Sharing the Japanese American experience. Look for programs near you at janm.org/OnTheGo
3,352 followers 69 following 100 posts
view profile on Bluesky 
Nancy Ukai dug into the stories behind the wood carvings & nameplates that are now a part of the Allen Hendershott Eaton Collection & featured in @jamuseum.bsky.social’s traveling exhibition, "Contested Histories: Preserving and Sharing a Community Collection."
When governments police museums, they are not simply policing exhibitions. They are policing imagination itself. Censorship has taken hold at the Smithsonian. I refused to play along.” —Amy Sherald
“The Snow Country Prison Memorial is our story as well as the Native American story.” The monument recognizes the common experience shared by Japanese Americans and Indigenous communities who faced forced removal and oppression by the United States. northdakotamonitor.com/2025/08/27/n...
These latest attempts to sanitize and reshape history to fit a narrow ideological narrative amount to nothing less than the erasure of history. We cannot reverse America’s journey toward a more just and equitable future. www.latimes.com/entertainmen...
If you are in the LA area, be sure to check out Cruising J-Town: Behind the Wheel of the Nikkei Community, a free exhibit from @jamuseum.bsky.social (off-site in Pasadena). And engage w/ the docents! Their stories and insights really enhanced my cultural awareness. #diversity #asianamerican
Their work to oppose demolition plans and preserve the Tuna Street buildings will give future generations that opportunity to remember and commemorate the significant contributions and history of Terminal Island's prewar Japanese American community.
Congratulations to the Terminal Islanders Association and Los Angeles Conservancy on the Historic-Cultural Monument designation of Terminal Island’s Furusato Tuna Street Buildings by the LA City Council! www.laconservancy.org/learn/histor...
Join us for a Day of Action to defend the truth of WWIl Japanese American incarceration history. Hear from incarceration survivors, community activists, and allies to honor our history and demand that this injustice never happens again. #ProtectEveryPark Saturday, August 23, 10am @ JANM Plaza
The use of national security rhetoric to justify mass incarceration today echoes the same logic that led to the incarceration of Japanese Americans. It is inconceivable that the US is once again building concentration camps, denying the lessons learned 80 years ago. www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-a...
History does not yield to censorship. These latest attempts to sanitize and reshape history to fit a narrow ideological narrative amount to nothing less than the erasure of history. We cannot reverse America’s journey toward a more just and equitable future.
Museums must be places of truth, not propaganda—spaces where the next generation can confront the complexity of our nation’s injustices, mistakes, and darkest chapters; where empathy, social responsibility, and the courage to defend democracy are nurtured. www.nytimes.com/2025/08/12/a...
“We are outraged and deeply distressed that armed federal agents came onto our campus — making arrests on the very ground where, in 1942, Japanese American families were forced to board buses bound for concentration camps.” — Ann Burroughs, CEO of the Japanese American National Museum
Earlier today, U.S. Border Patrol agents conducted a raid in Little Tokyo near a press event held by @cagovernornewsom.bsky.social. Reporting by @shoton35mm.bsky.social @eltragon.bsky.social @marinamasako.bsky.social
The parallels are stark: entire communities were forcibly removed from the West Coast in 1942 and today our immigrant brothers and sisters face the terror of ICE and CBP raids across the country. It was a miscarriage of justice then, and it is a miscarriage of justice now.
We are outraged and deeply distressed that armed federal agents came onto our campus—making arrests on the very ground where, in 1942, Japanese American families were forced to board buses bound for concentration camps. It was a deliberate act of provocation and intimidation.
I saw two versions of America in LA’s Little Tokyo yesterday. In the Democracy Center at the Japanese Am. Nat’l Museum, I watched CA leaders announce plans to fight authoritarianism. Outside were heavily armed ICE agents—a Trump regime stunt designed to terrorize immigrant Angelenos & stifle dissent
📷: Photo by US Army, courtesy of Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum (HB118-B)
On August 6, 1945 at 8:15 a.m., the US dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of #Hiroshima, the first time in human history that any country used the unparalleled power and devastation of atomic bombs. The US remains the only country to use nuclear weapons during a time of war.
What I learned patrolling for ICE in Terminal Island. The same federal facility that detained Japanese Americans in 1942 is now the staging ground for immigration raids across LA. One San Pedro resident documents what he’s seen and why history feels like it’s repeating itself.
Our newest exhibition uses cars and trucks to tell the story of Japanese Americans in Southern California #CruisingJTown www.latimes.com/00000198-5cf...
NOW ON VIEW! 🏁 "Cruising J-Town: Behind the Wheel of the Nikkei Community" tells the stories of influential figures and everyday car lovers alike who have played vital roles in countless car scenes—from hot rods and lowriders to the import craze and drift racing. www.janm.org/exhibits/cru...
"Right now it feels like that lesson that was learned has been entirely forgotten," says JANM curator Emily Anderson www.cbsnews.com/losangeles/v...
Oliver Wang has a great new book and exhibition about Japanese American car culture, that includes the story of the fabulous Atomettes, a women's social club that organized roadtrips barely a decade after WWII Japanese incarceration. I write about it for @kcrw.com: email.kcrw.com/cruising-j-t...
Opening July 31! 🏎️🏁 "Cruising J-Town: Behind the Wheel of the Nikkei Community" tells the stories of influential figures and everyday car lovers alike who have played vital roles in countless car scenes—from hot rods and lowriders to the import craze and drift racing. www.janm.org/exhibits/cru...
Long Lead's newest feature THE AGE OF INCARCERATION puts a human face on one of the darkest stains of U.S. history — the unjust incarceration of Japanese Americans during WWII. It's a testimony of a time when the U.S. locked up its own people simply because of where their families had come from.
JANM stands in solidarity with the National Museum of Puerto Rican Arts and Culture (NMPRAC) and denounces this show of intimidation and force by ICE. www.theartnewspaper.com/2025/07/17/u...
Once they were gone, the Navy bulldozed homes and shops, and confiscated abandoned boats for military purposes. The Terminal Island community was imprisoned at the Manzanar concentration camp in California’s Owens Valley for the duration of the war.
Overnight, families were split apart, and homes were turned into disarray as FBI agents searched for so-called “contraband” like radios and cameras. With the signing of Executive Order 9066, the remaining community members had two days to pack their belongings and find housing.
Once home to 3,000 Japanese fishermen, cannery workers, and merchants, the Terminal Island community was shattered at the start of the US’s entry into WWII. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, Issei (first generation) leaders and fishermen were arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
Reports of ICE presence on Terminal Island is an act that chillingly echoes the shameful forced removal of Japanese Americans from that very place eighty-three years ago. This dangerous pattern signals a willful failure to heed the lessons of wartime incarceration. lataco.com/ice-is-stagi...
Brian Niiya spoke to our @jamuseum.bsky.social teacher institute on the topic of redress (formerly interned Japanese Americans received a presidential apology and $20K each in 1988). Brian also runs Densho.org, which provides excellent resources for teaching Japanese Internment.
A special moment: Richard Murakami shared carvings his father made in internment camps in CA & AR. One act of kindness: Richard told us that a Long Beach neighbor carefully stored all of his father's farming equipment for the years of internment to return when they came home. @jamuseum.bsky.social
Incredibly fortunate to hear from four Japanese Americans who lived in internment camps as children. Two went on to serve in the US military. Thank you, Ms. Berk and Mr. Iwashashi, Mr. Yamashita, & Mr. Murakami for telling your story to our @jamuseum.bsky.social teacher institute.
Our @jamuseum.bsky.social teacher institute group had a very meaningful visit to Manzanar today. In the blazing sun, it was hard to imagine that many families spent years interned here, simply because they were of Japanese ancestry.
Our @jamuseum.bsky.social teacher institute kicked things off with very interesting walking tours of Little Tokyo and Boyle Heights, both historic centers of the Japanese American community in LA. One of our tour guides was born in Manzanar in 1944.
Our @jamuseum.bsky.social teacher institute learned about the US Army's 442nd regiment, comprised entirely of Japanese American soldiers who lived by their "Go For Broke" slogan and fought valiantly in the European theater of WWII- all while their families were interned in camps. Heroes!
They banned George Takei's "They Called Us Enemy" for telling the truth about our history. @georgetakei.bsky.social pen.org/magic-tree-h...
Kick off day for the @jamuseum.bsky.social teacher institute on Japanese American history in Little Tokyo, LA. My teacher roommate and I are staying at the Miyako Hotel, which has an Ohtani mural on the side and served LA Dodger helmet shaped buns in its coffee shop.
We know too well the devastating consequences of such action—families torn apart, livelihoods destroyed, and multigenerational trauma inflicted on a community for decades. #AlligatorAlcatraz #NeverAgainIsNow
The use of national security rhetoric to justify mass incarceration echoes the same logic that led to the forced removal and incarceration of over 125,000 Japanese Americans—our parents, grandparents and extended families—under Executive Order 9066. #AlligatorAlcatraz #NeverAgainIsNow
If you see one of these signs at a national historic park, we encourage you to go to the link provided and tell the Department of the Interior to STOP REWRITING HISTORY. #ScrubNothing
JANM denounces the signs at the Manzanar and Minidoka National Historic Sites, as well as at the national historic sites and parks, that encourage guests to report any information that is deemed critical of American history. Full statement: www.janm.org/press/releas...
History does not yield to censorship or political ideologies. It demands honest, transparent conversations and a commitment to having an evolving understanding of how the past shapes the present and the future. www.sfgate.com/california-p...
We remember our collective history, collected and archived by generations of Japanese Americans, and won’t stand by and allow the Trump administration to mold the law to its own liking. Read about case & our amicus: bit.ly/aea-amicus
The targeting of Venezuelan immigrants by the Trump administration today mirrors our country’s dark past of rounding up and incarcerating Japanese American families during World War II.
We and 60+ orgs are joining @asianlawcaucus.org , @AAAJ_AAJC, and the Fred T. Korematsu Center for Law and Equality in filing an amicus brief urging the court to fulfill their role in preserving the right to due process and ensuring judicial review of executive orders.
Widespread dismantling of federal agencies that support our work and the attempts at the wholesale erasure of history will not help us achieve a more just America. www.museumsassociation.org/museums-jour...
Discriminatory laws like these are dangerous to democracy and echo past injustices, including the Chinese Exclusion Act, Alien Land Laws, and World War II incarceration policies. fortune.com/2025/05/09/t...
We are deeply committed to our mission of preserving this history, building bridges across communities and divides, and ensuring that America remains a nation where all people can thrive.
On Friday, the Texas House of Reps voted to advance legislation that would bar Chinese citizens from owning property. Discriminatory laws like these are dangerous to democracy and echo the racism, xenophobia, and authoritarianism that led to the mass incarceration of Japanese Americans during WWII.
Terminal Island’s Japanese American residents rally to save its last standing buildings. After bulldozing an entire Japanese American village during WWII, San Pedro is about to destroy the only two buildings that survived – unless preservationists can stop the clock.
. @marinamasako.bsky.social visits Little Tokyo’s Japanese American National Museum to speak with them after they lost funding for standing for DEI. Here’s what they had to say. @jamuseum.bsky.social
Now, more so than ever, there’s a need for ethnic, cultural, religious, all communities, to join together to fight this madness. We need to stand together. We need to be holding hands. At JANM, we’re going to fight for all communities. lasentinel.net/national-jap...
We’re not going to change our history. #ScrubNothing news.artnet.com/art-world/mu...
Read JANM's full statement here: www.janm.org/press/releas...
In the wake of this significant ruling, JANM reiterates our call for the repeal of the Alien Enemies Act. The Act as written is discriminatory on its face. Its invocation during peacetime violates the Act itself. www.cnn.com/2025/05/01/p...
The people whose families were sent to US concentration camps in WWII understand what's going on today.
Thank you for your support! ❤️
“We stand up for our values, and we aren't prepared to sacrifice those values for federal funding." laist.com/news/arts-an...
In Mahmoud Khalil's letter from ICE detention in Louisiana, he cites Japanese American incarceration and Mitsuye Endo, who was incarcerated in the Tule Lake concentration camp, and whose case before the Supreme Court led to the closing of the camps. Read his letter here: t.ly/A04cc
The Manzanar Committee is grateful for the steadfast leadership of the @jamuseum.bsky.social The Japanese American National Museum made headlines after the institution’s board chairman Bill Fujioka told the Los Angeles Times that JANM would continue to embrace DEI hyperallergic.com/1002373/japa...
We will #ScrubNothing
JANM's 2025 Benefit & Online Auction is TONIGHT at 5:00 PM PDT! Celebrate our critical past, dynamic present, and ambitious future by tuning in to the livestream www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfpz...
“Our community is based on diversity, equity is guaranteed to us in the Constitution, and inclusion is what we believe in.” —Bill Fujioka, Japanese American National Museum board chairman
A reminder that if the government can send migrants to a prison camp without any due process, it can send U.S. citizens there, too. I know because this happened to me and my family in 1942.
“Facing pressure to scrub its website of diversity and inclusion references, a Japanese American National Museum leader says the museum will ‘scrub nothing.’” 🔥
Contact your representatives and support institutions like JANM that are at risk of losing federal funds! abc7.com/post/funding...
We cannot remain silent while these policies attempt to strip people of their humanity and dignity and reverse course on our nation’s journey towards a more just and equitable future. www.theartnewspaper.com/2025/04/04/m...
“We ask if you could carry this history with you, understanding that it is not a Japanese-American history, this is an American history, then maybe you can prevent it from happening again.” hyperallergic.com/998856/japan...
A huge loss for the community. Thank you Bob for your work in preserving the history of mass incarceration of Japanese Americans. www.cbsnews.com/colorado/new...
Ongoing erasure includes the contributions of the Navajo code talkers from the Marine Corps and US Army websites, Jackie Robinson’s Army history from the Department of Defense website, and webpages about the 100th Infantry Battalion and the 442nd Regimental Combat Team.
JANM Calls for Restoration of Contributions of People of Color on US Department of Defense Websites ‼️
Urge Congress to Save IMLS! A recent Executive Order would gut the only federal agency dedicated to America’s museums. The Institute of Museum & Library Services makes up only 0.0046% of the federal budget. Take action now: www.congressweb.com/aam/95/
US Army website has republished an article on the history of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team www.army.mil/article/283793
Four years ago today, eight women were killed—six of whom were Asian—and one man was wounded when a white gunman opened fire at three spas in the Metro Atlanta area. The shooting took place amidst a rise in violence against the AAPI community, fueled by xenophobia and racism and enabled by guns.
The Japanese American National Museum's Pictures of Belonging exhibition features artwork from Miki Hayakawa, Hisako Hibi, and Miné Okubo. It is now showing at the Smithsonian American Art Museum until Aug 17. americanart.si.edu/blog/picture... #JANM @jamuseum.bsky.social
Here's the text of the Alien Enemies Act that Trump's invoking in his executive order. Please read it and see if you can flag the important parts for current purposes. (You're not cheating if you pay attention to the highlighting.) 😉 #lawsky
The Manzanar Committee opposes President Trump's unlawful attempt to invoke the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 to enforce deportations This 18th century law was used by President Roosevelt in 1942 to justify the unconstitutional incarceration of 125,000 people of Japanese ancestry in concentration camps
The invocation during peacetime, in the absence of any incursion by the nation of Venezuela, violates the Act itself, which grants the President the power only “whenever there is a declared war between the United States and any foreign nation or government..."
JANM is watching with interest a lawsuit filed by attorneys with the ACLU and Democracy Forward in federal court in Washington, D.C. A US District Court Judge has issued a temporary restraining order blocking the deportations.
In 1941, FDR used it to arrest and detain citizens of Japan, Germany, and Italy without due process in Department of Justice internment camps. In 1942 he expanded his wartime powers to issue Executive Order 9066, leading to the mass incarceration of over 125,000 people of Japanese ancestry.
JANM Condemns Invocation of Alien Enemies Act to Enforce Mass Deportations of Venezuelan immigrants ‼️ JANM reiterates its support for the Neighbors Not Enemies Act, which calls for the repeal of the Alien Enemies Act.
The Army just deleted without explanation its page about the 442nd “GO FOR BROKE” infantry regiment—the Japanese American WW2 unit that is the most decorated in US military history. Archive is here: web.archive.org/web/20250304... Page was here: www.army.mil/asianpacific... Disgusting.
Reintroducing this legislation to Congress will ensure that all Americans learn from this history and recognize Fred Korematsu’s important contributions. He stood against racism and xenophobia, not just for his generation but for those to come. nwasianweekly.com/2025/01/jacl...
Films of Remembrance is the premier showcase of films commemorating the forced incarceration of Japanese Americans in American concentration camps during World War II, presented by the Nichi Bei Foundation. Tickets are available for screenings this weekend at JANM! 2025.filmsofremembrance.org
Happy Hinamatsuri! 雛祭り 🌸🎎 On this day, we celebrate the lives of young girls and wish them good health and happiness.
This map of the "Japanese American Confinement Sites in the United States During #WW2" includes the #LACounty locations where Japanese Americans were forcibly held until sent to concentration camps. #EO9066 #History Map from @jamuseum.bsky.social's Education Resources: www.janm.org/education/re...
Today we witness a continuation of history; the same forces and rhetoric that led to the mass incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II are now being used to detain immigrants at Guantánamo Bay. The lessons of history must not be ignored.
The last incarcerees to be moved out were primarily the elderly; they were given $25 and a train or bus ticket to start their lives over. After the war, as they resettled into their old neighborhoods or settled into new communities, they continued to face segregation and racial discrimination.
By the time the camps closed after the end of the war, 1,862 people had died in camp, 4 were killed by US Army soldiers, and 4,724 were deported to Japan. It is impossible to calculate the value of property and income lost by incarcerees. Estimates range from millions to billions of dollars.
Over 2200 people of Japanese ancestry living in Latin America were also forcibly removed from their homes, separated from their families, and deported to the US to be incarcerated. These Japanese Latin Americans never received reparations because they were deemed "illegal aliens" by the US govt.
On February 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 which authorized the US military to forcibly remove over 120,000 persons of Japanese ancestry and launched their mass incarceration into concentration camps during World War II.
The Irei Project will be traveling to the 56th Annual Manzanar Pilgrimage on Saturday, April 26, 2025. As part of the pilgrimage, Irei Project representatives will present the interactive memorial Ireichō Book of Names which documents the 125,000 Japanese Americans incarcerated during WWII.
Euphemistic language is a tool often used to sanitize grave injustices. When referring to the WWII incarceration of people of Japanese ancestry, it is important to use the correct terminology: concentration camps, not relocation centers; forced removal, not evacuation; citizens, not non aliens.
We are deeply committed to our mission of preserving this history, building bridges across communities and divides, and ensuring that America remains a nation where all people can thrive. Read JANM's full statement: www.janm.org/press/releas...
“You know, I’ve been evacuated before,” says 85-year-old Altadena resident Jane Kawahara. www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...
This Day of Remembrance, we celebrate Nikkei women’s stories, their determination to rebuild and thrive after World War II, and their contributions to our community and culture. We hope you will join us on February 15 to commemorate the signing of Executive Order 9066. www.janm.org/events/2025-...
The Ireichō is touring the nation! 📖🙏 First stop, Washington DC at National Archives and the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History February 18–21 www.janm.org/press/releas... @jacl-national.bsky.social @jampilgrimages.bsky.social
Learn from our history, don’t repeat it. www.orlandosentinel.com/2025/01/25/o... @elmunc.bsky.social
This is a perilous moment for lawyers in federal service. Stories of resistance from within can help. This book tells of lawyers who helped run the Japanese American camps of WWII. We can learn from their struggles to reconcile job with conscience. Would you please share? tinyurl.com/mrxm6vv2
