Category: Asian & Pacific American studies

Honoring Nisei World War II Veterans

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Nisei VetsOn October 5, 2010, President Barack Obama signed legislation to grant the Congressional Gold Medal to the 100th Battalion, the 442nd, and the Military Intelligence Service. The law recognizes more than 6,000 Japanese-Americans born of immigrant parents who served the United States and fought in battles in Europe and Asia during World War II. About two-thirds of them were from Hawai‘i. Read the Honolulu Star-Advertiser article here.

Learn more about Hawai‘i’s famous “Go for Broke” soldiers of the 442nd and 100th with these popular titles from UH Press:

Unlikely LiberatorsUnlikely Liberators: The Men of the 100th and 442nd, by Masayo Umezawa Duus; translated by Peter Duus
“A fascinating and highly readable slice of history which should be told, and told repeatedly. If ever a group of Americans had been driven to the point of despair and rebellion, it was the Americans of Japanese ancestry during World War II. . . . Unlikely Liberators vividly portrays in remarkable realism the officers and men with whom I served. Every American should read Masayo Duus’ book to better understand the true spirit of America which sustains its greatness.” —former U.S. Senator Spark Matsunaga

Combat ChaplainCombat Chaplain: The Personal Story of the WWII Chaplain of the Japanese American 100th Battalion, by Israel A.S. Yost; edited by Monica E. Yost and Michael Markrich
In October 1943, twenty-seven-year-old combat infantry chaplain Israel Yost arrived in Italy with the 100th Battalion, a little-known National Guard unit of mostly Japanese Americans from Hawai‘i. Yost was apprehensive when he learned of his assignment to this unusual unit composed of soldiers with whom he felt he had little in common and who were mostly Buddhists. But this would soon change.

Japanese EyesJapanese Eyes… American Heart: Personal Reflections of Hawaii’s World War II Nisei Soldiers, edited by the Hawaii Nikkei History Editorial Board (distributed for the Tendai Educational Fund)
“It isn’t often that you come across a book that is on the one hand extremely easy to read, enjoyable and inspirational, while on the other hand deeply moving, oftentimes disturbing, and very emotional. Japanese Eyes . . . American Heart is all this and more. . . . The American niseis’ tales create a fascinating literary mosaic, one that is highly educational, highly inspirational, and highly recommended.” —Mainichi Daily News

Short Stories by Wakako Yamauchi

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RosebudSecret desires, unfulfilled longing, and irrepressible humor flow through the stories of Wakako Yamauchi, writings that depict the lives of Nisei, second-generation Japanese Americans. Through the medium of Yamauchi’s storytelling, readers of Rosebud and Other Stories enter the world of desert farmers, factory workers, gamblers, housewives, con artists, and dreamers. Elegantly simple in words and complex in resonance, her stories reveal hidden strength, resilience, and the persistence of hope.

“Wakako Yamauchi is one of the foremothers of Asian American writing. Her prose is sharp, her voice strong, her dialogue true. Each story in Rosebud is a little gem that the reader turns slowly, sending glints of light off in unexpected directions. It is not often we get to hear the voice of an older Asian American woman in fiction, and that voice is richly present here in stories that celebrate change, memory, relationships, things that are lost . . . and kept.” —Paul Spickard, University of California, Santa Barbara

Intersections: Asian and Pacific American Intercultural Studies
October 2010 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3260-5 / $19.00 (PAPER)

Korean Adoptees and Their Journey toward Empowerment

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The Dance of IdentitiesKorean adoptees have a difficult time relating to any of the racial identity models because they are people of color who often grew up in white homes and communities. Biracial and nonadopted people of color typically have at least one parent whom they can racially identify with, which may also allow them access to certain racialized groups. When Korean adoptees attempt to immerse into the Korean community, they feel uncomfortable and unwelcome because they are unfamiliar with Korean customs and language. The Dance of Identities, by John D. Palmer, looks at how Korean adoptees “dance,” or engage, with their various identities (white, Korean, Korean adoptee, and those in between and beyond) and begin the journey toward self-discovery and empowerment.

Intersections: Asian and Pacific American Intercultural Studies
October 2010 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3371-8 / $49.00 (CLOTH)

New Catalog Available: Hawaii & the Pacific 2011

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Hawai‘i & the Pacific 2011
The UH Press Hawai‘i & the Pacific 2011 catalog is now available! To view the 3.4M PDF, click on the catalog cover image to the left. To view and print a 10.2M version, go to our catalogs page: http://uhpress.wordpress.com/latest-catalogs/.

Highlights include:
* A history of surfing compiled by John R. K. Clark and narrated primarily by native Hawaiians who wrote for the Hawaiian-language newspapers of the 1800s (Hawaiian Surfing: Traditions from the Past)
* A illustrated review of environmental concerns in Hawai‘i with an eye toward resolution by focusing on “place-based” management (Living on the Shores of Hawai‘i: Natural Hazards, the Environment, and Our Communities)
* The inaugural volume of the Race and Ethnicity in Hawai`i series (Haoles in Hawai`i)
* An eye-opening look at the relationship between surfing and colonialism in Hawai‘i (Waves of Resistance: Surfing and History in Twentieth-Century Hawai‘i)
* A new anthology of contemporary Polynesian poetry in English, co-edited by Albert Wendt (Mauri Ola: Contemporary Polynesian Poems in English)
* A collection of short stories by Wakako Yamauchi,“ one of the foremothers of Asian American writing” (Rosebud and Other Stories)
* A text that raises key questions about the capacity of pattern across the Pacific to bind and sustain ideas about place, body, and genealogy (Lines That Connect: Rethinking Pattern and Mind in the Pacific)

Talking Hawaii’s Story Readings to Air

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Talking Hawaii's StoryPaired readings from Talking Hawaiʻi’s Story: Oral Histories of an Island People, edited by Michi Kodama-Nishimoto, Warren Nishimoto, and Cynthia A. Oshiro, and Bamboo Ridge Press titles will air as a two-part program on September 7 and 14, at 6:30 pm, on “Aloha Shorts,” KIPO 89.3 FM. The readings were taped live at the fifth annual Hawai‘i Book and Music Festival on May 16, 2010.

Race and Citizenship in Hawaii’s Japanese American Consumer Culture

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Creating the Nisei MarketIn 1922 the U.S. Supreme Court declared Japanese immigrants ineligible for American citizenship because they were not “white,” dismissing the plaintiff’s appeal to skin tone. Unable to claim whiteness through naturalization laws, Japanese Americans in Hawai‘i developed their own racial currency to secure a prominent place in the Island’s postwar social hierarchy. Creating the Nisei Market: Race and Citizenship in Hawaii’s Japanese American Consumer Culture, by Shiho Imai, explores how different groups within Japanese American society (in particular the press and merchants) staked a claim to whiteness on the basis of hue and culture. Using Japanese- and English-language sources from the interwar years, it demonstrates how the meaning of whiteness evolved from mere physical distinctions to cultural markers of difference, increasingly articulated in material terms.

August 2010 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3332-9 / $38.00 (CLOTH)

Talking Hawai‘i’s Story at Pohai Nani Auditorium

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Talking Hawaii's StoryTalking Hawaiʻi’s Story: Oral Histories of an Island People editors Michi Kodama-Nishimoto and Warren Nishimoto of the University of Hawai‘i’s Center for Oral History will speak at the Pohai Nani Auditorium (45-090 Namoku Street, Kaneohe) on Tuesday, July 6, from 7 to 8 pm.

The program will include book readings, presented by storyteller Nyla Fujii-Babb and UH English professor Craig Howes, followed by a question-and-answer session. Fujii-Babb will read Edith Anzai Yonenaka’s narrative, “Recollections from the Windward Side,” and Howes will read Alfred Preis’ compelling chapter, ‘Interned: Experiences of an ‘Enemy Alien.’”

The talk and reading is the third event in the Pohai Nani Retirement Community’s Yamashita Lecture Series on Hawaiʻi. The program is free and open to the public. Books will be available for purchase from UH Press.

For more information on the event, contact Carolyn Nakamura, Pohai Nani’s resident services coordinator, at (808) 236-7805.

Racializing Okinawan Diaspora in Bolivia and Japan

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Embodying BelongingEmbodying Belonging: Racializing Okinawan Diaspora in Bolivia and Japan, by Taku Suzuki, is the first full-length study of a Okinawan diasporic community in South America and Japan. Under extraordinary conditions throughout the twentieth century (Imperial Japanese rule, the brutal Battle of Okinawa at the end of World War II, U.S. military occupation), Okinawans left their homeland and created various diasporic communities around the world. Colonia Okinawa, a farming settlement in the tropical plains of eastern Bolivia, is one such community that was established in the 1950s under the guidance of the U.S. military administration. Although they have flourished as farm owners in Bolivia, thanks to generous support from the Japanese government since Okinawa’s reversion to Japan in 1972, hundreds of Bolivian-born ethnic Okinawans have left the Colonia in the last two decades and moved to Japanese cities, such as Yokohama, to become manual laborers in construction and manufacturing industries.

Based on the author’s multisited field research on the work, education, and community lives of Okinawans in the Colonia and Yokohama, this ethnography challenges the unidirectional model of assimilation and acculturation commonly found in immigration studies. In its vivid depiction of the transnational experiences of Okinawan-Bolivians, it argues that transnational Okinawan-Bolivians underwent the various racialization processes—in which they were portrayed by non-Okinawan Bolivians living in the Colonia and native-born Japanese mainlanders in Yokohama and self-represented by Okinawan-Bolivians themselves—as the physical embodiment of a generalized and naturalized “culture” of Japan, Okinawa, or Bolivia.

May 2010 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3344-2 / $47.00 (CLOTH)

Talking Hawaii’s Story Editors at Na Mea Hawaii

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Based on oral history interviews conducted by the Center for Oral History at UH Mānoa, Talking Hawai‘i’s Story: Oral Histories of an Island People presents a rich sampling of the landmark work done by the Center, making accessible 29 first-person narratives that previously only appeared in the COH semiannual newsletter. The book’s three coeditors, Michi Kodama-Nishimoto, Warren S. Nishimoto, and Cynthia A. Oshiro will speak at Native Books/Nā Mea Hawai‘i in Ward Warehouse (phone: 596-8885) on Sunday, June 13, from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. The free talk is open to the public and will be followed by a book signing and light refreshments. Books will be available for purchase.

Bright Triumphs and Chinese Pioneer Families Authors in the News

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Hawaii Public Radio interviewed David Heenan, the author of Bright Triumphs From Dark Hours: Turning Adversity into Success. Click here to listen.

Ken Yee, editor of Chinese Pioneer Families of Maui, Molokai, and Lanai, published in October 2009 by the Hawaii Chinese History Center and distributed by UH Press, was also recently interviewed on KHPR. Click here to listen. Earlier this week, the Honolulu Star-Bulletin featured Yee and his book (as well as an excerpt). Click here to read the article.

Jon Shirota Returns to Maui

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Nationally acclaimed author Jon Shirota returns to Maui this month! Shirota’s 1965 classic Lucky Come Hawaii, the first novel by an Asian American writer in Hawai‘i to become a national bestseller, was recently issued in a newly revised edition by Manoa: A Pacific Journal of International Writing and University of Hawai‘i Press.

Thursday, January 14, 7 p.m., Maui Okinawa Cultural Center: Jon Shirota will give a free public talk hosted by the Maui Okinawa Kenjin Kai (MOKK). Please RSVP by calling MOKK at 808-242-1560.

Friday, January 15, and Saturday, January 16, 7:30 p.m., McCoy Studio Theater of the Maui Arts and Cultural Center: Kumu Kahua Theatre presents Shirota’s latest play, Voices from Okinawa. For more information, call the McCoy box office at 808-242-7469 or write boxoffice@mauiarts.org.

Saturday, January 16, 2-3:30 p.m., Borders-Kahului, Maui Marketplace: Shirota will be signing copies of his books. For more information, call Borders-Kahului at 808-877-6160.

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