actualresisting.
The next Japanese term isHokori, which is often
translated as pride or dignity.
When you listen to oralhistories of the camp, sometimes
(11:13):
people will mention this as away of taking their camp
experience with a sense ofpurpose and improvement, similar
to some of the concepts thatcovered in Shikata Genai.
Every time I hear it, it's likethe sense of despite what's
going to happen, we will keepour heads held up high.
And I really respect that.
And the final Japanese term I'dlike to go over is the
kenjinkai, a reference toancestry, those who are from the
(11:35):
same prefectures.
So kenjinkai is when they're incamps, there are all these
people brought in from totallydifferent parts of California,
Oregon, Washington, all over theWest Coast.
They might not necessarily befrom the same areas.
So you'll hear stories withinthe concentration camps of
people from the country nowbeing forced to interact with
(11:55):
people from the city and thatbeing a huge culture clash.
But one way that you could findcommon ground was that uh maybe
you were an Isei and you wereliterally from Japan, or you're
an Isaii and you had someexperience with uh your
ancestral homeland, the placesthat uh your ancestors were from
in Japan.
And sometimes common groundcould be built that way.
(12:15):
So that's the Japanese terms Iwanted to go over with you.
Uh there are a few English termsthat I think are important to
cover.
So throughout this series, uhyou'll hear us often talk about
those who lived through the campexperience as survivors.
So some people feel like thisword is loaded, implies that
something really horriblehappened, then they made it
through.
And I would say that's exactlythe point, that this was a
(12:37):
horrible thing that thegovernment did.
And even though many of them wholived through it did not
experience physical traumanecessarily, every single one of
them experienced the trauma oftheir community being
disintegrated before their eyes,their possessions being torn
away, the loss of everythingthat they had known and being
forced into a camp and having torebuild afterward is an
(12:58):
absolutely horrible thing.
And it's very common in thiscommunity to refer to those who
lived through it as survivors.
So when you see uh organizedevents for those who made it
through the camps, they'll oftensay it's for survivors.
Uh, the next one is that werefer to the entire
incarceration of Japanese andJapanese Americans as the
incarceration.
(13:18):
So sometimes you'll hear thatthis was the internment of
Japanese and Japanese Americans.
So I choose to use the wordincarceration, as many others
do, to give it that connotationof how awful it was, how this
was a confinement.
They were in gigantic prisons,prisons the size of towns
sometimes.
These people were not allowed toleave.
(13:38):
When you say internship, atleast in a modern connotation,
it kind of gives the feeling oflike, oh, this is something that
I'm doing to learn skills and tojump into my trade and things
like that.
And we don't want any of that, Idon't want any of that
connotation applied to what Isee as a horrific mismanagement
by the government, a horrificmisdeed by our nation.
(13:59):
So I refer to it, and as manyothers do, as the incarceration.
Now, the biggest hot buttonEnglish word you're going to
hear me using is referring tothe camps themselves as
concentration camps.
I'm doing that deliberately.
Historically, at the time, theUS government in papers, those
that represented the government,will sometimes use the word
concentration camps becausedefinitionally that is what they
(14:22):
are.
They're literally concentratinga specific group of people into
one place.
They were not allowed to leave.
It was exclusively based ontheir race.
Those who were married to aJapanese person but were not
Japanese themselves could choosenot to go to the camps.
And even those who were littlebabies in orphanages who
happened to be of Japaneseancestry were taken into the
(14:44):
camps.
All I had to say, entirely basedon race, we refer to them as
concentration camps.
Now, this is not to say thatthey were remotely similar to
the death camps made in infamousby the Nazi regime, which were
being done at the same time.
So oftentimes when we hear theword concentration camp, we
exclusively think of those thatwere run by the Nazis, and those
(15:06):
are absolutely unimaginablyhorrific.
I do, I am fine with theconnotation that people hear
concentration camp and thinksomething absolutely
unforgivable happened.
I'm okay with that happening,and definitionally, using the
term concentration camp asopposed to internment camp is
still accurate.
So that's what we're going to beusing throughout this series.
(15:27):
Okay, I hope that wasn't tooheavy for you, and I hope you've
learned some of the terms thatyou're going to hear, the
Japanese words, and also theEnglish words that we're going
to be using for the rest of theseries.
So as I close out today, I'dlike to share with you another
history-based podcast that I'vebeen listening to that I hope
you guys can get into too.
It's called Cultureful.
It's an award-winning narrativeinterview podcast that bridges
(15:49):
global history, world cultures,and family legacy.
So I'll tell you about a few ofthe episodes that I've listened
to.
It follows a woman who's uh oflike my generation.
I'm gonna guess she's in her30s, sharing the story of her
family.
So our host takes the her, thesethose that she interviews, her
guests, through their entirefamily history, at least a
(16:09):
couple generations back.
And as she does so, it's framedas this is us making a friend.
This is our new friend who istelling us their family's story,
which I think is so impactful,and I love it as a way to convey
history because even as youlearn the history of this one
family, the podcast weaves inwhat I would say is like hard
history.
(16:29):
So as this person is tellingabout uh their family fleeing
Vietnam during the Vietnam War,uh, we'll break into little
history portions that'll givesome context to what happened to
that family, but also to informwhat happened to all the
families that were leavingVietnam.
So I really encourage you to goand check out Cultureful.
That's culture plus F-U-L, likethe word beautiful, wherever you
(16:52):
get your podcasts.
It's a really beautiful way tolearn a lot of history, to make
a new friend, and to learnanother person's experience, as
I hope this podcast will do.
It'll help you learn someempathy to reach across to a
different type of experiencethat you do not have.
Alright, so that is what I havefor you for this addenda
episode.
Thank you so much for tuning in,and we'll catch you next week.
(17:14):
Season one of History for theReckoning is made possible by
support from the JACL MountOlympus chapter, as well as
generous financial support fromthe Takahashi Family Foundation
and the JA Community Foundation.
The music was produced byPatrick Coffin.
If you want to support the show,follow us on Instagram at
History for the Reckoning.
Sign up for our newsletter atHistory for the Reckoning on
(17:36):
Substack, where you'll also findthe show notes for each episode,
or support us financiallythrough Patreon at
patreon.comslash history for thereckoning.
This is History for the Reckoning, a podcast that
dives deep into the historythat's hard to hear but critical
to understand.
Season one, AmericanConcentration Camps, the story
of World War II JapaneseIncarceration.
Welcome to the addenda episodefor episode one of the podcast.
I'd like to start out with ahuge thanks to Susan Kame for
(00:24):
coming on the show.
She has years and years ofexpertise.
She's a big figure in thisfield.
I was honored to be able tointerview her.
And uh a little story about her.
When I first joined the JACL orthe Japanese American Citizens
League, an organization thatyou're going to hear a lot about
over this podcast, they had awelcome call for all of the new
members for that month.
And when I came on it, she wason it.
(00:44):
She was there introducing theorganization, and she was also
the voice for at least one ofthe videos from a video series
that JACL has put out, sharingthis history as well.
So I encourage you to go to theJACL's website and to find it
there.
So over this series, you'regoing to hear a lot of terms
that you're not going to befamiliar with.
A lot of them are going to be inJapanese.
(01:05):
So the Japanese Americans thatimmigrated to the United States
brought their language, theirculture, and even across
generations, many of the wordsfrom the Japanese language have
stuck around, especially forthose first and second
generations that were here inthe 1940s.
So I'd like to share some ofthose with you that are going to
be used in the podcast so thatyou'll be up to speed no matter
(01:26):
what.
So the first thing that youalready heard is the system of
naming the generations.
So this is based on the numbersystem in Japanese.
So big disclaimer, all theseJapanese terms I'm going to be
saying in this addenda episodeare not going to be pronounced
correctly because I am notJapanese.
Or I don't speak it at all.
So let me give it my best shotand try to explain these as best
(01:48):
I can in my terrible accent.
So in the Japanese numbersystem, counting one through
five is Ichi, Ni, San, Yon, andGo.
And that corresponds with thegenerations.
So if you happen to look up howto count one through five in
Japanese, you'll be able tounderstand the names of the
generations.
So our first generation is theIsei.
(02:08):
This is the immigrantgeneration, those who were not
born in the United States, butcame here some point in their
lives.
So, as it's important to knowfrom the history that Susan
shared with us, they were notable to legally become
naturalized or become citizensin the United States.
So a lot of their status wasseen as uh aliens, as foreign
(02:30):
peoples, people who did not havethe same rights and privileges
as citizens, and they were oftentreated as such.
Important distinction that theydidn't even have the option to
become citizens.
Another thing that's kind ofinteresting about the history
that we'll be covering, Imentioned how we're going to
hear a lot about the JapaneseAmerican Citizens League down
the road.
The Japanese American CitizensLeague was composed of the
(02:51):
generation right beneath theIsei or the Nisei.
So the Isei did not make up theJapanese American Citizens
League.
The Japanese American CitizensLeague are those who kind of
filled the vacuum after many ofthe community leaders who would
have been Isei, those whoimmigrated to the United States,
were arrested, were removed fromtheir homes by the FBI very
shortly after Pearl Harbor.
(03:13):
So the second generation is theNisei.
They're the children of theimmigrants.
These are citizens.
So they were born in the UnitedStates, and therefore, because
the United States has birthrightcitizenship, they had all the
rights and privileges ascitizens, even though often they
were not treated the same way asother American citizens.
So these are those that filledthe gap after the Isei were many
(03:34):
of the community leaders amongthe Isei were arrested, were
removed, and the Nissei, many ofthem were already into adulthood
at this time.
So they were able to step up asthe community leaders as part of
the JACL and as part of manyother organizations.
So when we get to the campexperience, we'll often hear the
term, we'll often hear it saidthat some two-thirds of those
(03:54):
who were incarcerated werecitizens.
So these were Nisei or the thirdgeneration Sansei.
So speaking of the Sansei.
The Sansei are the thirdgeneration.
And when we get into futureepisodes, you'll hear a lot
about them because they'reoften, their generation is often
credited as those who pushed forreparations.
So the entire camp experience,the forced removal, the
(04:14):
incarceration, the confinementinto concentration camps was
very clearly illegal,unconstitutional.
After the war, this reparationscampaign was undertaken largely
by the Sansei, who had adifferent cultural outlook than
their Nisei parents andespecially their Isei
grandparents.
It's often said, or many of thestories in these families will
(04:36):
talk about how the Isei andNisei chose not to talk about
the camp experience at all afterthey were able to leave, to go
home, to restart their lives.
And that extended to the factthat many of the Sansei did not
learn this history from theirNisei parents.
So many times there are storiesof they're sitting in class, it
comes up as, oh, all theJapanese were arrested in the
(04:58):
United States, and it was fortheir own good or something else
that was not accurate.
And the Sansei would get curiousand they'd look it up.
And in looking it up, askingtheir parents, asking their
grandparents, they'd learn more,they'd get activated, you might
say, and they got politicallyactive.
And that's how the reparationsmovement that progressed from
the 1970s came to be.
So now the fourth generation isthe Yonsei.
(05:21):
They're the people that uh oftenI'm interacting with.
So so many of the people that Iinteract with are Sansei and
Yonsei.
They're the people that areengaging with this history
today.
So as the generations have goneon, the Sansei fought for those
rights, and as many of theYonsei that I see as the
leaders, the new emergingleaders in the community today
(05:41):
who are sharing this history,who are spreading awareness, and
who are doing great activism.
And the final generation thatI'm talking about today is
fifth, the Gose.
There are many Gose that I knowas well.
They're in my generation,sometimes even younger, and
they're also picking up themantle and they're doing their
best as American citizens tomake the world a better place.
Be able to be.
(06:02):
The next Japanese word I'd liketo share is Nikke.
So this is a blanket term forall those who are ethnically
Japanese that live outside ofJapan.
So I'm told that it also appliesto those who live not in the
United States, anywhere in theworld, but are not living in
Japan.
So perhaps in your communitythey'll have things that are
like Nikkei events.
I know in Salt Lake City we havewhat are called Nikkei lunches
(06:25):
now and then, which is just forall the community that have
ancestry from Japan.
The next one is Inu or Dog.
So you'll hear many of thestories of those who were in the
camps and how they interactedwith different political
ideologies, all confined in oneplace.
So there were some people whowere thought of, and history
(06:46):
will show demonstrably werereporting on their fellow camp
in inmates.
They were uh reporting on theiractivities to the governments or
to the camp authorities.
Uh many of them were part of theJACL, and sometimes they would
be referred to as Inu or dogs bythose who thought that they were
bending to the camp's whims, tothe government's whims, were
(07:08):
spying on their fellowincarcerees.
Alright, the next Japanese wordis kibei, which is a reference
to those who were educated inJapan.
A kibei is someone who was bornin the United States, but
because their parents had themeans and felt that it was
important that their childrenhad a piece of their culture,
learn the Japanese language, orjust as a chance to interact
with their Japanese family backhome, back home for these
(07:31):
immigrant parents, uh they wouldsend their children all the way
over to Japan, and so they wouldbe educated in language and
manners and customs, so thatwhen they came back, they would
know all of these things andhave strong ties to the country
of their parents' home.
These are referred to as thekibay.
Alright, so the next one are afew just phrases that you might
hear just a couple times in theseries.
(07:51):
Well, I guess this next one isvery common.
So it's Shikata Ganai.
So I've often seen it translatedas can't be helped.
When I'm watching anime, itcomes up.
If something bad happens, acharacter might say shikata
ganai, which is just likenothing you can do about it.
Uh but even though for me as anoutsider in passing, when I hear
that phrase and I see ittranslated, it seems like such a
(08:12):
simple thing.
It is a deep and residingconcept, especially for these
Japanese and Japanese Americanswho were incarcerated during
World War II.
So it's this whole philosophy ofdo not struggle against the
things that you cannot changeand embrace the ways in which
you can affect good in your lifeand your community's life in the
world.
So when they say Shakata Ganai,sometimes it can be seen as
(08:35):
defeatist, like, oh, thegovernment's locking us up,
shakata ganai, there's nothingwe can do about it.
But it's also embracing thethings that you can do about it.
So when these people wereincarcerated, often they would
improve their surroundings, theywould plant gardens, they would
beautify their space, they'dmake furniture.
There was this real sense of thecommunity working together to
make it as beautiful aspossible, despite these awful
(08:58):
circumstances that they feltthey couldn't help.
Alright, so the next term, whichI don't think will come up a
lot, but Hakujin.
This refers to white Americans.
So sometimes those in camp wouldrefer to white Americans and
they'd use the Japanese termhakujin.
Uh, next one I want to say isthe Shimpo, a word for
newspaper.
So in the first days after PearlHarbor, many of those who ran
(09:21):
the Shimpo or newspapers, theJapanese language newspapers
especially, were arrested by theFBI.
We're going to hear about thatin the next episode.
One special shimpo that I wantto talk about is the Rocky
Shimpo.
So during the incarceration,many people were confined into
camps.
There were some groups thatchose to protest this treatment,
this unconstitutional actionthat the government had taken.
(09:43):
One way they might do that is byresisting the draft that would
come later.
So the government decided weneed more soldiers, we can get
them from these giantconcentration camps where we've
locked up all of these people,many of them uh young, strong
men.
So they would try to draftJapanese Americans from the
camps.
Uh and sometimes there arepockets of resistance and
organized resistance, even,particularly in one of the camps
(10:06):
called Heart Mountain inWyoming.
And as that was happening, we'regoing to share a little bit of
that story later, but there wasa Shimpo, a newspaper in
Japanese in Colorado, I think itwas in Denver, where there was
an editor named James O'Mora whochose to share that story.
So as this resistance washappening inside of the camp in
Wyoming, James O'Mora lived inColorado where people had not
(10:28):
been forced to relocate, had notbeen forced into the
concentration camps.
So he was free to use hisfreedom of speech, freedom of
the press, to share the story ofwhat was happening in the camp,
of these people resisting thedraft.
And it turns out that he wasvery brave to do so because in
the end, all those people whodid resist the draft were
rounded up, were arrested, weretried and convicted, and James
(10:50):
Omora was included with them.
So by using his freedom ofspeech, by using his shimpo or
newspaper, he was spreading themessage of resistance, of
freedom, and he suffered thesame consequences as those who
chose to do the actualresisting.
The next Japanese term isHokori, which is often
translated as pride or dignity.
When you listen to oralhistories of the camp, sometimes
(11:13):
people will mention this as away of taking their camp
experience with a sense ofpurpose and improvement, similar
to some of the concepts thatcovered in Shikata Genai.
Every time I hear it, it's likethe sense of despite what's
going to happen, we will keepour heads held up high.
And I really respect that.
And the final Japanese term I'dlike to go over is the
kenjinkai, a reference toancestry, those who are from the
(11:35):
same prefectures.
So kenjinkai is when they're incamps, there are all these
people brought in from totallydifferent parts of California,
Oregon, Washington, all over theWest Coast.
They might not necessarily befrom the same areas.
So you'll hear stories withinthe concentration camps of
people from the country nowbeing forced to interact with
(11:55):
people from the city and thatbeing a huge culture clash.
But one way that you could findcommon ground was that uh maybe
you were an Isei and you wereliterally from Japan, or you're
an Isaii and you had someexperience with uh your
ancestral homeland, the placesthat uh your ancestors were from
in Japan.
And sometimes common groundcould be built that way.
(12:15):
So that's the Japanese terms Iwanted to go over with you.
Uh there are a few English termsthat I think are important to
cover.
So throughout this series, uhyou'll hear us often talk about
those who lived through the campexperience as survivors.
So some people feel like thisword is loaded, implies that
something really horriblehappened, then they made it
through.
And I would say that's exactlythe point, that this was a
(12:37):
horrible thing that thegovernment did.
And even though many of them wholived through it did not
experience physical traumanecessarily, every single one of
them experienced the trauma oftheir community being
disintegrated before their eyes,their possessions being torn
away, the loss of everythingthat they had known and being
forced into a camp and having torebuild afterward is an
(12:58):
absolutely horrible thing.
And it's very common in thiscommunity to refer to those who
lived through it as survivors.
So when you see uh organizedevents for those who made it
through the camps, they'll oftensay it's for survivors.
Uh, the next one is that werefer to the entire
incarceration of Japanese andJapanese Americans as the
incarceration.
(13:18):
So sometimes you'll hear thatthis was the internment of
Japanese and Japanese Americans.
So I choose to use the wordincarceration, as many others
do, to give it that connotationof how awful it was, how this
was a confinement.
They were in gigantic prisons,prisons the size of towns
sometimes.
These people were not allowed toleave.
(13:38):
When you say internship, atleast in a modern connotation,
it kind of gives the feeling oflike, oh, this is something that
I'm doing to learn skills and tojump into my trade and things
like that.
And we don't want any of that, Idon't want any of that
connotation applied to what Isee as a horrific mismanagement
by the government, a horrificmisdeed by our nation.
(13:59):
So I refer to it, and as manyothers do, as the incarceration.
Now, the biggest hot buttonEnglish word you're going to
hear me using is referring tothe camps themselves as
concentration camps.
I'm doing that deliberately.
Historically, at the time, theUS government in papers, those
that represented the government,will sometimes use the word
concentration camps becausedefinitionally that is what they
(14:22):
are.
They're literally concentratinga specific group of people into
one place.
They were not allowed to leave.
It was exclusively based ontheir race.
Those who were married to aJapanese person but were not
Japanese themselves could choosenot to go to the camps.
And even those who were littlebabies in orphanages who
happened to be of Japaneseancestry were taken into the
(14:44):
camps.
All I had to say, entirely basedon race, we refer to them as
concentration camps.
Now, this is not to say thatthey were remotely similar to
the death camps made in infamousby the Nazi regime, which were
being done at the same time.
So oftentimes when we hear theword concentration camp, we
exclusively think of those thatwere run by the Nazis, and those
(15:06):
are absolutely unimaginablyhorrific.
I do, I am fine with theconnotation that people hear
concentration camp and thinksomething absolutely
unforgivable happened.
I'm okay with that happening,and definitionally, using the
term concentration camp asopposed to internment camp is
still accurate.
So that's what we're going to beusing throughout this series.
(15:27):
Okay, I hope that wasn't tooheavy for you, and I hope you've
learned some of the terms thatyou're going to hear, the
Japanese words, and also theEnglish words that we're going
to be using for the rest of theseries.
So as I close out today, I'dlike to share with you another
history-based podcast that I'vebeen listening to that I hope
you guys can get into too.
It's called Cultureful.
It's an award-winning narrativeinterview podcast that bridges
(15:49):
global history, world cultures,and family legacy.
So I'll tell you about a few ofthe episodes that I've listened
to.
It follows a woman who's uh oflike my generation.
I'm gonna guess she's in her30s, sharing the story of her
family.
So our host takes the her, thesethose that she interviews, her
guests, through their entirefamily history, at least a
(16:09):
couple generations back.
And as she does so, it's framedas this is us making a friend.
This is our new friend who istelling us their family's story,
which I think is so impactful,and I love it as a way to convey
history because even as youlearn the history of this one
family, the podcast weaves inwhat I would say is like hard
history.
(16:29):
So as this person is tellingabout uh their family fleeing
Vietnam during the Vietnam War,uh, we'll break into little
history portions that'll givesome context to what happened to
that family, but also to informwhat happened to all the
families that were leavingVietnam.
So I really encourage you to goand check out Cultureful.
That's culture plus F-U-L, likethe word beautiful, wherever you
(16:52):
get your podcasts.
It's a really beautiful way tolearn a lot of history, to make
a new friend, and to learnanother person's experience, as
I hope this podcast will do.
It'll help you learn someempathy to reach across to a
different type of experiencethat you do not have.
Alright, so that is what I havefor you for this addenda
episode.
Thank you so much for tuning in,and we'll catch you next week.
(17:14):
Season one of History for theReckoning is made possible by
support from the JACL MountOlympus chapter, as well as
generous financial support fromthe Takahashi Family Foundation
and the JA Community Foundation.
The music was produced byPatrick Coffin.
If you want to support the show,follow us on Instagram at
History for the Reckoning.
Sign up for our newsletter atHistory for the Reckoning on
(17:36):
Substack, where you'll also findthe show notes for each episode,
or support us financiallythrough Patreon at
patreon.comslash history for thereckoning.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!