The Literature of Japanese American Incarceration

Join journalist, writer, and filmmaker Frank Abe for a discussion of his new book, The Literature of Japanese American Incarceration on the experiences of the over 125,000 Japanese Americans expelled from their homes during World War II by the U.S. government and incarcerated in American concentration camps, based solely upon the race they shared with a wartime enemy.

This event is co-sponsored with the Japanese American Historical Society of San Diego. UCSD Ethnic Studies Professor Christen Sasaki will be in conversation with the author. Audience Q&A will follow. Copies of the book will be available for purchase and signing.

Please scroll down to register. Refreshments served.

Co-edited with Floyd Cheung, this anthology represents the collective voice of incarcerated Japanese Americans in the camps. The contributors span incarcerees, their children, and their descendants who reflect on the long-term consequences of mass incarceration for themselves and the nation. Together they form an epic narrative with a singular vision of America’s past, one with disturbing resonances with the American present.

Frank Abe is lead author of the graphic novel, We Hereby Refuse: Japanese American Resistance to Wartime Incarceration. He’s won an American Book Award as co-editor of John Okada: The Life & Rediscovered Work of the Author of No-No Boy in which he authored the first-ever biography of Okada and traced the origins of his novel. He wrote and directed the award-winning PBS documentary Conscience and the Constitution and helped organize the first-ever Day of Remembrance. He's been awarded residencies through the Centrum Foundation, Willapa Bay AiR, and the Mineral School. He is currently developing a new stage adaptation of No-No Boy.