Artwork from We Hereby Refuse is on display in a new exhibit that opens January 13 at the Museum of Work & Culture in Woonsocket, Rhode Island.
Continue reading “We Hereby Refuse” artwork on display in Rhode Island
The North American Post interview
In Seattle, the North American Post is the successor to the prewar Hokubei Jiji newspaper that Fuyo Tanagi helped edit, before she wrote the letter protesting the drafting of Nisei boys from camp for the Mothers Society of Minidoka. So it is an honor to be interviewed by Elaine Ikoma Ko in this wide-ranging exchange on No-No Boy, John Okada and We Hereby Refuse for the cover of the current issue of the Post.
Read the interview in the North American Post here.
Continue reading The North American Post interview
John Okada in Detroit History Podcast
The story of how John Okada migrated to Detroit in 1953 — where he wrote the great American novel, No-No Boy — is told in a new interview for the Detroit History Podcast.
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In Memoriam: Holly Yasui
As a community we are grieving the loss of Holly Yasui, youngest daughter of Min Yasui and producer/director of the award-winning film, Never Give Up!: Minoru Yasui and the Fight for Justice.
The Alien Enemy Hearing Boards at Fort Missoula
At this weekend’s education conference for the Japanese American Confinement Sites Consortium, we’ll get a virtual tour of the restored courtroom at Fort Missoula, and I’ll show how we used a transcript of a hearing inside that courtroom for a key scene in our graphic novel, We Hereby Refuse.
Continue reading The Alien Enemy Hearing Boards at Fort Missoula
Bringing John Okada to the global stage
Our favorite novel is getting more exposure in Europe.
I’m unexpectedly representing Seattle as a UNESCO City of Literature at the Scottish International Storytelling Festival. For the program on Thursday, October 21, I will virtually present two stories about John Okada and the writing of No-No Boy. Continue reading Bringing John Okada to the global stage
First in-person book event for ‘WE HEREBY REFUSE”
After nearly two years, it felt great to be able to share our new graphic novel with a live audience.
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Coming in 2023: The John Okada Centennial Year
© Yoshito Okada family
Novelist John Okada would have been 98 years old today. This means that two years from today, we will be observing the 100th anniversary of his birth.
To celebrate his legacy and honor his work in writing the great Japanese American wartime novel, a number of institutional partners are being recruited for a series of events to observe 2023 as the John Okada Centennial Year in his native city of Seattle. Continue reading Coming in 2023: The John Okada Centennial Year
The descendants of “WE HEREBY REFUSE”
Our graphic novel We Hereby Refuse weaves together the stories of three Nisei who refused to submit to imprisonment in American concentration camps without a fight. On Sept. 18 we got to meet three of their children and hear what they think about the book.
First preview of our forthcoming anthology of camp literature
For three years, Floyd Cheung of Smith College and I have been gathering pieces and building the outline for a new anthology of camp literature commissioned by the publisher of Penguin Classics. On Sunday I presented a preview of our work on translations of Issei writing in camp in Japanese, part of what the late Yuji Ichioka called “our buried past.” This video screen is cued to the start of that discussion:
Continue reading First preview of our forthcoming anthology of camp literature