EVENTS

BOOK EVENTS and FILM SCREENINGS

PORT TOWNSEND, WA
March 25-April 8, 2024
Centrum writers residency

Two weeks as an artist-in-residence back in a cabin at Fort Worden State Park to work on rewrites for the No-No Boy play adaptation.

SEATTLE, WA
Wednesday, March 27, 2024, 1:25-2:15 pm
Seattle Public Library All Staff Day
Seattle Convention Center

Seattle Public Library logoSharing my presentation on the John Okada Centennial so that front-facing library staff, whose work schedules often conflict, can have a chance to experience the kinds of library programs enjoyed by the public. All library locations are closed for Staff In-Service Day.

BELLEVUE, WA
Saturday, April 13, 2024, 2:45-3:30 pm
Left Coast Crime 2024: Seattle Shakedown
Hyatt Regency Bellevue on Seattle’s EastsideLeft Coast Crime banner

This annual convention of mystery writers and fans will recognize novelist John Okada as their “Ghost of Honor” with a panel, “Introducing the World of John Okada and No-No Boy,” featuring Shawn Wong and me, and moderated by our favorite mystery writer, Naomi Hirahara. This promises to be fun.

SEATTLE, WA
April 25-26, 2024
2024 Association for Asian American Studies Conference
Seattle Sheraton Hotel

Association for Asian American Studies logo— Thursday, April 25, 10:00 am.
Program T27, Medina Room.
The Literature of Japanese American Incarceration: A Collective Voice, A New Canon” 
Floyd Cheung and I are looking forward to launching our new Penguin anthology at this panel with Andrew Leong and Vince Schleitwiler, chaired by Rei Magosaki. Details in the Facebook Event.

— Friday, April 26, 1:00 pm.
Program F63, Jefferson Room A.
“Roundtable in Honor of Roger Daniels: A Tribute” 
Remembering the dean of camp history, in the region where he last lived. With myself, Jonathan van Harmelen, Anna Pegler-Gordon, Madeline Hsu, Huping Ling, and chaired by Greg Robinson. See my tribute to Roger, and one from Jonathan.

ELKO, NV
Friday, May 3, 2024, 7:00-8:00 pm
“Resistance & Resilience: Reflections on the Japanese American Incarceration during WW2”
Great Basin College

Great Basin College logoFollowing the performance of “A Thousand Cranes,” a multimedia play on the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, I will take part virtually on a panel with Dr. Meredith Oda, Miya Hannan, and Cary Yamamoto to discuss the Japanese American experience of WW2 here in the Western states. Program funded by Nevada Humanities.

SEATTLE, WA
Saturday, May 4, 2024, 11:00 am
Humanities First program
University of WashingtonHumanities First logo

Taking the UW’s freshman core program, Humanities First, on a tour of John Okada’s Chinatown, with lunch at the Bruce Lee table at Tai Tung.

NEW YORK, NY
Tuesday, May 14, 2024
cover of Penguin anthologypublication of The Literature of Japanese American Incarceration

Not a public event, more of a milestone to be bookmarked: the publication date of the new anthology edited by Floyd Cheung and me, with book launches and media events now being scheduled in various cities. If you’re interested in hosting one, please contact us.

SEATTLE, WA
Thursday, May 16, 2024, 7:00 pm
Book launch for The Literature of Japanese American Incarceration
Elliott Bay Book Company, 1521 10th Avenue

Elliott Bay Book Company logoBook maven Karen Maeda Allman will host me in conversation for the official launch of the new anthology from Penguin Classics. We will be joined by the families and friends of several of the locally based authors who contributed to the volume. Look for the event page to come here.

PORTLAND, OR
Saturday, May 18, 2024, 1:00 pm
Book launch for The Literature of Japanese American Incarceration
Japanese American Museum of Oregon
One Pacific Square, 220 NW 2nd, first floor conference room

JAMO logoPortland launch for the new anthology from Penguin Classics. I will be in conversation with attorney Peggy Nagae. We will be joined by the families and friends of several of the locally based authors who contributed to the volume.

LITTLE ROCK, AR
Saturday, June 8, 2024, 9:00 am
Jerome Rohwer Pilgrimage
“Resistance to Registration at Jerome”

My first trip to personally experience the swampy environments of the two WRA camps in Arkansas. Speaking on George Kuratomi, Singer Terada, the Rev. Shizuo Kai, and the resistance to registration at Jerome on Saturday.

CODY/POWELL, WY
Tuesday, June 18 and June 25, 2024, 11:00 am-2:00 pm
NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Educator Workshop
Heart Mountain Interpretive Center
“We Hereby Refuse: The Heart Mountain Fair Play Committee and other camp resistance”

mountainFor a fourth summer I’ll speak to educators from across the nation at a pair of week-long NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Educator Workshops using the film Conscience and the Constitution and the graphic novel We Hereby Refuse. We will examine mass resistance in all the camps to the government’s administration of a loyalty questionnaire, and the organized resistance at Heart Mountain to military conscription from inside camp. The theme for 2024 will be “Heart Mountain, Wyoming and the Japanese American Incarceration.” Funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and hosted by the Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation.

Tule Lake graphicKLAMATH FALLS, OR
July 5-8, 2024
Tule Lake Pilgrimage

In training to serve as a bus tour docent for the first in-person Tule Lake Pilgrimage since 2018. More programming for events TBA.

BOISE, ID
September 11-13, 2024
Friends of Minidoka and the Mellon Foundation
Resisters of the Pacific Northwest” and
Nisei Trials Distinguished Lectures 2024

Friends of Minidoka logo Mellon Foundation logoDevelopment of an audio tour of resistance sites in Washington and Oregon that can be viewed on a mobile app and a website with narration, oral histories, and visual content. Funded by the Mellon Foundation Monuments Project Initiative, the tour will launch in Fall 2024 to coincide with the 80th anniversary in September of the Minidoka draft resister trials in Boise, with a recreation of the trials of Jim and Gene Akutsu and all the Minidoka resisters as portrayed in We Hereby Refuse. Eric Muller and I will also speak as part of a Distinguished Lecture Series in Boise, Twin Falls, Idaho Falls, and Portland.

PAST EVENTS

MINERAL, WA
March 3-17, 2024
Mineral School writers residencyMineral School entry

Taking two weeks in residence near Mount Rainier to work on rewrites for the No-No Boy play adaptation, with an in-house show-and-tell on March 14.

SEATTLE, WA
Wednesday, February 28, 2024
Tilden School class tour Tilden School logo

Introducing 4th and 5th grade students of the Tilden School from West Seattle to the story of wartime incarceration in a tour through Chinatown and the Panama Hotel.

SAN FRANCISCO and SAN JOSE, CA
Saturday and Sunday, February 24-25, 2024, 5:45 pm
The Akutsu Family Resists” at
Films of Remembrance film festival
AMC Kabuki 8 and San Jose Buddhist Church Betsuin

Film festival debut of new animation by the Seattle Channel based on the Jim Akutsu story in We Hereby Refuse. The film will be paired with Sharon Yamato’s revelatory new film on attorney Wayne Collins. Join us for a post-screening discussion on both days. Sponsored by the Nichi Bei Foundation. Facebook Event here. See the trailer for the “Films of Resistance” program below and get tickets here.

PHILADELPHIA, PA
Wednesday, February 21, 2024, 6:30 pm
Philadelphia Day of Remembrance
University of Pennsylvania
Irvine Auditorium – Amado Recital Hall

Philadelphia DORSpeaking on “Resistance, Redress, and the Day of Remembrance,” I will link the camp resistance in We Hereby Refuse to the constitutional stand for redress brought forward by the first Day of Remembrance, to Rob Buscher’s class on “Asian American Activism” and the community. Sponsored by the UPenn Asian American Across the Disciplines Series and Philadelphia JACL. Free registration here.

ORANGE, CA
Monday, February 19, 2024, 1:00-2:15 pm
Resisters: Japanese American Incarceration Stories and Literature
Chapman University, Argyros Forum, Room 209C

For Chapman University’s Day of Remembrance I’ll be speaking to students about our graphic novel We Hereby Refuse, in support of Prof. Stephanie Takaragawa’s brilliant online exhibit, “Images and Imaginings of Internment: Comics and Illustrations of Wartime Incarceration.” I’ll then engage in conversation with Prof. Rei Magosaki and Audrey Fong of The Soapberry Review about the forthcoming Penguin anthology of The Literature of Japanese American Incarceration.

PORTLAND, OR
Saturday, February 17, 2024, 2:00-4:00 pm
“Threads of Remembrance: 45 Years of Activism, Community, and Reparations”
Lincoln Hall, 1620 SW Park Ave.

Portland DORFor the Portland Day of Remembrance, I’ll join Peggy Nagae and Chisao Hata on a panel recalling our work with the local community to create the very first DOR in Portland 45 years ago, on February 17, 1979, on a panel moderated by Mira Shimabukuro. Sponsored by Portland JACL and the Japanese American Museum of Oregon. Free registration here.

SEATTLE, WA
Monday, February 12, 2024, 6:00-8:00 pm
UW Nikkei Student Union Day of Remembrance program
HUB Lyceum

UW graphicSpeaking on “Resistance, Redress, and the Day of Remembrance,” I will link the camp resistance in We Hereby Refuse to the constitutional stand for redress brought forward by the first Day of Remembrance, for the University of Washington Nikkei Student Union. Register here.

BERKELEY, CA
Tuesday, November 14, 2023, 3:30-5:00 pm
“Translating TESSAKU: Lives Behind Barbed Wire”
University of California, Berkeley, 50 Birge Hall

Japanese kanjiFirst public presentation of the Tessaku Translation Project, led by Prof. Andrew Leong, alongside Kyoko Nancy Oda, Hiroshi Shimizu, and Konrad Aderer, speaking to students in the English 53/Asian American Studies 20C — Asian American Literatures and Cultures class. I will discuss four translations from Tessaku that will appear in our forthcoming Penguin Classics anthology of The Literature of Japanese American Incarceration.  Free Eventbrite registration.

SEATTLE, WA
Monday, October 30, 2023, 1:00 pm
posterKing County Equity & Social Justice program
King Street Center, 201 S. Jackson St.

Returning to see friends in the 8th floor conference room to present We Hereby Refuse and share my journey through Japanese American history and what it can show us about stemming anti-Asian violence today. Or something like that.

ONLINE PRESENTATION
Friday, October 27, 2023, 2p HT / 5p PT / 8p ET
The Politics of Translating Incarceration Literature
Tadaima! A Community Virtual Pilgrimage

graphicWith a discussion of four translations that will appear in our forthcoming Penguin Classics anthology of The Literature of Japanese American Incarceration. “Translation is a political act that comes with ethical responsibilities and considerations, especially when dealing with texts that carry the weight of historical trauma for marginalized communities. This panel will gather together translators and community members who have been involved in translating TESSAKU, a Japanese-language literary journal written, edited, and compiled by Japanese Americans who were incarcerated at Tule Lake, California, during World War II. We will discuss some of the ethical considerations that have arisen in the course of translating this material, including our obligations to descendants of Tule Lake incarcerees. Panelists: Frank Abe, Junko Kobayashi, Andrew Leong. Moderator: Lisa Hofmann-Kuroda.”  Register here for the free Zoom panel. Like the Facebook Event.

ONLINE PRESENTATION
Thursday, October 19
“The John Okada Centennial: A Celebration of his life and work”
Tadaima! A Community Virtual Pilgrimage

logoFor 2023 Tadaima! will feature the Seattle Channel video from our September 26 kickoff in Seattle upon the 100th anniversary of the birth of novelist John Okada, author of No-No Boy.

BELLEVUE, WA
Wednesday, October 18, 2023, 2:30 pm
Bellevue School District English Language Arts
Sammamish High School

Bellevue School District logoOn-site professional development for teachers interested in sharing We Hereby Refuse and John Okada’s No-No Boy with their students and adopting them into the district curriculum.

SANTA CRUZ, CA
Saturday, October 7, 2023, 3:00-6:00 pm
“Never Again Is Now: Japanese American Women Activists and the Legacy of Mass Incarceration” exhibit

Eloise Pickard Smith Gallery, Cowell College
University of California, Santa Cruz

Smith Gallery Opening ReceptionI’ll speak at a reception at my alma mater, Cowell College UCSC, for an exhibit organized by Prof. Alice Yang, featuring pages from the story of Mitsuye Endo in our graphic novel, We Hereby Refuse. The exhibit is on display at the Smith Gallery from October 3 to December 2.

SEATTLE, WA
September-November 2023
The Seattle Public Library 

The John Okada Centennial

Join The Seattle Public Library this fall for a special series that celebrates the centennial of the birth of Seattle native John Okada, author of the Great Japanese American Novel, “No-No Boy.” The series is co-presented by the University of Washington Press and the North American Post and is supported by The Seattle Public Library Foundation and the Gary and Connie Kunis Foundation.

Okada banner

  • The John Okada Centennial: A celebration of his life and work. From 7 p.m. to 8:15 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 26, 2023. Central Library, Level 1 Microsoft Auditorium.
    To kick off the centennial series, Okada biographer Frank Abe will present still-unseen images and stories from Okada’s life, and novelist Shawn Wong will share how he and his friends rediscovered and republished “No-No Boy” in the 1970s, leading to the edition currently available from the University of Washington Press, along with the story of Okada’s unfinished second novel. Karen Maeda Allman, literary agent and former Elliott Bay Book Company bookseller, will moderate the program. Free registration here. Watch the Seattle Channel recording of the complete program:
  • Okada bannerFrom Page to Stage: Adapting John Okada’s “No-No Boy” for today’s theater. From 7 to 8:15 p.m., Tuesday, October 24. Central Library, Level 1 Microsoft Auditorium. Writer Frank Abe shares scenes from a new stage adaptation of “No-No Boy” that he is currently developing under license from the University of Washington Press, and engages in a conversation with Seattle Rep Literary Manager and Dramaturg Paul Adolphsen on the challenges of bringing a novel published in 1957 to life for today’s theater audience. They will be joined by actors who will read scenes from the new adaptation and discuss them with the panelists. Co-presented by Seattle Rep. Free registration here.
  • four faces in circlesThe Postwar Seattle Chinatown of John Okada.
    From 2 p.m. to 3:15 p.m., Sunday, Nov. 19. Central Library, Level 1 Microsoft Auditorium.
    The sense of postwar Seattle Chinatown as a place imbues the pages of John Okada’s 1957 novel “No-No Boy,” and in this panel we will examine the imagined world of the novel along with the real history behind it. Family historian Shox Tokita shares the legacy of Chinatown hotels managed by Japanese Americans, including three owned by his mother;  former Seattle City Councilmember Dolores Sibonga tells stories of Filipino residents and workers in Chinatown, including that of her mother and her Estigoy Café; and Dr. Marie Rose Wong, author of “Building Tradition: Pan-Asian Seattle and Life in the Residential Hotels,” examines the history of single-room occupancy residential hotels in Chinatown and the threats they now face. The panel will be moderated by Emily Porcincula Lawsin, 4Culture Historic Preservation Program Manager. Book sales by Chin Music Press. Free registration here.

SEATTLE, WA
Sunday, September 24, 2023, 8:00 pm PDT
Cascade of History” hosted by Feliks Banel
SPACE 101.1 FM in Seattle

SPACE-FM logoJoining host Feliks Banel on his “Cascade of History” to talk about the John Okada Centennial and preview our first public event this Tuesday night at The Seattle Public Library Central Library auditorium. Tune in live to SPACE 101.1 FM in Seattle, broadcasting from Magnuson Park. Here is the 45-minute interview as a podcast.

OYSTERVILLE, WA
Willapa Bay AiR logoAugust 1-28, 2023
Willapa Bay Artists in Residence

Taking the month working in residence in southwest Washington State to develop a new project for the stage.

SEATTLE, WA
Monday, July 31, 2023, 12:30-2:00 pm
Walking tour of John Okada’s Chinatown
for the National Japanese American Historical Society

logoA tour of John Okada’s postwar Chinatown and its intersections with African Americans, and a visit to the Wing Luke Museum’s Resisters exhibit, for educators in NJAHS’s day-long workshop on “THROUGH OUR EYES: People of Japanese Ancestry from Mass Incarceration to Segregation in 1940s America.”

CODY/POWELL, WY
Friday, July 28, 2023, 1:00 pm
2023 Heart Mountain Pilgrimage

Holiday Inn Cody-At Buffalo Bill Village, Ballroom
Authors of Incarceration panel

graphicBringing We Hereby Refuse and the story of camp resistance to the plenary panel moderated by Shirley Ann Higuchi (Setsuko’s Secret: Heart Mountain and the Legacy of the Japanese American Incarceration) and also featuring Eric Muller (Lawyer, Jailer, Ally, Foe: Complicity and Conscience in America’s World War II Concentration Camps), and Douglas Nelson (Heart Mountain: The History of an American Concentration Camp).

SACRAMENTO, CA
Thursday, June 22, 2023, 10:45 am
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy Judicial Library and Learning Center
Summer Seminar for Educators 

Robert T. Matsui Federal Courthouse

graphicA professional development seminar for local educators, organized by the American Bar Association in partnership with the McGeorge School of Law at University of the Pacific. I will present the case of Mitsuye Endo, with a focus on the legal strategy of attorney James Purcell, as told through the pages of We Hereby Refuse. Register here.

CODY/POWELL, WY
Wednesday, June 21 and July 26, 2023, 10:00 am
NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Educator Workshop
Heart Mountain Interpretive Center
“We Hereby Refuse: The Heart Mountain Fair Play Committee and other camp resistance”

NEH websiteFor a third summer I’ll speak to educators from across the nation at a pair of week-long NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Educator Workshops using the film Conscience and the Constitution and the graphic novel We Hereby Refuse. We will examine mass resistance in all the camps to the government’s administration of a loyalty questionnaire, and the organized resistance at Heart Mountain to military conscription from inside camp. This year’s theme is “Echoes of History: Mistreatment and Incarceration in the American West.” Funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and hosted by the Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation.

SEATTLE, WA
Tuesday, May 23, 2023, 8:40-10:00 am
National Consortium on Racial & Ethnic Fairness in the Courts
2023 Conference
Hilton Motif Seattle

Discussing the historical arc of the incarceration experience and exploring the tension between themes of patriotism and resistance with Shirley Ann Higuchi and Daniel James Brown on a plenary session, Japanese American Incarceration Authors Panel: Forced Removal, Patriotism, & Resistance.

SANTA CRUZ, CA
Monday, May 22, 2023, 12:00 pm
University of California, Santa Cruz, Arts Professional Pathways
Arts & Activism: A Conversation with Shepard Fairey, Frank Abe, and Andrew Aydin” poster

A Zoom panel that “brings American contemporary artist/activist Shepard Fairey, Frank Abe, lead author of WE HEREBY REFUSE: Japanese American Resistance to Wartime Incarceration, and Andrew Aydin, co-author of the graphic novel trilogy March, into a conversation about their journeys of mobilizing artistic interventions for political activism.” Moderated by Professors Dee Hibbert-Jones and Kristen Gillette. The three of us are all UCSC arts alums. Open to all, free registration here.

SEATTLE, WA
Thursday, May 18, 2023, 10:30 am
University of Washington
Mary Gates Hall

University of Washington logoInformal discussion of We Hereby Refuse and the camp experience with students of Prof. Devin Naar in his honors course on “Race, Religion, and Migration in Global Context.”

SEATTLE, WA
Tuesday, May 16, 2023, 11:30 am
Seattle Mariners AAPI Cultural Luncheon
T-Mobile Park

baseball logoAs a Mariners season ticket member, I couldn’t be more excited to moderate a private event for Mariners front office staff on the story of Japanese American baseball in both prewar Seattle and the wartime incarceration camp at Minidoka, with presentations by novelist Shawn Wong, Dr. Marie Rose Wong, and Ken Mochizuki, author of Baseball Saved Us.

SEATTLE, WA
Saturday, May 6, 2023, 11:00 am
Humanities First program
University of Washington Humanities First logo

Taking the UW’s freshman core program, Humanities First, on a tour of John Okada’s Chinatown, with lunch at the Bruce Lee table at Tai Tung. Here’s a short YouTube video from the day:

WALLA WALLA, WA
Tuesday, April 11, 2023, 7:00 p.m.
Walla Walla University, Winter Environmental Center 209
7th annual Donald Blake Center Academic Conference

paradePresenting We Hereby Refuse in-person at the annual conference held by the Donald Blake Center for the Study of Race, Ethnicity, and Culture, along with Shawn Wong and Marie Rose Wong.



LONG BEACH, CA

Friday, April 7, 2023, 4:30-6:00 pm
2023 Association for Asian American Studies Conference
The Westin Long Beach, Shoreline Room

Association for Asian American Studies logoChairing an independent papers panel on “Citizenship & Legalities” with presentations by Gabriel Chin, UC Davis;  Andrew Parayil Boge, University of Iowa; Anne Soon Choi, California State University, Dominguez Hills; and  David Mori, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

SEATTLE, WA
Friday, March 10, 2023, 2:00 pm
2023 AWP Conference & Bookfair
Washington State Convention Center

Booksigning for We Hereby Refuse at the Chin Music Press booth at Bookfair booth #139 at the Association of Writers and Writing Programs annual conference. I will be attending panels Thursday and Saturday as well.

SEATTLE, WA
Saturday, February 18, 2023, 2:00-5:00 pm
Japanese American WWII Graphic Novels re-launch
Wing Luke Museum 

three graphic novel coversA Day of Remembrance program with book signings to reintroduce The Wing’s partnership with Chin Music Press and the packaging of the three graphic novels, Fighting for America: Nisei Soldiers, We Hereby Refuse: Japanese American Resistance to Wartime Incarceration, and the new Those Who Helped Us: Assisting Japanese Americans During the War.

RENO, NV
Thursday, February 16, 2023, 6:00-8:00 pm
Nevada Humanities
Downtown Reno Library Theatre, 301 S Center St.

Nevada Humanities eventA 90-minute in-person conversation with Dr. Meredith Ota and visual artist Miya Hannan on ““Memory and Resistance: Remembering Japanese American Incarceration,” on We Hereby Refuse, memory as captured through the graphic novel, and the importance of Japanese American community organizing around redress and reparations. Share the Facebook Event.

SEATTLE, WA
Wednesday, February 1, 2023, 7:00 pm 
Elliott Bay Book Company
Beyond the Betrayal book talk 

book talk graphicModerating an in-person book talk on Yosh Kuromiya’s Beyond the Betrayal, now in paperback from University Press of Colorado. With editor Art Hansen and one of Yosh’s daughters who worked on the manuscript, Gail Kuromiya of Bellingham. Co-sponsored by Densho. Share the Facebook Event.

BOWLING GREEN, OH
Thursday, November 17, 2022, 2:30 pm ET
Bowling Green State University
ACS 6750 Literature of Japanese American Incarceration

Bowling Green State University logoSpeaking virtually with graduate students reading We Hereby Refuse in the ACS 6750 Japanese American Incarceration class of Prof. Jolie Sheffer.

FRESNO, CA
Tuesday, November 15, 2022, 2:30 pm PT
California State University, Fresno

Fresno State logoSpeaking virtually with students in the ENGL 169T Visual Narratives class of Prof. Alison Mandaville who are working on civics action narratives, researching and creating non-fiction pieces focused on civics issues in the Central Valley.

PORT TOWNSEND, WA
Friday, October 28, 2022, 6:00 pm
Building 310, Fort Worden State Park 

Centrum Emerging Writers Residenccy Open Studio and Writers Showcase

Centrum showcaseAt the end of our cohort’s month-long Centrum Foundation residency at Fort Worden State Park. a showcase of new work by the Emerging Artist and Writers Residents, including a cold reading of the prologue and first scene from the new stage adapation I’ve been developing here.

ST. PAUL, MN
Saturday, October 8, 2022, 6:00 pm
Twin Cities JACL 75th Anniversary Celebration

Historic Fort Snelling Visitor Center, 200 Tower Avenue
“Three Takes on the Midwest”Twin Cities JACL

Guest speaker for the Twin Cities JACL 75th Anniversary Celebration at their Bento Box dinner and program. A return to the Midwest where I was born five years after this chapter’s founding.

ST. PAUL, MN
Saturday, October 8, 2022, 2:00 pm
Historic Fort Snelling Visitor Center, 200 Tower Avenue
“Camp Resistance, the MIS Language School, and John Okada”

Historic Fort SnellingA free public lecture presenting the story of We Hereby Refuse and how it intersects with No-No Boy novelist John Okada, who trained at the MIS Language School at nearby Camp Savage. RSVP via the Facebook Event.

CODY/POWELL, WY
Friday, July 29, 2022, 1:00 pm and 2:40 pm
2022 Heart Mountain Pilgrimage

Holiday Inn Cody-At Buffalo Bill Village, Ballroom
Authors of Incarceration panel

2022 Pilgrimage night skyI’ll discuss We Hereby Refuse and its inspirations on a panel with Shirley Ann Higuchi (Setsuko’s Secret), Susan Kamei (When Can We Go Back to America?), Douglas Nelson (Heart Mountain: The History of an American Concentration Camp), and Alden Hayashi (Two Nails, One Love).

SAN FRANCISCO, CA
Thursday, July 14, 2022, 6:00 pm PDT
Nichi Bei Café  livestream video: “Voices of Resistance”

Nichi Bei Cafe graphicTune in for the next episode of the Nichi Bei Cafe livestream for a preview of the Summer Book Review issue and my conversation with Art Hansen on the publication of Yosh Kuromiya’s long-awaited book, Beyond the Betrayal: The Memoir of a WW2 Japanese American Draft Resister of Conscience. Watch it on the Nichi Bei Foundation Facebook LIve or YouTube channels.

CODY/POWELL, WY
Wednesday, June 22, 2022, 9:00 am
Wednesday, July 27, 2022, 9:00 am
NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Educator Workshop
Heart Mountain Interpretive Center
“We Hereby Refuse: The Heart Mountain Fair Play Committee and other camp resistance”

NEH Educator WorkshopsI’ll speak in-person at a pair of week-long NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Educator Workshops on the film Conscience and the Constitution and the graphic novel We Hereby Refuse. We will examine mass resistance in all the camps to the government’s administration of a loyalty questionnaire, and the organized resistance at Heart Mountain to compulsory military conscription from inside camp. Funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and hosted by the Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation.

PORTLAND, OR
Thursday, June 2, 2022, 6:00 pm – “Books and Bites” book signing
Friday, June 3, 2022, 10:15 am – panel followed by book signing

2022 NCORE Conference
Oregon Convention Center
“Teaching Japanese American Resistance Through the Graphic Novel”

NCORE bannerAn in-person session with book signings for We Hereby Refuse at the annual meeting of the National Conference on Race and Ethnicity in Higher Education (NCORE), a program of the University of Oklahoma billed as “the leading national forum on issues of race and ethnicity in higher education.” The Friday presentation is Session #4204 in Portland Ballroom 252. Book signings in the Exhibit Hall Thursday at 6:00 pm and Friday at 12:00 noon.

SEATTLE, WA
Friday, May 27, 2022, 12:30 pm
University of Washington
Humanities First program, Denny Hall 257University of Washington logo

Speaking to the UW’s Humanities First program, taught by Prof. Sarah Stroup.

TACOMA, WA
Thursday, May 26, 9:00 am-1:00 pm
“I” Corps and Joint Base Lewis-McChord Office of the Staff Judge Advocate professional development workshop
Washington State History Museum
“Japanese American Incarceration During World War II and its Legal Aftermath.”

flyer A professional development workshop training for Army attorneys in the Seattle-Tacoma region, with a presentation on “Resistance to Incarceration Through the Courts,”  covering We Hereby Refuse and Conscience and the Constitution . With retired Seattle University professor and noted coram nobis attorney Lorraine Bannai, attorney Hoyt Zia, and Fred Borch, archive historian for the JAG office.

KING COUNTY, WA
Tuesday, May 24, 2022, 5:30 pm
AKCHO Awards Celebrationlogo

Each of our creative team wiil speak virtually in acceptance of the Virginia Marie Folkins Award for Outstanding Historical Publication from the Association of King County Historical Organizations.

BAINBRIDGE ISLAND, WA
Saturday, April 30, 2022, 2:00 pm
Bainbridge Island Museum of Art
Frank Buxton Auditorium
Resisting and the Fight for Justice

Bainbridge Museum of Art film seriesI’ll speak in-person on the long-suppressed stories of resistance to wartime incarceration, as documented in the film Conscience and the Constitution and the graphic novel We Hereby Refuse. Common to both works are the characters of Bainbridge Island native, journalist James Omura, and Seattle draft resister Jim Akutsu.

SANTA CRUZ, CA
April 21-23, 2022
Cowell Class of 1972 Alumni Week

Alumni Week logoHow We’re Still Changing the World
Thursday, April 21, 3:00-5:00 pm 

I’m really Class of 1973, but will take part in two alumni panels. The first is a virtual one I’m moderating: “We started out protesting the Viet Nam War and volunteering on Daufuskie Island to change the world, but since then our community involvements have become much more diverse and far reaching. Join with our classmates to tell your stories of where this impulse, engendered by so many of our professors, has led us. We will also learn about what community service looks like at Cowell today. Moderated by Frank Abe.”

Alumni Week logo(Nearly) Everything I Know about the Creative Process I Learned at Cowell College: Writers and Their Writing
Saturday, April 23, 1:30–3:30 pm
Page Smith Library

“We’re gathering writers of all stripes and experiences from our classes to hold an open discussion on the writing process, from creativity to publishing, from comics to film and theater. Some of the participants: David Stanford, Frank Abe, Alesa Lightbourne, Ren Weschler, Cameron Vanderscoff. Possibly livestreamed.

Alumni Week logo“(Nearly) Everything I Know about the Creative Process I Learned at Cowell College: Acting and Writing for the Theater” 

A video interview recorded in January for posting on the alumni webpage, along with a clip from Conscience and the Constitution. The page features other alumni from the early years of Cowell reflecting on their writing for and engagement with film , theater, and history, including Adilah Barnes (who I knew as Lovey Barnes), David Stanford, Malcolm Taylor, and Patty Nelson Limerick.

DENVER, CO
AAAS DenverThurs., April 14, 2022, 6:00 pm
Friday, April 15, 2022, 10:00 am
Association for Asian American Studies conference
Hilton Denver City Center

Seeing friends in person, sharing We Hereby Refuse at the New Books Reception, and chairing a panel on Asian American Comics as Fantasy and Possibility.

SACRAMENTO, CA
Saturday, April 9, 2022, 12:00-1:30 pm
Pacific Sociological Association conference
Sheraton Grand Sacramento Hotel
“Reconstructing and Reframing the Collective Narrative of Japanese American Incarceration”

Pacifc Sociological Association logoFeatured speaker in-person for the Presidential Session, using We Hereby Refuse to speak to the conference theme of “Telling Our Stories: Collective Memory and Narratives of Race, Gender, and Community Identity. A key question for conferees is how we use memory as agency in disrupting power and systematic inequality, and as a tool for change and action. Thanks for the invitation from PSA president Dr. Wendy Ng of CSU East Bay.

BOCA RATON, FL
Wednesday, March 30, 2022, 4:00-7:00 pm EDT
Florida Atlantic University
Center for Holocaust and Human Rights Education

Holocaust Center event flyer

A virtual professional development workshop for 30 high school history teachers and Florida Atlantic University faculty in Southeast Florida on the incarceration experience, including the resistance portrayed in We Hereby Refuse. Organized by Toshimi Abe-Janiga of the Riviera Beach Preparatory & Achievement Academy for the FAU Center for Holocaust and Human Rights Education.

BAINBRIDGE ISLAND, WA
Tuesday, March 29, 2022, 2:00 pm and 7:00 pm
Bainbridge Island Museum of Art
Frank Buxton Auditorium
“smARTfilms: Executive Order 9066 at Eighty”

Bainbridge Museum of Art film seriesFilm screening of Conscience and the Constitution, held in connection with the “smARTfilms: Executive Order 9066 at Eighty” film series and exhibition.

POMONA, CA
Thursday, February 24, 2022, 12:00-1:00 pm PT 
Cal Poly Pomona Day of RemembranceCPP DOR flyer

A virtual Day of Remembrance presentation around We Hereby Refuse and the legacy of Michi Weglyn, at the school which is home to the Michi and Walter Weglyn Multicultural Studies Chair and Weglyn Endowed Chair, Dr. Mary Kunmi Yu Danico. Much of the Tule Lake story in our book is drawn from and honors the work of Michi and her landmark Years of Infamy.

BELLEVUE, WA
Wednesday, February 23, 2022, 1:30 pm PT
Bellevue College Day of Remembrance

Bellevue DOR posterIn a virtual presentation for the Asian Pacific Islander Student Association, which is distributing 50 copies of We Hereby Refuse to students, I’ll connect the wartime incarceration of Japanese Americans with the resurgence in anti-Asian violence today and explore how false accusations of disloyalty have historically been made solely on the basis of race. With API Students host Sunny Lee.  Watch the presentation on YouTube:

SEATTLE, WA
Monday, February 21, 2022, 6:00 pm PT
Elliott Bay Book Company author event

The Perfect Sound EventbriteIn virtual conversation with author Garrett Hongo on his new book, The Perfect Sound: A Memoir in Stereo: “A poet’s audio obsession, from his earliest vinyl to his quest for the perfect vacuum tubes, as he strives to make both sound and sense of his life.” It’s a great read.

VASHON ISLAND, WA
Saturday, February 19, 2022, 4:00 pm PT
Vashon Island Day of Remembrance

Vashon Island DORA virtual event presenting We Hereby Refuse and the story of camp resistance with Tamiko Nimura and moderated by Islander Rita Brogan, in collaboration with Mukai Farm & Garden, and with support from 4Culture, Vashon Island Heritage Museum, and Humanities Washington. Free registration to get the Zoom link here. More details at the Facebook Event. Watch the video on the Mukai Farm & Garden YouTube channel:

WASHINGTON, DC
Saturday, February 19, 2022, 2:00 pm PT/5:00 pm ET
National Day of Remembrance

National DORThe Smithsonian National Museum of American History, the Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation, and the National Park Service are hosting a two-day, virtual National Day of Remembrance focusing on 80 years of reckoning since Executive Order 9066. I will lead off the panel “Day of Remembrances: Standing for Redress and Reclaiming History,” celebrating how the community reclaimed this date to seek justice, joined by Susan Hayase, San Jose Nikkei Resisters founder; David Inoue, Japanese American Citizens League National executive director; and Brian Niiya, Densho content director. Erin Aoyama of Brown University moderates the entire weekend of events. Watch live on the NPS YouTube channel:

CODY/POWELL, WY
Saturday, February 19, 2022, 12:00 pm PT/1:00 pm MT
Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation Educators Workshop

Educators Workshop graphicI’ll be filling in via Zoom for a recuperating Tak Hoshizaki to speak about resistance in the camps at a professional development workshop for Wyoming and Montana teachers on the Day of Remembrance.  Among the resources used by the participants is We Hereby Refuse. Sponsored by the Wyoming Humanities Council. See the Facebook Event.

ST. PAUL, MN
Saturday, February 19, 2022, 11:00 am PT/1:00 pm CT
East Side Freedom Library
Day of Remembrance: Minnesota’s Role in Incarceration and Transcendence

East Side Freedom Library logoIn connection with a screening of The Registry, Bill Kubota and Steve Ozone’s PBS film on the MIS, I’m happy to drop in to briefly online speak about the first Day of Remembrance and John Okada’s role in the MIS. Hosted by the East Side Freedom Library and the Twin Cities Japanese American Citizens League. Watch on the East Side Freedom Library YouTube channel:

SEATTLE, WA
Thursday, February 17, 2022, 12:00-1:00 pm PT
Seattle Colleges Day of Remembrance

Seattle Colleges DOR A virtual Day of Remembrance program, in conversation with noted artist Erin Shigaki, weaving the stories of four Broadway High School students through the lens of We Hereby Refuse, Conscience and the Constitution, and the first Day of Remembrance and redress. Download the poster. Watch on the Seattle Central College Student Leadership YouTube channel:

OAKLAND, CA
Sunday, February 13, 2022, 3:00-4:30pm PST
Oakland Asian Cultural Center
“We Hereby Refuse: The Bay Area Allies”

Eastwind Books event bannerFor this Day of Remembrance program, moderator Darren Murata will join with writer Frank Abe for a virtual conversation around We Hereby Refuse with Kathleen Purcell of San Francisco, the daughter of Mitsuye Endo’s attorney James Purcell; Wayne Collins Jr. of Berkeley, the son of Hiroshi Kashiwagi’s attorney Wayne Collins; and Sadako Kashiwagi of Berkeley, Hiroshi’s wife. Hosted by Eastwind Books of Berkeley and the Oakland Asian Cultural Center, with a livestream to the OACC’s YouTube channel. Register via Eventbrite for free tickets. Download the PDF flyer. Join the Facebook Event. Watch on YouTube here: 

SAN FRANCISCO, CA
Thursday, February 10, 2022, 6:00 pm PST
Nichi Bei Café livestream video

Nichi-Bei-CafeTune in for the debut of NIchi Bei Weekly publisher Kenji Taguma’s new innovation, the Nichi Bei Cafe, a monthly livestream program designed to keep the community engaged and connected with “a mixed plate of Japanese American news and culture.” For the premiere, I contribute a video essay on helping create and organize the first Day of Remembrance in 1978. Watch it on the Nichi Bei Foundation YouTube channel.

LOS ANGELES, CA
Thursday, February 10, 2022, 9:30-10:15 am PST
UCLA Asian American Studies class

UCLA logoA virtual discussion of We Hereby Refuse and the overall camp resistance for the Asian American Studies 131B course on “Japanese Americans and Incarceration,” taught by Karen Umemoto and Brian Niiya.

SEATTLE, WA
Wednesday, February 9, 2022, 9:30-10:20 am PST
University of Washington English class

Speaking virtually about We Hereby Refuse with students in Alan Williams’ English 200A course on “Tracing 20th-Century U.S. Racialization through Literary Forms.”

DETROIT, MI
Wednesday, February 2, 2022, 1:30 pm EST
Detroit Prep 6th graders
Detroit Prep

Virtually answering questions of 6th graders beginning their in-depth study of World War II and Japanese American incarceration camps in the class of Charles Johns.

SEATTLE, WA
Friday, January 28, 2022
Washington Game Changers podcast

Washington Game Changers logoA lot of laughs in this half-hour conversation with former colleague Lauri Reed Hennessey on the Day of Remembrance, We Hereby Refuse, our time at KIRO Newsradio 71, and my weekly series, “Other Voices.” And we touch upon the attacks on teaching history, recorded days before the MAUS book-banning blew up. Listen here.

SEATTLE, WA
Saturday, November 20, 2021, 12:00-1:00 pm PST
Wing Luke Museum Community Hall
Winter Book-O-Rama book signing

Book-O-RamaAfter a year of virtual events, it’s with great pleasure to say we’re having our first Seattle in-person book-signing for We Hereby Refuse. Bring proof of vaccination and your mask and you’ll find Frank Abe, Ross Ishikawa, and Tamiko Nimura seated at socially-distanced tables.

LOS ANGELES, CA
Saturday, October 30, 2021, 2:15-3:45 pm PDT
Japanese American Confinement Sites Consortium
Fall 2021 Education Conference: “Stronger Together: Voices to Inspire, Advocate, and Educate”

JACSC workshop save the dateModerating the stories from We Hereby Refuse and others for a virtual workshop session on “Trials of Suspicion, Segregation, and Selective Service.” Also presenting are Matt Lautzenheiser on the Enemy Alien Hearing Boards held at Fort Missoula, Montana, and Stan Shikuma on the Tule Lake Segregation Center. Free and open to the public. #JACSC2021. Click here to open the schedule as a PDF, and here for a PDF of the full program.

EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND
Thursday, October 21, 2021, 8:00-10:00 pm Scottish Time
Scottish International Storytelling Festival

Scottish International Storytelling Festival storytellersI’m representing Seattle as a UNESCO City of Literature by virtually presenting two stories about John Okada and the writing of No-No Boy at the Scottish International Storytelling Festival. The program is called “Global Hearth: Walter Scott and City Writers,” and its hosted by Anna Fancett (Edinburgh), with Frank Abe (Seattle), Nuala Hayes (Dublin) and Dima Matta (Beirut). It’s a ticketed event. See the full program on page 18. #SISFImagine

WASHINGTON, DC
Friday, October 15, 2021, 3:00-5:00 pm EDT
George Washington University
Comics and Graphic Narratives Symposium

symposium flyer

In their Fall courses, undergraduate and graduate students will read We Hereby Refuse and I Was Their American Dream. Authors Frank Abe and Tamiko Nimura will be joined  by author Malaka Gharib in virtual conversation at a symposium on “Race, Rights, and Immigration in Ethnic American Comics.”  We’ll speak about how we went about creating, visualizing, and researching our works, describe the challenges along the way, and fit our work into  current debates on the Asian American experience.

NEW YORK, NY
Sunday, October 3, 2021, 12:00-1:00 pm EDT
Brooklyn Book Festival
St. Francis College, Founder’s Hall, 180 Remsen St.

Brooklyn Book Festival bannerThe first in-person event for We Hereby Refuse will be the Brooklyn Book Festival, the largest free literary festival in New York City. It’s a roundtable discussion of historical graphic novels at St. Francis College called “From the Past to the Future” also featuring Brian Keith Mitchell (Monumental), Bill Campbell (The Day the Klan Came to Town), and Dash Shaw (Discipline). Moderated by Lara Saguisag of CUNY College of Staten Island. Free admission. #BKBF. See the Facebook Event.

TADAIMA! A COMMUNITY VIRTUAL PILGRIMAGE
Saturday, September 18, 2021, 1:00 pm PDT
We Hereby Refuse: The Next Generation”

Tadaima 2021Our graphic novel We Hereby Refuse presents the stories of three Nisei who refused to submit to imprisonment in American concentration camps without a fight. Now meet their children. In this panel for Tadaima! we’ll meet Jim Akutsu’s son Phillip, Mitsuye Endo’s daughter Wendy, and Hiroshi Kashiwagi’s son Soji, and get their reactions to the characterization of their parents. See the Facebook Event and watch the replay on YouTube:

TADAIMA! A COMMUNITY VIRTUAL PILGRIMAGE
Sunday, September 5, 2021, 1:00 pm PDT
“Unlocking Issei Voices in Camp Literature”

The buried past of Issei writing in camp is uncovered in two new publication projects. Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation Museum Manager Cally Steussy will unveil the foundation’s new translations of the Heart Mountain Bungei literary magazine, joined by two of her translators, Lisa Hofman-Kuroda and Allison Markin Powell. Writer/editor Frank Abe will discuss other recent translations of Issei writing planned for the forthcoming Penguin Book of the Literature of Japanese American Incarceration, including two commissioned from the Tule Lake Tessaku magazine. See the Facebook Event and watch the replay on YouTube, cued to the start of our anthology discussion:

SACRAMENTO, CA
Wednesday, August 25, 2021, 5:00 pm PDT
Sacramento Public Library “Authors Uncovered

Sacramento Public Library event

Our Sacramento book launch will feature the local stories of young Mitsuye Endo and Hiroshi Kashiwagi, with a special focus on Ross Ishikawa’s artwork and the craft of visual storytelling and graphic novel production. Here’s the program, moderated by Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Kara Ueda:

SEATTLE, WA
Monday, August 16, 2021, 6:00 pm PDT
Elliott Bay Book Company author event

Virtual Conversations for Clark and Division A pleasure to be in virtual conversation with Edgar Award-winning mystery novelist Naomi Hirahara, on the publication of her groundbreaking new book CLARK AND DIVISION, centered on the postwar resettlement of Japanese Americans in Chicago. See the Facebook Event notice. Here’s our conversation:

CODY/POWELL, WY
Saturday, July 24, 2021, 2:00 pm MDT
Heart Mountain Pilgrimage “Authors of Incarceration” panel

2021 Heart Mountain virtual pilgrimageFor the 2021 virtual pilgrimage, the Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation has organized an “Authors of Incarceration” panel “with the authors of the most popular books about Japanese American incarceration out now! Panelists include Frank Abe (We Hereby Refuse), Daniel James Brown (Facing the Mountain), Shirley Ann Higuchi (Setsuko’s Secret), and Bradford Pearson (The Eagles of Heart Mountain). Ray Locker and Erin Aoyama will moderate.” Watch the replay on YouTube.

National Endowment for the Humanities logoCODY/POWELL, WY
Thursday, July 22, 2021, 11:00 am MDT
NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Virtual Workshop
We Hereby Refuse: The Heart Mountain Fair Play Committee and other camp resistance

Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation logo

Frank Abe speaks to educators at this NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Virtual Workshop on his film Conscience and the Constitution and the graphic novel We Hereby Refuse. We will examine mass resistance in all the camps to the government’s administration of a loyalty questionnaire, and the organized resistance at Heart Mountain to compulsory military conscription from inside camp. Funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and hosted by the Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation.

LOS ANGELES, CA
Saturday, June 26, 2021, 2:00 pm PDT
Japanese American National Museum

JANM eventSouthern California book launch for We Hereby Refuse. Authors Frank Abe and Tamiko Nimura will read from the graphic novel and describe the process of dramatizing a history that overturns the usual expectations around camp stories, with a special focus on segregation at Tule Lake. Artist Ross Ishikawa will share his use of computer-aided design CAD software to recreate scenes from Japanese American history, and YURI Education Project creators will demonstrate a free online curriculum that accompanies the book. $10 and free for members. This program is co-sponsored by the George and Sakaye Aratani CARE Award, UCLA’s Asian American Studies Center, and the Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience. Watch on the JANM YouTube channel:

SEATTLE, WA
Saturday, June 26, 2021
2021 Virtual Minidoka Pilgrimage
The Minidoka Story in We Hereby Refuse

2021 Minidoka PilgrimageThe experience of incarceration at Minidoka is presented in a way not seen before in a provocative new graphic novel on camp resistance. Join authors Frank Abe and Tamiko Nimura for an inside look at the draft resistance of Jim and Gene Akutsu, the organizing of the Mother’s Society of Minidoka, and the brief life of the Civil Liberties League. UPDATE: See the YouTube video here.

National Endowment for the Humanities logoCODY/POWELL, WY
Thursday, June 24, 2021, 10:15 am MDT
NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Virtual Workshop
We Hereby Refuse: The Heart Mountain Fair Play Committee and other camp resistance

Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation logo

Frank Abe speaks to educators at this NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Virtual Workshop  on our film Conscience and the Constitution and the graphic novel We Hereby Refuse. We will examine mass resistance in all the camps to the government’s administration of a loyalty questionnaire, and organized resistance at Heart Mountain to compulsory military conscription from inside camp. Funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities and hosted by the Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation.

SEATTLE, WA
Monday, June 14, 2021, 6:00 pm PDT
Seattle Public Library author series

Seattle Public Library eventAuthors Frank Abe and Tamiko Nimura and artist Ross Ishikawa debut We Hereby Refuse for Seattle library patrons, in conversation with Densho’s Tom Ikeda. Co-sponsored by Densho and the Elliott Bay Book Company. UPDATED with the video recorded by the Seattle Channel:

SEATTLE, WA
Monday, June 14, 2021, 12:00 pm PDT
KUOW “The Record” with Bill Radke

A live conversation about We Hereby Refuse with a former colleague from KIRO Radio days. We’ll chat in the second half-hour. Listen live locally at 94.9 FM. UPDATE: Hear the 17-minute interview segment using the third button of this webpage.

BERKELEY, CA
Thursday, June 3, 2021, 7:00 PDT
KPFA-FM “APEX Express

APEX Express radioIn the San Francisco Bay Area , tune in Pacifica Radio’s KPFA 94.1 FM (or stream it live worldwide at KPFA.org) for our conversation about We Hereby Refuse and camp resistance with the Powerleegirls hosts Miko Lee and Jalena Keane-Lee. UPDATE: Listen to the program here or download it as an mp3 to listen later as a podcast.

LOS ANGELES, CA
Wednesday, May 26, 2021, 8:00 & 11:00 pm
Spectrum News One “Inside the Issues with Alex Cohen”

Inside the Issues with Alex CohenFor Charter Communications cable-tv subscribers in Southern California, from Santa Barbara to North San Diego County, a 9-minute conversation on “Inside the Issues with Alex Cohen” on Spectrum News One.

SANTA CRUZ, CA
Wednesday, May 26, 2021, 12:00 pm PDT
UC Santa Cruz

UC Santa Cruz logoPresenting We Hereby Refuse to Prof. Brenda Sanfilippo’s class on “War and American Literature,” from WWI to the present.

LOS ANGELES, CA
Tuesday, May 25, 2021, 9:30-10:45 am PDT
UCLA Asian American Studies 40: “Asian American Movement” 

UCLA book talk

A livestream presentation of We Hereby Refuse to Dr. Kelly Fong’s class on the history of the “Asian American Movement.” This program is co-sponsored by the George and Sakaye Aratani CARE Award, UCLA’s Asian American Studies Center, and the Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience. Details at the Facebook Event. To get the livestream link, free registration at  jaresistance.eventbrite.com.

TACOMA, WA
Tuesday, May 18, 2021, 6:00 pm PDT
King’s Books book talk

King's Books logoOn the official date of publication of We Hereby Refuse, authors Frank Abe and Tamiko Nimura join in conversation with Rachel Endo, Founding Dean of the School of Education at the University of Washington Tacoma. Register here to join the Zoom event.

SEATTLE, WA
Friday, April 23, 2021, 10:30 am PDT
Humanities First program
University of Washington 

University of Washington logoSpeaking to the freshman core program, Humanities First, which is reading John Okada’s Seattle-based No-No Boy as its text for the spring HUM 103 course on Community Connections.

SEATTLE, WA
Friday, April 9, 2021, 1:30pm PDT
Association for Asian American Studies virtual conference

Association for Asian American Studies logoGraphic novels open the door to alternative narratives from hitherto-marginalized communities, while increasing student engagement. For the panel, “Unsettling the Japanese American Narrative Through the Graphic Novel,” authors Frank Abe and Tamiko Nimura will present excerpts from We Hereby Refuse that unsettle familiar victim narratives of Japanese American incarceration. Professors Caroline Hong of Queens College CUNY and Alison Mandaville of Cal State Fresno will analyze the work and place it within the larger field of counternarratives and resistance narratives in Asian American Studies.

SEATTLE, WA
Wednesday, March 16, 2021, 4:00 pm PT
Friends of the UW Libraries 
UW Libraries logo

Presenting We Hereby Refuse in an informal salon for Friends of the Library at the University of Washington, hosted by Friends of the Library board member Anne Repass.

CALIFORNIA STATE
Sunday, March 7, 2021, 11:15 am PT
California Council for the Social Studies
2021 Virtual Conference

CCSS panel logo“Teaching Japanese American Resistance Through the Graphic Novel:” Writer Frank Abe & Wing Luke Museum curriculum director Rahul Gupta present We Hereby Refuse to registered conference attendees, along with its accompanying Educator Guide, developed in partnership with the YURI Education Project and supported a grant from the George and Sakaye Aratani CARE Award and UCLA Asian American Studies Center. #CCSS #CCSS2021

SEATTLE, WA
Saturday, February 27, 2021, 8:00 am-3:00 pm PT
Wing Luke Museum teacher training workshop 

We Hereby Refuse coverA day-long workshop for Washington state teachers at which  we will debut the Educators Guide and interactive historical timeline that accompany our new graphic novel, We Hereby Refuse. Author Frank Abe will unpack how the structure of the book and its narrative arc upend the usual expectations around camp stories. Wing Luke curriculum director Rahul Gupta will demonstrate a free online curriculum that accompanies the book.  To register, go to this link and click on the plus sign (+) next to “Educator Resources.”

SAN JOSE, CA
Sunday, February 21, 2021, 6:00 pm PT
45th anniversary screening of Farewell to Manzanar
West Wind Capitol Drive-in Theater
3630 Hillcap Avenue

Farewell to Manzanar screeningFeatured actor Frank Abe will host a virtual cast and crew reunion prior to the live and COVID-safe drive-in theater screening of the 1976 TV-movie, Farewell to Manzanar. Sponsored by the Nichi Bei Foundation as the closing night event of its 10th anniversary Films of Remembrance series. Read the Nichi Bei Weekly article about it.

MINNEAPOLIS-ST. PAUL, MN
Sunday, Feb.  21, 2021, 4:00 – 6:00 pm CT
Twin Cities JACL Day of Remembrance

Twin Cities DOR graphicDOR screening of Conscience and the Constitution followed by an online discussion with director Frank Abe and Jaylani Hussein, executive director of the Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), with Japanese American and Muslim students from the University of Minnesota. Moderated by Twin Cities JACL chapter president Vinicius Taguchi. Watch the saved video stream on YouTube, courtesy of the East Freedom Library.

PUYALLUP, WA
Sunday, February 21, 2021, 1:00 pm PT
Tsuru for Solidary – Seattle  car caravan

Tsuru Seattle 2021 graphic“Another Time, Another Place” — In advance of a Day of Remembrance car caravan from the Puyallup Fairgrounds to the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma, original DOR organizer Frank Abe has recorded a video greeting that links the first Day of Remembrance at the fairgrounds in 1978 to the ongoing need to press for release of asylum-seekers still held at the GEO Group private prison operated on behalf of ICE. Sponsored by Tsuru for Solidarity, La Resistencia, Densho, the Minidoka Pilgrimage Planning Committee, Seattle JACL, and Puyallup Valley JACL.

SEATTLE, WA
Saturday, February 20, 2021, 2:00 pm PT
Wing Luke Museum online book launch

Wing Luke book launchBook launch for new graphic novel, We Hereby Refuse: Japanese American Resistance to Wartime Incarceration, published by Chin Music Press of Seattle. Authors Frank Abe and Tamiko Nimura will  and read from the book. Artists Ross Ishikawa and Matt Sasaki will break down their process.

SEATTLE, WA
Saturday, February 20, 2021, 11:00 am PT
Wing Luke Museum virtual tour of INS Building 

Wing Luke DOR tour logoA key scene in our graphic novel We Hereby Refuse takes place inside the U.S. Immigration Station, on the edge of Seattle’s Chinatown, where 100 immigrant Issei were held after their arrest by the FBI two months after Pearl Harbor. Writer Frank Abe will join the tour to speak about the detention of Jim Akutsu’s father inside the Immigration Station and show scenes from the book.

BELLEVUE, WA
Wednesday., Dec. 2, 2020, 10:00 am
Bellevue College TELOS online seminar

Bellevue College retiree programs

Speaking on the work of John Okada, No-No Boy, and the wartime story of life in the Chinatown/International District of Seattle, for the TELOS retiree education program.

ONLINE EVENT: Japanese American Memorial Pilgrimage Book Talk
Friday, Nov. 27, 2020, 1:00-2:15 pm
JAMP Black Friday Holiday Special
YouTube live stream

JAMPilgrimages Holiday SpecialOur first online preview with both of the writers and one of the artists of the forthcoming graphic novel, We Hereby Refuse. Hosted by Japanese American Memorial Pilgrimages. Watch the discussion on YouTube. 

ESCONDIDO, CA
Tuesday, October 27, 2020, 3:00 pm
“Japanese American Voices in Graphic Novels”
Escondido Public Library o
nline event for “One Book, One San Diego”

Escondido panel

First public discussion of We Hereby Refuse for the “Japanese American Voices in Graphic Novels” panel, as part of the Escondido Public Library Pop Culture Panel Series in support of the “One Book, One San Diego” program. Register for free via Eventbrite, and add the Facebook Event to your timeline. This program will be broadcast live on Facebook @escondidolibrary. The recording is available for viewing on Facebook (@escondidolibrary), YouTube (@EscondidoLibrary), Instagram IGTV (@escondidolibrary), and  here.

The Rainier Club logoSEATTLE, WA
Tuesday, August 18, 2020, 6:30 pm
The Rainier Club literary happy hour

A Virtual Literary Happy Hour and Northwest Author’s Showcase at “Seattle’s preeminent private club,” on the local significance of No-No Boy and its author, John Okada.

We Are All Americans bannerWASHINGTON, DC
Tuesday, August 4, 2020
National Japanese American Historical Society
We Are All Americans” Free Online Workshop for Teachers of History and the Humanities

Speaking on the life and work of novelist John Okada for the NJHAS teacher workshop, “We Are All Americans.” Co-sponsored by the National Park Service. Download a PDF of the workshop flyer.

We Are All Americans bannerMINNEAPOLIS-ST. PAUL, MN
Thursday, July 30, 2020
National Japanese American Historical Society
We Are All Americans” Free Online Workshop for Teachers of History and the Humanities

Speaking on the life and work of novelist John Okada for the NJHAS teacher workshop, “We Are All Americans,” with a local focus on Okada’s time at the Military Intelligence Service Language School at Fort Snelling. Co-sponsored by the National Park Service. Download a PDF of the workshop flyer.

We Are All Americans bannerSEATTLE, WA
Thursday, July 16, 2020
National Japanese American Historical Society
We Are All Americans” Free Online Workshop for Teachers of History and the Humanities

Speaking on the life and work of novelist John Okada for the NJHAS teacher workshop, “We Are All Americans,” with a local focus on the story of Japanese Americans from Bainbridge Island. Co-sponsored by the National Park Service. Download a PDF of the workshop flyer.

Tadaima logoTADAIMA! A COMMUNITY VIRTUAL PILGRIMAGE
Friday, July 10, 2020, 5:00 pm PDT
Tadaima! Book Club Discussion of No-No Boy

Join John Okada co-editor Frank Abe and moderator Vince Schleitwiler for a live Book Club presentation and discussion of the novel NO-NO BOY and the story of the author behind it. Learn how a Nisei veteran of the MIS came to write the classic work of fiction about a Nisei draft resister. Watch on the JAMP YouTube channel:

We Are All Americans bannerBOISE, ID
Thursday, July 9, 2020, 10:00 am MT
National Japanese American Historical Society
We Are All Americans” Free Online Workshop for Teachers of History and the Humanities

Speaking on the life and work of novelist John Okada for the NJHAS teacher workshop, “We Are All Americans,” with a local focus on the camp at Minidoka and the trial of Jim Akutsu in the federal courthouse in Boise. Co-sponsored by the National Park Service. Download a PDF of the workshop flyer.

Tadaima logoTADAIMA! A COMMUNITY VIRTUAL PILGRIMAGE
Saturday, July 4, 2020, 2:00 pm PDT
Tadaima! Film Festival: Conscience and the Constitution screening with director’s commentary

Join director Frank Abe and moderator Erin Aoyama for a live group viewing with a twist: while the film is streaming, Frank will offer a director’s commentary on the making of CONSCIENCE AND THE CONSTITUTION. Tune in for behind-the-scenes stories about the Heart Mountain draft resisters, and leave questions in the chatroom for discussion afterwards. Watch on the JAMP YouTube channel:

We Are All Americans bannerCHICAGO, IL
Monday, June 29, 2020, 10:00 am CT
National Japanese American Historical Society
We Are All Americans” Free Online Workshop for Teachers of History and the Humanities

Speaking on the life and work of novelist John Okada for the NJHAS teacher workshop, “We Are All Americans.” Co-sponsored by the National Park Service, Japanese American Service Committee, and Japanese American Historical Society. Download a PDF of the workshop flyer.

University of Oregon logo

EUGENE, OR
Tuesday, Nov. 19, 2019 @ 10:00 am
University of Oregon, Eugene
Knight 41

Digital mapping project in the ENG 250 Literature & Digital Culture class of professor Tara Fickle, locating the places in the life of John Okada and the sites in his novel, No-No Boy.

Before Columbus Foundation bannerSAN FRANCISCO, CA
Friday, Nov. 1, 2019 @ 1:00 pm
American Book Awards

San Francisco Public Library
Koret Auditorium, 100 Larkin St. 

JOHN OKADA co-editors Frank Abe and Greg Robinson will be accepting an American Book Award from the venerable Before Columbus Foundation for outstanding literary achievement. Open to the public, RSVP via the Facebook Event.

CODY, WY
Friday, July 26, 2019 @ 2:00 pm & 3:20 pm
2019 Heart Mountain Pilgrimage 
Holiday Inn Cody – At Buffalo Bill Village, 1701 Sheridan Ave.

Resisters & Their Legacy:” Documentarian Frank Abe, resister Tak Hoshizaki, and historian Art Hansen will discuss the draft resistance movement at Heart Mountain and the living legacy of the largest organized resistance to the mass wartime incarceration of Japanese Americans in WW2. Frank will screen a clip from Conscience and the Constitution. The panel will be presented twice to accommodate all pilgrims.  Frank will also sign copies of the Conscience DVD  on discounted sale in the Taggart Room from 7:00 to 8:00 pm. Download a PDF of the final schedule and RSVP via the Facebook Event.

book flyerSAN JOSE, CA
Saturday, June 15, 2019 @ 1:00 pm
Japanese American Museum of San Jose
535 N. Fifth St.

JOHN OKADA book talk and signing with co-editor Frank Abe. A return for him to the Santa Clara Valley where he grew up and graduated from Cupertino High School and UC Santa Cruz. Download the flyer and RSVP via the Facebook Event.

logo fo rUniversity of Washington, BothellBOTHELL, WA
Tuesday, May 14, 2019 @ 11:00 am
University of Washington, Bothell

Speaking to Prof. Scott Kurashige’s class on JOHN OKADA and CONSCIENCE. Little known fact you’ll learn in our book: Scott’s grandfather was the model for the Buddhist priest officiating in the funeral scene in NO-NO BOY.

UW Libraries logoSEATTLE, WA
Thursday, May 2, 2019 @ 6:00 pm
University of Washington Libraries “Libraries Unbound” fundraising dinner
Husky Union Building Ballrooms

JOHN OKADA co-editor Frank Abe will serve as a “table author” for the Friends of the University of Washington Libraries 14th annual fundraising dinner, “Libraries Unbound.” John’s sister Connie was the longtime art librarian for the UW Libraries, and our book is indebted to the Suzzallo and Allen Libraries for the microfilms and bound volumes where we rediscovered all of Okada’s unknown works.

Association for Asian American Studies logoMADISON, WI
Thurs-Fri, April 25-26, 2019
Association for Asian American Studies annual conference
Madison Concourse Hotel

1) Thursday, April 25, 1:00 – 2:30 pm in the Assembly Room. Filmmakers Frank Abe, Emiko Omori, and Chizu Omori will appear on a panel chaired by Greg Robinson on “‘Rabbit in the Moon’ and ‘Conscience and the Constitution’: Looking Backward and Forward.”  Panelists: Elena Tajima Creef will analyze the visual and photographic elements of these films and how they interact with their storylines. Robert Hayashi will discuss storytelling in the films and their narrative strategies. Jonathan van Harmelen will situate the two films within the history of the documentary film. Karen Inouye and Chris Suh will discuss the historical legacy of the films and their use as teaching tools, both inside the classroom and outside. RSVP via the Facebook Event.

2) Friday, April 26, 1:00 – 2:30 pm in the Caucus Room. OKADA co-editor Floyd Cheung will chair a panel on “John Okada’s Unknown Works: Reassessing the (Un)governability of Japanese Americans in Mid-Century America.”  RSVP via the Facebook Event. Presenters:

Floyd Cheung, Smith College
“’I Must Be Strong’: Awareness and Resistance in John Okada’s December 7th Poem.”
— Cheung’s paper about the poem Okada wrote the night of Pearl Harbor investigates his prescience about dominant American racism and the need to self-govern Japanese American identity.
Vince Schleitwiler, University of Washington
“’A Larger Capacity for Normalcy: Apparitions of the Non-Alien in Midcentury Empire.”
— Schleitwiler’s paper about Okada’s satirical essays read Okada’s attempts to perform “exceptional normalcy” in the face of supposed Japanese American “abnormalcy.”
John Streamas, Washington State University
“Street Lit: John Okada Ventures into the Proletarian.”
— Streamas’s paper about one of Okada’s short stories situates his work in the proletarian tradition–one marked by the intersection of class and race.
3) Friday, April 26, 3:00 – 4:00 pm in the Exhibit Room. Immediately following the John Okada panel, JOHN OKADA co-editors Frank Abe, Greg Robinson, and Floyd Cheung will reunite for a book signing at the University of Washington Press exhibit table.


book fair flyerTACOMA, WA
Sat., April 6, 2019, 10:00 am – 5:00 pm

Washington State History Museum
Book Fair,
1911 Pacific Avenue

JOHN OKADA co-editor Frank Abe will meet with readers and sign books at a table from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm, and present a book talk at 2:00 pm, at a book fair in connection with the museum’s new exhibition, A Thousand Words Worth: Washington Authors Tell Stories Through Objects. For the exhibit, Abe curated a section around a quote from John Okada’s opening lines to No-No Boy.  Included with museum admission, free for members. Download the flyer, and RSVP via the Facebook Event.

SEATTLE, WA
Tuesday, April 2, 2019 @ 7:00 pm
Elliott Bay Book Company
1521 Tenth Avenue

Frank Abe will join Art Hansen in presenting Nisei Naysayer: The Memoir of Militant Japanese American Journalist Jimmie Omura, in the area of Omura’s birth on Bainbridge Island. Hansen edited Omura’s wartime diary. Abe documented Omura in the film, Conscience and the Constitution, and provided the afterword to this new volume. RSVP via the Facebook Event.

Kyoto University logoTOKYO, JAPAN
Monday, March 25, 2019 @ 3:00 – 6:00 pm
The Kyoto University Tokyo Office in Marunouchi
Shin-Marunouchi Building
1 Chome-5-1, Marunouchi, Chiyoda

Co-editor Frank Abe will present a visual gallery of images showing how the life of John Okada informed his work, and contend that it is time to declare No-No Boy as “The Great Nisei Novel” envisioned by his contemporaries. Frank will also discuss a new project to collect fiction and poetry published in Japanese by Issei and Kibei Nisei incarcerees for an anthology of the literature of Japanese American incarceration.  Preceding Frank on the program will be research scientist  Lyle de Souza, speaking on  Nikkei literature in Australia. See the Facebook Event.

Asian Heritage Education and Diversity Lecture flyerHOLLAND, MI
Thursday, March 7, 2019 @ 4:00 – 5:30 pm
Hope College
Bultman Student Center
Schaap Auditorium, 115 E. 12th Street

For the college’s annual Asian Heritage Education and Diversity Lecture, Frank Abe will share the personal journey that led him to help reframe the narrative around the wartime incarceration of Japanese Americans – from resettlement in the Midwest, to redress for the injustice, to recovery of the story of resistance to that injustice. Included will be excerpts from his film, Conscience and the Constitution. Throughout, he will relate this experience to that of those targeted in America today on the basis of race, religion, or immigration status. Open to the public. Presented in collaboration with the college’s Phelps Scholars Program, Hope’s Asian Perspective Association, the Center for Global Engagement and the Department of American Ethnic Studies. Download the PDF flyer and see the Facebook Event.

SEATTLE, WA
Weds., February 27, 2019 @ 12:30 pm
University of Washington
Mary Gates Hall, Room 251

Co-editor Frank Abe will speak about the books JOHN OKADA and No-No Boy with students of Vince Schleitwiler’s Japanese American Incarceration class.

New York Day of RemembranceNEW YORK, NY
Saturday, February 23, 2019 @ 1:00 pm
Japanese American United Church
255 7th Avenue

“Day of Remembrance” co-founder Frank Abe will speak at the 2019 New York Day of Remembrance.  RSVP at their Event page.

Art Hansen and his booksSAN FRANCISCO, CA
Saturday, Feb. 23, 2019 @ 11:00 am
Films of Remembrance
New People Cinema
1746 Post St.

Our extended interview with James Omura from Disc Two of the Conscience and the Constitution DVD will screen as part of “Voices of Resistance,” a free multimedia presentation with author Art Hansen. Art will present his two new books, Nisei Naysayer: The Memoir of Militant Japanese American Journalist Jimmie Omura and Barbed Voices: Oral History, Resistance, and the World War II Japanese American Social Disaster. The free presentation kicks off the 2019 Films of Remembrance festival.

UConn flyerSTORRS, CT
Thursday, February 21, 2019 @ 4:00-6:00  pm
University of Connecticut Asian and Asian American Studies Institute
Homer Babbidge Library, Room 1102

2019 “Day of Remembrance” panel at UConn with JOHN OKADA co-editors Frank Abe, Greg Robinson, and Floyd Cheung. Sponsored by the UConn Asian and Asian American  Studies Institute and the UConn Asian American Cultural Center. Download the PDF flyer and RSVP via the Event page.

JAJA group photo

NEW YORK, NY
Tuesday, Feb. 19, 2019 @ 7:00 pm
JAJA – Japanese Americans and Japanese in America
12 W. 18th St, Apt #3E

JOHN OKADA co-editor Frank Abe with speak with the informal potluck gathering of people of Japanese ancestry living in NY. RSVP at their Event page.

American Sutra flyerSEATTLE, WA
Thursday, Feb. 14, 2019 @ 7:00 pm
Elliott Bay Book Company
1521 Tenth Avenue

Frank Abe introduces professor Duncan Ryuken Williams, Director of the USC Shinso Ito Center for Japanese Religions and Culture, for the launch of American Sutra: Buddhism and the WWII Japanese American Internment, a groundbreaking history of Japanese American Buddhists put in camp while insisting that they could be both Buddhist and American. Download the PDF flyer and RSVP via the Event page.

UCLA flyerLOS ANGELES, CA
Monday, Feb. 4, 2019 @ 12:30 – 1:45 pm
University of California, Los Angeles
Kaplan Hall, Room A68 

Frank Abe will speak with students of Prof. Kelly Fong’s AAS 103 Social Science Research Methods class on the research behind the book, JOHN OKADA, and his film, CONSCIENCE AND THE CONSTITUTION.  Download the PDF flyer.

museum logoLOS ANGELES, CA
Saturday, Feb. 2, 2019 @ 2:00 pm
Japanese American National Museum
100 N. Central Ave.

Southern California book launch for JOHN OKADA with co-editors Frank Abe, Greg Robinson, and special guests, at an event moderated by Densho’s Brian Niiya. Admission free but RSVP at their Event page.

USC flyerLOS ANGELES, CA
Friday, Feb. 1, 2019
University of Southern California
Shinso Ito Center for Japanese Religions and Culture
Doheny Memorial Library, East Asian Seminar Room

JOHN OKADA co-editors Frank Abe and Greg Robinson will present on the life of the author and the process of unearthing his lost stories. Free admission.  RSVP on their Event page and download the PDF  flyer.

Palo Alto City Library logo PALO ALTO, CA
Thurs., Jan. 10, 2019 @ 7:00 pm Palo Alto Rinconada Library
1213 Newell Road
Embarcadero Room

JOHN OKADA book talk and signing with co-editor Frank Abe. RSVP via the Facebook Event and download the flyer.

San Francisco Public Library logoSAN FRANCISCO, CA
Tues., Jan. 8, 2019 @ 6:00 pm
San Francisco Public Library
100 Larkin Street, Latino/Hispanic Rooms A & B 

JOHN OKADA book talk and signing with co-editor Frank Abe. RSVP via the Facebook Event.

Japanese American Service Committee logoCHICAGO, IL
Weds., Nov. 28, 2018 @ 6:30 pm
Japanese American Service Committee
4427 N. Clark Street

JOHN OKADA co-editor Frank Abe will trace the author’s development as an artist, with a special focus on how Okada revealed the emotional truth of the postwar resettlement of Japanese Americans while writing the novel in the Midwest. See the JASC flyer. RSVP via the Facebook Event and download the flyer.

Wing Luke logoSEATTLE, WA
Saturday, November 17, 2018 @ 11:00 am
Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience
719 S. King Street

At The Wing’s first-ever “Book-O-Rama” book fair, JOHN OKADA co-editor Frank Abe will chat with guests and sign books. At 12:30 in the theater he will discuss and show the Chinatown locations in No-No Boy. RSVP via the Facebook Event.

Kinokuniya logoSEATTLE, WA
Saturday, November 10, 2018 @ 2:00 pm
Kinokuniya Seattle
525 S. Weller St. inside Uwajimaya Village

JOHN OKADA book talk and signing with co-editor Frank Abe, in the heart of Okada’s imaginative landscape for his novel, No-No Boy. RSVP via the Facebook Event and download the flyer. J-Sei logo

EMERYVILLE, CA
Saturday, Nov. 3, 2018 @ 4:00 pm
J-Sei, 1285 66th Street

The second half of a double-header for the Bay Area book launch of JOHN OKADA,  with co-editors Frank Abe and Greg Robinson. RSVP via the Facebook Event and download the flyer.

logoSAN FRANCISCO, CA
Saturday, Nov. 3, 2018 @ 12 noon

National Japanese American Historical Society
1684 Post Street, San Francisco Japantown

The first half of a double-header for the Bay Area book launch of JOHN OKADA, with co-editors Frank Abe and Greg Robinson. RSVP via the Facebook Event and download the flyer.

Civil Liberties Symposium adBOISE, ID
Tuesday, October 23, 2018 @ 7:00 pm
Civil Liberties Symposium

Boise State University
1910 W University Dr.

Keynote address by Frank Abe for the 13th annual Civil Liberties Symposium, on the 40th anniversary of the first “Day of Remembrance,” followed by a screening of Sharon Yamato’s film, Moving Walls. RSVP via the Facebook Event. Seattle Public Library logo

SEATTLE, WA
Saturday, Sept. 22, 2018, @ 2:00 pm
Seattle Central Library
1000 Fourth Avenue
Microsoft Auditorium

Please join us for the book launch of JOHN OKADA: The Life & Rediscovered Work of the Author of NO-NO BOY — on the 95th anniversary of his birth in Seattle, and at the Central Library where he once worked as a reference librarian. Co-editor Frank Abe will present images from his new biography of Okada, and join contributors Shawn Wong and Stephen Sumida for a conversation moderated by Tom Ikeda of Densho. Co-sponsored by the Seattle Public Library, the Elliott Bay Book Company, Densho, and the Wing Luke Museum. Free to the public. Books will be available for purchase and signing. See the Seattle Channel video of the entire program or download and listen to the Seattle Public LIbrary podcast of the event.

It Happened Here logoSEATTLE, WA
Wednesday, August 8, 2018 @ 11:30 am
Wing Luke Asian Museum’s “It Happened Here” series
Hing Hay Park, Maynard and King Streets

The Chinatown landscape in John Okada’s No-No Boy: ” Under the pagoda at Hing Hay Park, JOHN OKADA co-editor Frank Abe will share events on the corner of Maynard and King both fictional and real from the world of Seattle author John Okada. Frank will read from Okada’s classic novel set in Seattle’s historic Chinatown, No-No Boy, and point out the landmarks from Okada’s childhood at the Yakima Hotel, his postwar return to the Pacific Hotel, and sites from the life of Hajime Jim Akutsu, the real-life model for the novel’s protagonist. Sponsored by The Wing and the City of Seattle’s Urban Parks Partnership.  UPDATE: The event was live-streamed on the Wing Luke Asian Museum’s Facebook page. See the 40-minute Facebook Live video here.

Palo Alto Obon PALO ALTO, CA
Saturday, August 4, 2018 @ 6:00 pm
Palo Alto Buddhist Temple
2751 Louis Road, in the Hall

JOHN OKADA co-editor Frank Abe will speak and sign books at the Asian American Curriculum Project book exhibit in the Hall, during the cultural program attached to the 2018 Obon Festival. See the flyer. Minidoka PIlgrimage logo

TWIN FALLS, IDAHO
Friday, July 6, 2018 @ 11:15 am
Minidoka Pilgrimage College of Southern Idaho Fine Arts Center, Room 87

“John Okada, No-No Boy, and the Draft Resistance at Minidoka”– Frank Abe will present a gallery of images that reveal the new biography and long-unseen short stories and play that inform his new book, JOHN OKADA: The Life and Rediscovered Works of the Author of No-No Boy. He will examine the draft resistance of Jim Akutsu at Minidoka, which provided a model for the protagonist of No-No Boy, and preview a forthcoming graphic novel portraying the Minidoka draft resisters as part of the entire story of camp resistance.

KLAMATH FALLS, OR
Sunday, July 1, 2018
Tule Lake Pilgrimage

Oregon Institute of Technology

Frank Abe, Martha Nakagawa, and Takako Day will present a workshop on “No-No Boys, John Okada, and the Kibei Resistance at Tule Lake.”  Drawing from the argument in Martha’s chapter for our book, JOHN OKADA: The Life and Rediscovered Work of the Author of No-No Boy, and rejecting old stereotypes, this workshop will break down the false constructions of loyalty and disloyalty created by the government at Tule Lake through registration, segregation, and renunciation. We will examine the life of novelist John Okada, whose novel No-No Boy incorrectly framed the perception of Tule Lake resisters in the public and inside our own community. Takako Day, author of Show Me the Way to Go Home: The Moral Dilemma of Kibei No-No Boys in World War Two Incarceration Camps, will speak about  Kibei dissenters at Tule Lake whom she interviewed in Japanese. We will also preview the storyline of my forthcoming graphic novel chronicling Japanese American resistance to incarceration, with a special focus on how the book seeks to reframe the registration crisis and renunciation at Tule Lake as expressions of protest and resistance. Moderator Art Hansen will lead a Q and A discussion. He will touch upon his new book, Nisei Naysayer, describe how journalist James Omura initially misunderstood the protest at Tule Lake against the loyalty oath, and compare the resistance at Tule Lake with other examples of dissent covered in his other forthcoming new book, Barbed Voices.

American Literature Association logoSAN FRANCISCO, CA
Friday, May 25, 2018 @ 3:40 pm
American Literature Association 
Hyatt Regency, 5 Embarcadero

Session 12-B:  Okada and Beyond – Using a gallery of images, Frank Abe will reveal the new  biography and long-unseen stories that inform our forthcoming book, JOHN OKADA: The Life and Rediscovered Work of the Author of No-No Boy.”  Organized by The Circle for Asian American Literary Studies (CAALS). Chairs: David Cho, Hope College, and Christine Kitano, Ithaca College.

Association for Asian American Studies logoSAN FRANCISCO, CA
Saturday, March 31, 2018 @ 8:00 am
Association for Asian American Studies
Westin St. Francis, Grand Ballroom

Co-editors Frank Abe, Greg Robinson, and Floyd Cheung and contributor Jeffrey Yamashita will introduce their forthcoming book, “JOHN OKADA: The Life and Rediscovered Work of the author of No-No Boy.” Panel S-12 in your program. At the panel, Abe will present the new information captured in his biography of Okada, supported with a gallery of images drawn from the author’s life. Cheung will investigate the influence of Okada’s college writing instructor on the creation of several previously unknown short stories which show the young writer experimenting with genre a decade before No-No Boy. Yamashita reviews two generations of critical literature on No-No Boy, reflecting shifts in approaches by the academic community. Robinson chairs the proceedings.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA
Saturday, February 24, 2018 @ 6:00 pm
2018 Films of Remembrance
New People Cinema, 1746 Post St.

Filmmaker Frank Abe will moderate a discussion after a screening of “Speak Out For Justice” (2018, 14 min., see the trailer), Steve Nagano’s new film drawn from video of the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians hearings in Los Angeles in 1981.

ACC Senior Services logoSACRAMENTO, CA
Fri., February 23, 2018 @ 1:00-3:00 pm
ACC Senior Services
7334 Park City Drive

CONSCIENCE will screen as part of the “Films of Resistance” series for the 2018 Day of Remembrance. Producer Frank Abe will speak on a panel moderated by Dr. Linda Revilla along with retired Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Charles Kobayashi and Dr. Phillip Akutsu of Sacramento State University, whose father Jim Akutsu is featured in our film and also in our forthcoming book on John Okada. Co-sponsored by the Jan Ken Po Cultural Association and supported by a grant from API Rise.  Admission is free and open to the public, but please RSVP to [email protected] or (916) 393-9026.

Torii gate with name tagsPORTLAND, OREGON
Thursday, December 7, 2017 @ 5:30 pm
Lincoln Hall
1620 SW Park Avenue

CONSCIENCE screens in Portland on Pearl Harbor Day, in support of an event with artist Valerie Otani discussing “Voices of Remembrance,” her sculpture at the Portland Expo Center commemorating the 1942 incarceration of Japanese Americans. The announcement takes note of the fact that our narrator, Lawson Inada, was once Poet Laureate of Oregon.

(please forgive formatting lost in a recent server move, will correct as time allows)

CLEVELAND, OHIO
Saturday, November 18, 2017 @ 1:00 pm
Tinkham-Veale University Center
11038 Bellflower Road

The Social Justice Institute at Case Western Reserve University is presenting Think Tank 2017, “Educating for Struggle: State Violence, Then and Now.” I’ll be speaking at Plenary Session I on the state violence involved with the WW2 incarceration. Free and open to the community.  UPDATE: Here’s video of the presentation.

logoCLEVELAND, OHIO
Friday, November 17, 2017 @ 9:45 am
Case Western Reserve University School of Law
Moot Courtroom (A59), 11075 East Blvd.

Participating in a symposium sponsored by the Case Western Reserve Law Review on “National Security, National Origin, and the Constitution: 75 Years After Executive Order 9066.” The event brings me back to the place of my birth at Western Reserve Hospital, as a direct result of 9066. UPDATE: Here’s video of the presentation.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA
Friday, September 15, 2017 @ 6:30 pm
Unitarian Universalist Center
1187 Franklin Street @ Geary Blvd.

Free screening of CONSCIENCE as part of the Sensible Cinema series sponsored by Unitarian Universalist Social Justice Council.

SEATTLE, WA
Tuesday, May 23, 2017 @ 10:20 am
University of Washington
Gowan Hall 201

Speaking to Prof. Jeannie Shinozuka’s class on “American Internment and Incarceration: Race, Discrimination, and Power” on the WW2 resistance and the immediacy of its meaning today. The class will have earlier screened CONSCIENCE.

21 Pell Street logoNEW YORK CITY
Sunday, March 19, 2017 @ 3 pm
21 Pell Street Community Center

A free and timely “pop-up” screening of  CONSCIENCE, organized by NYC activists Corky Lee and Shirley Ng in historic Manhattan Chinatown to show the roots of #resistance to unjust executive orders and racial registries. A statement from the film’s producer will be read, and former Muslim U.S. Army Chaplin James Yee will attend the Q&A session afterwards.

library logo PALO ALTO, CA
Sunday, Feb. 19, 2017 @1:30 pm
Palo Alto Mitchell Park Library
3700 Middlefield Rd., Midtown Room, 1st floor

Screening of CONSCIENCE on the 75th anniversary of the signing of Executive Order 9066, with a post-screening conversation led by Susan Hayase, long-time activist for redress in the San Jose Japanese American community as part of the Nihonmachi Outreach Committee and the National Coalition for Redress/Reparations, and the former vice-chair of the federal Civil Liberties Public Education Fund.

logo fo rUniversity of Washington, BothellBOTHELL, WA
Tuesday, February 14, 2017 @11:00 am
University of Washington, Bothell

Speaking to Prof. Mira Shimabukuro‘s class on “Public Memory and Dissent” on the roots of redress in Seattle and the first Day of Remembrance. The class will have earlier screened CONSCIENCE.

JERSEY CITY, NJ
Thursday, July 21, 2016 @ 10:30 am
Westin Jersey City Newport Hotel
Liberty Room, 479 Washington Blvd.

Screening free and open to the public, as part of a pre-convention film festival at the 2016 OCA National Convention, aka the Organization of Chinese Americans. The screening will be introduced by photography legend Corky Lee.  Take the PATH train to Newport Mall station, for a five-minute walk to the hotel.

KLAMATH FALLS, OR
Saturday and Sunday, July 2-3, 2016
Oregon Institute of Technology, Diamond Peak Room

Two evening screenings of CONSCIENCE for participants in the 2016 Tule Lake Pilgrimage.

Wing Luke Museum logo SEATTLE, WA
Saturday, August 16, 2014 @ 4:00 p.m.
Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience
Tateuchi Story Theatre

ACT Theater logo719 South King Street

Acts of Resistance on Film. A screening and Q and A held in connection with two events — the Wing Luke’s current exhibition, “In Struggle: Asian American Acts of Resistance,” and ACT Theater’s production of Hold These Truths, a play about federal court defendant and draft resister Gordon Hirabayashi.

Day of Remembrance flyerSEATTLE, WA
Thursday, February 20, 2014
South Seattle Community College
Jerry Brockey Student Center, Room A
6000 16th Avenue SW, Seattle

For the college’s Day of Remembrance program, for students, faculty, staff and the larger community. All events are free and open to the public.

Nagomi Tea House posterSEATTLE, WA
Saturday, November 2, 2013 2:00 – 4:00 p.m.
Nagomi Tea House, 519 Sixth Ave. S.

In a program aimed at the Japanese-speaking community, we’ll screen a version of our film with Japanese subtitles that were created for us by the Fukuoka Film Festival. Presented by Hokubei Hochi Foundation, The North American Post, and Soy Source. Free admission with suggested donation.

Fife History Museum posterFIFE, WA
Thursday, October 17, 2013 7:00 p.m.
Fife History Museum

Screening of CONSCIENCE and discussion with producer Frank Abe, local historian Ron Magden, Tacoma attorney Daniel C. Russ, and Elsie Taniguchi with Puyallup Valley JACL.

Japanese American National Museum conference logoSEATTLE, WA
July 5, 2013

Japanese American National Museum annual conference
Seattle Sheraton 

We’re sharing a DVD exhibit table, speaking at a panel on the “Tangled Routes to Japanese American Redress,” and moderating a Friday evening screening of Farewell to Manzanzar reunited with old friend Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston.

program coverSEATTLE, WA
April 17-20, 2013
Association for Asian American Studies annual conference
Westin Seattle

Held down a DVD exhibit table screening the film on a laptop and sharing the story with conference attendees. Also moderated a panel on “Revisiting the Sites of Japanese American Incarceration.”

SAN FRANCISCO, CA
Monday, February 18, 2013 5:30 pm
“Films of Remembrance”
Nihonmachi Little Friends, 1830 Sutter St.

Our DVD featurette, “The JACL Apologizes,” caps off a full day series of screenings in San Francisco Japantown. The event is sponsored by the Bay Area Day of Remembrance Consortium, the Nichi Bei Weekly and the National Japanese American Historical Society.  Free admission.

JACL convention logoSEATTLE, WA
Fri.-Sat., July 6-7, 2012
2012 JACL National Convention Bellevue Hyatt Regency

In the author’s booth at various times both days, speaking with delegates and signing DVDs.

Tateuchi Democracy Forum
Tateuchi Democracy Forum at JANM

LOS ANGELES, CA
Saturday, May 12, 2012 @ 11:00 am
Japanese American National Museum
100 N. Central Ave.

Join us for the Southern California debut of the new Two-Disc Collector’s Edition DVD of “Conscience and the Constitution.” Producer Frank Abe will screen the film and debut a new DVD featurette, “The JACL Apologizes.” Q&A with the filmmaker and DVD signing will follow the screening. Admission is free to the museum and the screening, thanks to the “Target Free Family Day” in celebration of Asian Pacific Heritage Month.

Bainbridge Island post-screening panelBAINBRIDGE ISLAND , WA
Friday, March 30, 2012 6:30 – 8:30 p.m.
Sonoji Sakai Intermediate School
9343 Sportsman Club Road

Bainbridge Islanders will commemorate the 70th anniversary of the first forced removal of Japanese Americans in WW2 with “A Day of History, Honor and Healing. The day also celebrates the unique legacy of a community that stood by their Japanese American friends and neighbors and welcomed them home. The screening will be followed by a discussion with producer/writer Frank Abe, U.W. professor Dr. Tetsuden Kashima, and Bainbridge Island camp survivors. Download a printable program of the full day’s events. Admission is free.

Wing Luke Museum logoSEATTLE, WA
Saturday, February 18, 2012 1:00 – 3:00 p.m.
Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience
Tateuchi Story Theater 719 South King Street

Please join us for the world premiere of the new Two-Disc Collector’s Edition DVD of Conscience and the Constitution. Producer Frank Abe will screen the film along with a new DVD featurette, “The JACL Apologizes,” on events that occurred after the film’s release, and answer questions. Admission is free.

SCREENINGS AND WORKSHOPS

Film Festivals
Athens International Film & Video Festival, OH
Big Muddy Film Festival (JOHN MICHAELS MEMORIAL AWARD finalist)
Chicago Asian American Film Festival
Celluloid Bainbridge Film Festival, WA
Hawaii International Film Festival (BEST DOCUMENTARY finalist)
Fukuoka Asian Film Festival, Japan
NewFilmmakers Anthology series, New York City New York
International Independent Film & Video Festival (BEST DOCUMENTARY, GRAND JURY PRIZE)
Northwest Film & Video Festival, Portland Ohio
Independent Film Festival (BEST DOCUMENTARY finalist)
San Diego Asian Film Festival San Luis Obispo International Film Festival (BEST DOCUMENTARY, GEORGE SIDNEY INDEPENDENT FILM COMPETITION)
Seattle Asian American Film Festival
Singapore Film Festival Fringe Fest
Spaghetti Junction Urban Film Festival, Atlanta
UrbanWorld Film Festival, New York City
VC Film Fest 2000,the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film & Video Festival (BEST FEATURE FILM, AUDIENCE AWARD)
Vermont International Film Festival (BEST OF FESTIVAL, WAR AND PEACE)

Additional Awards
AMERICAN SCENE AWARD: American Federation of Television and Radio Artists
NATIONAL JOURNALISM AWARD: Asian American Journalists Association
BEST MUSIC SCORE: Emerald City Awards, Seattle
DARUMA CIVIL RIGHTS AWARD: Sacramento Asian American Community

Colleges and Universities Clark Community College, Vancouver, WA Mills College, Oakland, CA North Seattle Community College Pacific Oaks College, Pasadena, CA Sacramento City College San Francisco State University San Jose State University Seattle Central Community College St. Cloud State University, St. Cloud, MN Swarthmore College, Philadelphia, PA University of California, Santa Cruz University of Dayton, Dayton, OH University of Illinois, Chicago University of North Carolina University of North Carolina School of Law University of Washington, “The Nikkei Experience in the Pacific Northwest” conference Washington State University, Pullman Western Washington University, Bellingham, WA Willamette University, Salem, OR

Libraries and Museums Bellevue Art Museum, Bellevue, WA Bellevue Regional Library, Bellevue, WA Bruggemeyer Memorial Library, Monterey Park, CA Fresno County Public Library Japanese American National Museum, Los Angeles Japanese Cultural Center of Hawaii, Honolulu National Japanese American Historical Society, San Francisco Oakland Public Library, Rockridge Branch Phoenix Public Library San Diego Public Library Seattle Public Library Sunnyvale Public Library Torrance Public Library Washington Center for the Book, Seattle Public Library

Teacher Training Workshops The College of Southern Idaho, Civil Liberties Symposium VI, Boise, ID Heart Mountain, Wyoming Foundation, Cheyenne, WY Oral History Association annual meeting, St. Louis Prince William County Schools, Multicultural Summer Institute, Manassas,VA Seattle University Summer Institute Washington Library Media Association annual conference, Wenatchee, WA Washington State Council for the Social Studies fall in-service, Edmonds, WA

Community Events Asian American Journalists Association national convention, New York City Civil Liberties Celebration, Seattle Day of Remembrance 2003, New York City JACL Bi-District Regional Conference, 2001 Kitsap Human Rights Network, Bremerton, WA Latah Human Rights Task Force, Moscow, ID Nihonmachi Outreach Committee, San Jose, CA Northridge United Methodist Church Nikkei 2000 conference, San Francisco, CA Pinedale High School Auditorium, Pinedale, WY Seattle City Council Spokane Human Rights Commission, WA Tule Lake Pilgrimage, 2002 Wallingford Neighbors for Peace and Justice, Seattle Wyoming Grassroots Project

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The history and literature of Japanese American resistance to wartime incarceration