Suffering under a Great Injustice: Ansel Adams's Photographs

[Steve Bildermann]

In 1943, Ansel Adams (1902-1984), America's best-known photographer, documented the Manzanar War Relocation Center in California and the Japanese Americans interned there during World War II. In "Suffering under a Great Injustice": Ansel Adams's Photographs of Japanese-American Internment at Manzanar, the Prints and Photographs Division at the Library of Congress presents for the first time side-by-side digital scans of both Adams's 242 original negatives and his 209 photographic prints, allowing viewers to see his darkroom technique and in particular how he cropped his prints.

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/aamhtml/aamhome.html



Biography of Ansel Adams

Glossary of Internment

Issei
The first generation. Born in Japan, they immigrated to the U.S. where laws prevented them from being naturalized as citizens.

JACL
Japanese American Citizens League. It often worked closely with camp administration and as a result, its members were often labeled inu.

Kibei
Japanese Americans born in the U.S. who returned to America after being educated in Japan.

loyalty question
Two questions on a loyalty questionaire given to all Japanese Americans (seventeen and older) held in the internment camps. Soon after Stimson announced plans for an all-Nisei combat team on January 29, 1943, the War Department began to use the loyalty questionaire to register imprisoned male citizens, while the WRA handled all other prisoners age 17 and over.1

No. 27. Are you willing to serve in the armed forces of the United States on combat duty wherever ordered?

No. 28. Will you swear unqualified allegiance to the United States of America and faithfully defend the United States from any or all attack by foreign or domestic forces, and forswear any form of allegiance or obedience to the Japanese emperor, to any other foreign government, power or organization?

For female citizens, question 27 was reworded, asking if they were willing to volunteer for the Army Nurse Corps or Women's Army Corp if they were found qualified; and question 28 left out defense during attack.1

Nisei
The second generation of Japanese Americans. U.S. citizens by birth (as opposed to their Issei parents who were not allowed to be naturalized).

non-alien
A U.S. citizen with Japanese ancestry. (Japanese Americans were referred to as aliens and non-aliens, rather than as non-citizens and citizens.)

relocation
Euphemism for the imprisonment/incarceration of Japanese Americans in concentration camps within the interior of the country.

Sansei
The third generation of Japanese Americans. Children of the Nisei.

[kurohinge1]

Along a similar vein ...
Michael L. Cooper's "Fighting for Honor"

Michael Cooper's book provides insight into the treatment of Japanese Americans before, during and after World War II ... There are good examples of the exploits of Japanese American soldiers fighting for the U.S. during the war and a sad chapter describing the welcome the troops received after returning from the war ...

The 442nd

The 442 Regimental Combat Team (RCT) included Japanese Americans from Hawaii and internment camps across the country. Their accomplishments in Europe made them famous and their 4,000 members earned over 9,000 Purple Hearts. In just 255 days between 1944 - 1945 they became the most decorated team for its size in all of American Military history ...

[FeLingHi]

Did I miss something here?

Is someone at war with the Jap's?

[Mulboyne]

Some other internment links:

Executive Order 9066



This video is available on the site for streaming or download.

A Challenge to Democracy (1944)

Government-produced film attempting to defend the massive internment of Japanese Americans in concentration camps during World War II. (17 minutes)

Japanese Immigration - Internment

[Mulboyne]

A Challenge to Democracy (1944)

Sorry, just noticed that Caustic Sainted posted about this film a while ago in this thread. It's worth checking out the other films he mentions.

[Russell]

Legendary photographer Ansel Adams visited a Japanese internment camp in 1943, here’s what he saw

In 1943, Ansel Adams set out to document life inside the Japanese-American internment camp at the Manzanar War Relocation Center in California. It was a departure for Adams, who at the time was known as a landscape photographer and not for social-documentary work. When Adams offered this collection of images to the Library of Congress, he said, “The purpose of my work was to show how these people, suffering under a great injustice, and loss of property, businesses and professions, had overcome the sense of defeat and dispair [sic] by building for themselves a vital community in an arid (but magnificent) environment….All in all, I think this Manzanar Collection is an important historical document, and I trust it can be put to good use.”

[...]

On Feb. 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued his five-paragraph Executive Order No. 9066, “Authorizing the Secretary of War to Prescribe Military Areas” from which “any or all persons may be excluded.”

[...]

Within a month, a 50- to 60-mile-wide swath of the Western coast was designated as Military Area No. 2. It extended from Washington down through California and into parts of Arizona. More than 110,000 residents of this area were given only days to sell off their farms, businesses, homes and other possessions before being shipped off to internment camp barracks around the United States. Although the law extended to other ethnic groups as well, it was primarily applied to Japanese Americans.

More

[kurogane]

Seen the Photos!!???? Now read the book and see the movie:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farewell_to_Manzanar

WARNING: both are, ummmmm............crap. Badly done art about a very important issue. Reminiscent of Obasan by Joy Kogawa. But the movie does have a young Mr. Miyagi and Yukie, who used to be pretty hot.

[Takechanpoo]

and when do the mean americans return the grounds, which those japanse american cultivated and converted wastelands to productive fields with bloodily sweating? those mean mericans are still using the grounds with nonchalant looks.

[kurogane]

nonchalance is the mindfulness of pizza time foregone due to lackadaisical heart