"CAPTURED On Film: WRA Photos of the 1940s"
UCLA ASSC Sponsors Professor Lane Hirabayashi's Demonstration/Talk
Lane Hirabayashi, Ph.D., chair of the UCLA Asian American Studies Department and the George & Sakaye Aratani Endowed Chair of the Japanese American Internment, Redress and Community, will give a presentation of the thousands of WRA photos of Japanese Americans during World War II at a forum scheduled for Saturday, October 11, 2 pm to 4 pm, at the Gardena Valley Japanese Cultural Institute, 1964 West 162nd Street, Gardena, in the Veterans Hall.
Between 1942 and 1945 the War Relocation Authority [WRA] created a photographic record of all phases of the mass incarceration of Japanese Americans. Thousands of these photos are now available on-line. Who took these photos, when, and under what conditions? How were the final images selected, and how were they utilized during the 1940s? Once this is known, we can better explore the possible uses of these photos today. Examples include oral history work and other kinds of research--that the WRA itself never imagined. Hirabayashi will demonstrate how on-line sites can be searched and explored.
To make the forum interactive, encouraging audience participation, Professor Hirabayashi has offered to do research for the first fifty registrations by email (no phone requests, please) for forum participants ONLY. One request per email and participant will be accepted and must include the following information: name of person, birthdate, camp, areas of activity that MAY possibly have been photographed by the WRA (e.g. extra-curricular activities, sports, work teams such as farming, mess hall, police, fire, etc). The results will be shared with forum participants during the demonstration of accessing on-line sites.
Iku Kiriyama and George Nakano of the Japanese American Historical Society of Southern California (JAHSSC) Board of Directors are assisting Professor Hirabayashi with the logistics of the program. Local organizations that have signed on as co-sponsors with the Japanese American Historical Society of So Calif include Gardena Valley JCI, Go For Broke National Education Center, Japanese American Bar Assn, So Bay JACL, Torrance JACL, Gardena Valley JACL, Torrance Historical Society, Okinawa Association of America. Organizations interested in being listed as co-sponsors are asked to contact Nakano at kusenji@aol.com or (310) 325-2473. Co-sponsorship has no financial commitments or organizational responsibilities but involves only the willingness to publicize the event among their membership.
Participants interested in the possibility of locating someone in a WRA photo may email their request, with the information indicated above, at the same time as their reservation for the forum, to Kiriyama at goiku@sbcglobal.net until the first 50 requests are filled.
Reservations are not required but recommended. Please contact Kiriyama by email or call (310) 326-0608. Please give the names of all who would attend along with an email or phone contact.
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