Exhibition commemorates Japanese internment

Published: Friday, October 31, 1997

Friday, October 31, 1997

EXHIBIT: Display in Powell, programs aim to educate community

By Michael Weiner

Daily Bruin Contributor

During World War II, almost 120,000 Japanese Americans were forced from their homes and businesses, and collected into camps surrounded by barbed wire and guarded by military police. At the time, the Supreme Court ruled that this internment was constitutional in the context of war, and therefore legal.

This episode in history is now being commemorated on the UCLA campus. The opening ceremony of an exhibition entitled, "A More Perfect Union: Japanese Americans and the United States Constitution" was held Thursday in Royce Quad. The highlight of the ceremony was a speech by UCLA alumnus George Takei, a former internee and the actor who played Mr. Sulu on "Star Trek."

Taiko drummers from the Nikkei Student Union performed at the ceremony, and afterward Takei signed copies of his autobiography, "To the Stars" in the College Library rotunda.

"I remember that confusing, chaotic and scary day when the soldiers came and took us from our home," said Takei, who was a small child when he was interned.

In addition to the exhibition, which will be displayed at Powell Library until Dec. 22, there will be panel discussions, film screenings and electronic projects presented by the College Library. The Asian American Studies Center will seek to educate students, staff and the surrounding community about the experience of internment.

"The idea of this program is that you just don't plunk down pictures; you want to generate ideas," said Janice Koyama, associate librarian for public service. "The library, in conjunction with the Asian American Studies Center, has brought something very unique to this campus."

UCLA was chosen to host the exhibit because of its location and the fact that the library already has a substantial amount of information on internment, according to Eleanor Mitchell, head of the College Library.

Several programs are planned to augment the exhibition. On Nov. 1 and 8, the Los Angeles Unified School District will hold teacher in- service training sessions in an attempt to add more information about the internment to school curricula.

Other programs include a special screening of the film "Beyond Barbed Wire" on Nov. 16, a panel discussion on interned Japanese Americans on Dec. 6 and a presentation of UCLA electronic projects regarding internment on Dec. 10.

Don Nakanishi, director of the Asian American Studies Center, emphasized the effect of internment in the UCLA community.

"Many of the faculty members who are here of Japanese American descent either went through it or had parents who went through it," he said.

Students from the Nikkei Student Union said that it is important for all Americans to learn about internment.

"It makes everyone see their own histories as immigrants," said Kelli Nakayama, a third-year English student. "It affects everybody, not just Japanese."

The exhibition, which travels around the country, is sponsored nationally by the American Library Association and the National Museum of American History at the Smithsonian Institution. It is funded by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.