Japanese Internment Camps in 1942

If collocations were phrased in a series of human actions, one may assume or be abject to the archetypes they and others play. Affiliation never grants one immunity from tribalism. Symbols are powerful, and the concord of voices can sometimes silence those perceived to be the opposing affiliation. The opposite can be abject to the objective that the voices play.

The Pearl Harbor attack brought the world into light of Japan’s imperialist motives. And it is the people implicated in the process, who share a similar identity to those perceived as evil on the basis of affiliated groups actions [like Mccarthyism] who may face discrimination.

The Pearl Harbor attack brought suspicion towards the Nisei [American born Japanese people ] and the Issei [Japanese immigrants].

However hostility directed at Japanese people were present before the Pearl Harbor attack, however the weight of the hostility became more pronounced during this time. And offered the opportunity for business owners to eliminate their counterparts.

The 9066 Executive Order ratified by Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1942 February the 19th, sent about 120, 000 people to the internment camps . The rationale for the camps were to adopt safety measures. But what ensued was discrimination hidden beneath propaganda.

Families were assigned a WCCA number during evacuation and exclusion zones were used to relocate Japanese people from areas highlighted in the Civilian Exclusion Order below. The Western Defense Command and Fourth Army carried the exclusion zones in line with the Executive Order 9066.

*Document Civilian Exclusion Order. 1942 Instructions to all persons of Japanese Ancestry*

TEMPORARY ASSEMBLY CENTERS – THE FIRST STOP

Before heading into the internment camps, 16 assembly centers were created to handle 92,000 people of Japanese Descent to be held, until the camps were established by the War Relocation Authority. The Wartime Civil Control Administration (WCCA) oversees the centers during that time.

The temporary assembly centers were inadequate for human living, considering that people were housed in horse stables and in small shacks around race tracks or fair grounds, and they had to stay there for a couple of months.

WAR RELOCATION AUTHORITY

The War Relocation Authority was established on 18th of March 1942, to administer the mass relocation of Japanese people into internment camps.

The Japanese internment housings are designed in the form of milatary barracks where it is said that for a place constructed for four people, 25 people inhabit the space.

There were no plumbing or cooking appliances in the barracks.

Long lines were common place where no one could dress in privacy.

THE SCHOOLS

Ratio of 48 students to 1 teacher in the internment primary school

Ratio of 25 secondary schools students to 1 teacher in normal schools. The average ratio in the 1940’s was 28 students to 1 teacher.

Propaganda : WRA vs Internee accounts