Barbara Takei
@barbaratakeiBarbara Takei is a Detroit-born Sansei whose introduction to the Asian American movement in the late 60s was Grace Lee Boggs and the Detroit Asian Political Alliance. She puzzled over the missing stories of Japanese American dissent against the unjust incarceration for decades, but it wasn’t until her first Tule Lake pilgrimage in 2000 that she realized peaceful protest during WWII was erased by demonizing it as “pro-Japan disloyalty.” For the past two decades, she has served as an officer on the non-profit Tule Lake Committee and devoted herself to preserving Tule Lake as the site of Japanese American civil rights resistance.
Updated January 2023
Stories from This Author
Legalizing Detention: Segregated Japanese Americans and the Justice Department’s Renunciation Program - Part 1 of 9
March 15, 2013 • Barbara Takei
I hope this uniquely American story will serve as a reminder to all those who cherish their liberties of the very fragility of their rights against the exploding passions of their more numerous fellow citizens, and as a warning that they who say that it can never happen again are probably wrong. —Michi Nishiura Weglyn, Years of Infamy Among the many stories of Tule Lake, perhaps the saddest and least known is that of the approximately 5,500 Americans of Japanese …
Silk Cocoon Shatters the Myth of the “Model Minority”
Jan. 15, 2013 • Barbara Takei
It was not until her mother died that Satsuki Ina came to understand the historic event that deeply affected her family—a part of World War II history that has been long suppressed within the Japanese American community.“My mother had it all set up for me when she left me that box,” Satsuki Ina said of the small metal box she found at her deceased mother’s home. “I was stunned by what she described.” From that box emerged the little-known story …
Internment Stigma
May 18, 2012 • Barbara Takei
A remarkable journey began as a handful of Nisei survivors gathered on the wind-swept plains of Bismarck, North Dakota, at the site of what was once Ft. Lincoln, a World War II-era Department of Justice prison. What made this weekend so memorable was that the program, hosted by Native Americans, was one of those welcome occasions where a part of history that is little known within the Japanese American community was acknowledged and validated. These former inmates at Tule Lake …
TULE LAKE’S BLOCK 42: A Little-Known Story of Wartime Civil Disobedience
May 9, 2012 • Barbara Takei
Referred to as the camp for “troublemakers” and “bad” and “disloyal” people, Tule Lake’s reputation still carries stigma for those who were incarcerated there. The stigma remains so pervasive that most Nisei who refused to answer “yes” to the so-called “loyalty questionnaire” questions 27 and 28 some 65 years ago don’t like talking about what one Nisei referred to as Tule Lake’s “dirty linen.” On December 5, 2008, President George W. Bush acted to change all that, designating the Tule …
Review of Prisoners and Patriots
Feb. 28, 2012 • Barbara Takei
A recent film on Santa Fe, Prisoners and Patriots: The Untold Story of Japanese Internment in Santa Fe, according to the film’s writer/director/producer Neil H. Simon, is the first film to tell the story of the WWII era internment camp run by the Department of Justice in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The film (which was shown at Day of Remembrance events in Northern California and scheduled at JANM in April) assembles a rich collage of material related to Santa Fe’s …
Deporting “Troublemakers” Redux
Jan. 27, 2012 • Barbara Takei
Time of Remembrance observances are coming up in another few weeks, a good time to do something to assure, “never again.” This year, in the context of the National Defense Authorization Act that provides for indefinite military detention of the accused, we need to be more vigilant than ever, especially with two companion pieces of legislation introduced this session of Congress. The two bills, S 1698 and HR 3166, resurrect the specter of the little-known government denationalization and deportation program …
Thoughts on the 2009 Tule Lake Pilgrimage
July 29, 2009 • Barbara Takei
“How was the pilgrimage?”It’s a question I and other pilgrims have been asked many times since returning from the 2009 Tule Lake Pilgrimage that took place over the 4th of July weekend. As one of the event organizers, it’s a question I have trouble answering in a sentence or two. It was the biggest pilgrimage that our small, all-volunteer committee has organized. It was also remarkable that of the 400 pilgrims, 56 of them were 80 years of age or …
