Jonathan van Harmelen: Andrea, just to ask you briefly, have you ever thought about performing yours or your grandmother’s poetry? I mean, I guess the presentation yesterday was close to that.
Andrea Mariko Grant: For me, what was surprising was the extent to which people did seem to enjoy my grandmother’s poetry. I’ve agonized a lot about translation. I was very worried that none of the power of her work would come across, because the translations are so different from what they are in Japanese. So it was very unexpected and very gratifying to actually hear that they did resonate with people and evoked a lot of different memories. That was really a lovely surprise.
Actually going back to your first question, about the benefits of being here all together – working with artists like Elysha and Rachel, and also interviewing Japanese Canadian artists for my own project, has really inspired me to want to respond creatively to my grandmother’s poetry. And actually, I wasn’t necessarily thinking about it in terms of spoken word, but maybe I should. Or that can be part of it, some kind of audio.
Neilesh Bose: In the field of global history – more of a subfield of teaching and synthesizing history – there are these tensions between the local and the particular and fitting the local and the particular into some larger narrative. And everybody I think, who’s involved in global history, at some level is always aware of that; we’re always somewhat scared of dipping into local histories as non-specialists.
But I found a very pleasant surprise in the sense that so much of the emotional weight that is in the air that is on us all the time, resonated so much with me. So aspects of loneliness, tragedy, but also ambivalence and not being able to necessarily fit experiences into a preset understanding of oppression, violence or resistance. I think the histories of Japanese people during the war and after all, exist in a way that it’s very difficult to categorize for global history, which makes it so compelling.
And especially if we tried to put them together into one history we find it a challenge to put all the feelings and emotions into one story. For those of us who work in the history of 20th century South Asia, all of us have to confront the partition of colonial India, which produced all of these feelings and emotions that are very difficult to put into one container. And then the over three million South Asians outside of territorial South Asia who were caught up in migrations of various sorts – some dispersals, some forced migrations and some that are difficult to categorize as one sort of migration. The feelings are not so straightforward.
They’re at times tied to a conception of home that isn’t home anymore. Some conceptions of home were part of Imperial structures that were themselves very violent but then a part of one’s own life and family history. Feelings of not necessarily fitting into whatever home became, you know, after whichever migration, expulsion, or dispersal, is a common theme.
So I think all of those are so present everywhere we go in this history, they’re in every corner of this history. That’s why the arts are so important because they give us a home to think and to feel in ways that may not be easily placed into a scholarly historical monograph. I found that to be a pleasant surprise that it makes complete sense. And it’s a sort of struggle that’s worth continuing.
Jonathan van Harmelen: I’ve been trying to figure this out, especially as we’ve been talking about, because there is so much I really appreciate about being in Victoria. I mean, the serendipitous experience of how I found out about Toyo Takata was just going through a thrift store in downtown and found a copy of Nikkei Legacy. And then going through the contents of the book and finding out how he contributed to the city of Victoria along with his journalistic work was wonderful.
And especially knowing as we’ve done with the work with hearing with Japanese Canadians, how much erasure has happened because of Canada’s dispossession policy. And so trying to find more about those stories, I think, in my own research has been something I’ve really enjoyed because it can give back to the greater community.
Building on that, I found that in the US, there were several Japanese American community newspapers like the Rafu Shimpo that followed the wartime events in Canada. The fact that they’re giving attention to forced removal and dispossession shows a sense of concern that people in the States should know about this.
I think it speaks to this idea that there is a shared concern among Nikkei communities facing forced removal, and in these newspapers Nikkei journalists shared their different aspects as part of the shared experience.
Andrea Mariko Grant: I would say I think that is very true. And it has been interesting to see all the commonalities of Nikkei experience in history across all these continents. But what’s also been striking to me is the differences within Japanese Canadian communities, the differences between West Coast and East Coast.
You know, having grown up in Toronto, I think my experience of being Japanese Canadian is different from someone who grew up in Vancouver. I think it’s become clearer to me that we have different, regional histories.
Masumi Izumi: Yeah, when we were talking about the movie Dear Community by Angela May, I didn’t realize how it was a West Coast Nikkei story. I did a lot of research about Japanese Canadian activism on the West Coast. And then, when I wrote my book about Japanese Canadian history, I claimed that I wrote a comprehensive history of Japanese Canadians. But I didn’t include too much about activism in Toronto. I didn’t realize it, but I think the regional differences need to be considered.
Andrea Mariko Grant: Growing up in Toronto, we never really had anything comparable to the Powell Street Festival. We never had the same connections to historic neighbourhoods. So our sense of community I think was very, very fragmented and dispersed. When I go to Japanese Canadian events out here, I do feel a kind of longing, wishing I’d grown up with access to similar events and spaces.
Neilesh Bose: Yeah, one of the wonderful results of this project is that it makes us think about the “local” aspect of history differently. It is only possible when we put all these multifaceted histories together that we realize this very point. If we look at the Canadian state, from various angles, we often focus on the West Coast, both in terms of the actual history as well as the politics of redress. So then the rest of Canada is often not focused on in the same way, for the people who have lived through Canadian historical changes but from the perspective of Ontario and other parts of Canada. Their voice is often not included.
But now we have this opportunity to think about that, perhaps in a way that hasn’t been done. Outside of the nation-state of Canada, what do we make of the context if we broaden it out of the Canadian context of North America? Do we make it beyond the Americas?
In those ways, we then see some other case that looks different. I mean, in the Brazilian case there were so many more people who were subjected to extraordinary experiences of racism and trauma, but not a camp experience. Throughout the 20th century, we see a different kind of visibility, I think, within Latin America. But does that matter to those in Canada? I mean, those are questions that I think we can continue to think about.
Masumi Izumi: I would like to add one more thing. I took a one-year sabbatical leave so I could devote my time to this kind of project. And we all gathered here in Victoria from many different places, Eastern Canada, Australia, Japan, and the United States. But I feel like I’m very much a part of this community, even if it’s only five people.
There are other people related to the PWFC project who support us, and they do a tremendous job. All of us feel this energy and willingness to work hard. When somebody has an idea, and everybody says, “Oh, yes! Let's do it!”
In my regular situation, I don't necessarily feel that way all the time. I wonder how much of a burden it is going to be for me, etc., because I am busy with teaching and other tasks. So this residency has been really energizing and motivating. I'll carry this when I go home, and I hope I can keep feeling energetic about the PWFC project.
Elysha Rei: I do agree time and space is so precious – to be away from work life, family life, and just experience complete immersion and focus. And one of the things that surprised me in a good way, coming from a Nikkei Australian community which is comparatively small, and being a descendant from migration in the White Australia Policy era, is this sense of kinship with the community – the Japanese Canadian community. It’s almost unspoken, but it’s like this instant kinship through exchanging histories. There are some commonalities, even on the other side of the world, and with different generations. I found that pleasantly surprising.
Neilesh Bose: The film and the Australian experience, which is often not as well known, I think, in North America, really showcases that so powerfully that even though numbers are different and the particulars are different from other space, the lived experience in the community is very much alive and it lives on within us in this shared historical space.
Masumi Izumi: Yeah, like Gabriel said in our interview with him that Dr. Yuriko Nagata wasn’t keen on revisiting her work on Australian Nikkei when Gabriel first talked to her, and now the story of exiled Nikkei Australians is discovered and retold.
Jonathan van Harmelen: To wrap this up, this would be great way to kind of share what we’re all doing here. And I still think it’s impressive that Jordan and company has been able to amass this group of scholars. I don’t think there’s anything out there like this in academia, even not just Nikkei diasporas studies. I think this is a really fascinating, one-of-a-kind project to have.
Neilesh Bose: Unprecedented, I would venture to say.
Jonathan van Harmelen: Yeah, I would say so too. Absolutely unprecedented.
Andrea Mariko Grant: I think that’s why I find it so difficult to explain it to people.
Masumi Izumi: All these institutions in different countries and all these people who are interested in the Nikkei experiences during World War II are bringing their knowledge, creativity, and expertise to the PWFC. Everyone is invested in this project, and this is really exciting!
*Special thanks to Michael Abe for his help with this article.
© 2023 Jonathan van Harmelen
