With a new generation of interest in the wartime incarceration of Japanese Americans, I’m fielding more inquiries about the JACL’s 1990 research report into its own wartime activities, a document commonly known as “The Lim Report.” One thing led to another, and we’ve quickly put together this workshop for the Tule Lake Pilgrimage on Sunday, July 5, at 8:00 am in the big College Union Auditorium:
Continue reading A brief history of “The Lim Report” and how it came to be
Mass Incarceration and Deportation Today: A Tale of Two Maps
In the first year of the current federal regime, I spoke widely about What Japanese American Wartime Incarceration Tells Us About Mass Deportation Today. The favored means then of deportation by Homeland Security was the outsourcing and offshoring of American concentration camps, away from the public eye.
Now in its second year, this regime’s tactics have evolved. Here are highlights of the grim outlook I gathered from several sources and shared at Densho’s recent workshop on “Teaching Difficult Histories;” at a panel at the Association for Asian American Studies conference just concluded; and last week at the Seattle Public Library’s “One Book, One Coast” program.
Continue reading Mass Incarceration and Deportation Today: A Tale of Two Maps
Warehouses as 21st Century American Concentration Camps
I recently introduced a video call for The 50501 Movement — the group bringing you the No Kings 3 march this weekend — to hear from activists in New Hampshire, New Jersey, and Salt Lake City who are using local zoning codes and permitting processes to stop or slow the Department of Homeland Security from buying or leasing vacant warehouses near cities for use as immigrant detention centers. Continue reading Warehouses as 21st Century American Concentration Camps
Q and A with Ishmael Reed on “NO-NO BOY: The Play”
It’s unbelievable to be among Luis Valdez, Robert Hooks, and others interviewed for the American theater issue of Tar Baby, a new quarterly journal published by the Toni Morrison Foundation that “connects a global community of intellectuals, artists, educators, and cultural enthusiasts.”
Many thanks to renowned novelist Ishmael Reed for the Q and A below. I encourage you to get a copy of the Fall 2025 issue here, just to see the world-class magazine design by Gisela Swift of Picante Creative that uses photos from our recent script workshop at the Seattle Repertory Theater. You can click on the images to read the spread, but I’ve also posted the text below:
Continue reading Q and A with Ishmael Reed on “NO-NO BOY: The Play”
John Okada and “The Good American Citizenship Club”
The following is adapted from a short talk I gave January 10 at the Museum of History and Industry in Seattle, in advance of an exhibit opening today of traditional Boys’ and Girls’ Day dolls that were entrusted to a beloved school principal by Japanese American families facing forced removal in 1942. Continue reading John Okada and “The Good American Citizenship Club”
“BURN ORDER” launches before a live audience in Los Angeles
Rachel Maddow and her team at MS NOW completed the final two episodes of her Burn Order podcast on the wartime incarceration only last Friday, just in time for the series launch before a live audience on Sunday, December 15, at the ornate Orpheum Theater in Los Angeles. Her team invited Satsuki Ina, Lori Bannai, and me to speak on the first of two panels.
Continue reading “BURN ORDER” launches before a live audience in Los Angeles
Featured in new Rachel Maddow podcast, “BURN ORDER”
Many thanks to Rachel Maddow and her team at MS NOW for reaching out to me and others in the community to help connect the dots between the wartime incarceration of Japanese Americans and the abductions of non-white immigrants and citizens on the streets of America today. Their six-part podcast series, “Burn Order,” dropped the first two episodes today, preceded by this video trailer:
Continue reading Featured in new Rachel Maddow podcast, “BURN ORDER”
For its 25th anniversary, find “Conscience and the Constitution” on a new streaming platform
Today is the 25h anniversary of the broadcast premiere of Conscience and the Constitution. It first aired on November 30, 2000, at10:00 pm on the Public Broadcasting System, presented by ITVS, the Independent Television Service. ITVS successfully placed the film on the PBS national hard feed, which meant the story of the largest organized resistance to wartime incarceration appeared in most major markets on the same day and time.
Continue reading For its 25th anniversary, find “Conscience and the Constitution” on a new streaming platform
“One Bellevue, One Book:” the links between wartime incarceration and ICE abductions
Here is the most detailed story yet from my recent talks on the links between wartime incarceration and the scourge of ICE abductions. 
You should read the story by Kai Curry online at the Northwest Asian Weekly, but it conveys so much that’s important, and so much has changed since I first spoke on this in April, that I’ve shared it in full below. Thanks to the King County Library System and the Bellevue Library branch for centering We Hereby Refuse as their “One Bellevue, One Book.” Continue reading “One Bellevue, One Book:” the links between wartime incarceration and ICE abductions
First live audience for staged reading of “NO-NO BOY” adaptation
Audience is who we make theater for, and it was a privilege to have such a lively one witness the first staged reading of our new theatrical adaptation of John Okada’s No-No Boy at the Seattle Rep on Thursday, May 8. Continue reading First live audience for staged reading of “NO-NO BOY” adaptation