Appropriately, as the National Basketball Association (NBA) celebrates its 75th anniversary, it included Wat Misaka as an important figure in its history. This might seem remarkable since Wataru “Wat” Misaka’s playing career consisted of only three games with the New York Knickerbockers. But Misaka’s mere presence on a roster in …
In Kerwin Berk’s short film, Kikan: The Homecoming the most dramatic moments occur around a dining room table when no one is speaking. The Ito family, trying to absorb the loss of their only son Ken (Ken Takeda) at the end of the war in Europe, is confronted with the reality …
Japan’s Hideki Matsuyama’s recent capturing of the Master’s Golf Championship at the venerable Augusta Country Club in Georgia is one of the greatest individual achievements for an athlete from Japan. What’s interesting for me is that while I was happy for Matsuyama, his victory was not as impactful as previous …
When I attended college at UC Riverside closing in on five decades ago, I took a sociology class on Japanese Americans and World War II. Like many Sansei, I knew very little about my family’s experiences during the war, but I was stunned at the enormity of the events that …
Keston Hiura has made a habit of breaking barriers and smashing stereotypes on his way to major league success.
In seeking to preserve and share the Japanese American experience, the Japanese American National Museum maintains the largest collection of its kind in the world. While clearly a serious and scholarly endeavor, the collection also contains items that touch on popular culture and (dare we say) are fun.
When I was five years old, our family lived in Los Angeles on 12th Avenue, near what was known as the Seinan district. Construction of the Santa Monica Freeway was being planned, and its path went right through our home. Because of this our house was condemned, and our family …
The passage and signing of the Civil Liberties Act of 1988 remains the most significant event for Japanese Americans since World War II. In an unprecedented act of Congress, the U.S. government apologized for its unlawful forced removal and mass incarceration of thousands of people of Japanese ancestry during the …
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