The National Association of Japanese Canadians is a non-profit incorporated community organization in Canada that represents the Japanese Canadian community. Formed in 1947, the NAJC focuses on human rights and community development.
The NAJC successfully negotiated the historic Redress Settlement on behalf of all Japanese Canadians who suffered injustices at the hands of their own government during and after World War II when they were dispossessed, forcibly relocated and interned. On September 22, 1988, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and NAJC President Art Miki signed the redress agreement acknowledging the wrongs committed against Japanese Canadians.
Gordon Hirabayashi as a UW student in the 1940's. Photo by Sharon Maeda/The Wing Luke Asian Museum.
At the National Association of Japanese Canadians AGM held in Edmonton Alberta on October 16, 2011, the NAJC unveiled the Dr. Gordon Hirabayashi Human Rights Award at the AGM Dinner. Gordon had been a Professor of Sociology at the University of Alberta during the sixties, seventies, and eighties. He had also served as the Department Head for several years. He continued to teach at the U of A into the nineties but in the last ten years the scourge of Alzheimer’s forced him to retire and presently he lives in a nursing hospital. He is physically healthy but elderly.
He had been a student at the University of Washington in early 1942 when FDR’s Presidential Executive Order 9066 was enacted in the US. Being American-born, he felt that as an American it was it was unconstitutional. However, blinded by racism, ignorance and expediency, the U.S. government classed all persons with Japanese ancestry as enemies of the State. He defied the Order and was jailed. He finished his University in Spokane.
After many years of legal battles and the release of classified secret government documents, Gordon returned to the Courts to appeal the guilty conviction of 1943. In 1986, the unjust conviction of not complying to the Order of Exclusion was overturned in a belated act of justice by the Supreme Court of the United State. Gordon received a citation from the President of the United States – Gerald Ford. Gordon was hailed as a hero in the States, especially to Japanese Americans.
The Honourable Jason Kenney
Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism
House of Commons
Parliament Buildings
Ottawa, ON K1A0A6
Dear Minister Kenney:
Re: Consultation process for immigration policy changes
In recent months members of the Human Rights Committee of the National Association of Japanese Canadians have noted the consultations on immigration policy. Last August, one was done via an online survey to determine immigration levels and immigrant mix, and the other was through a Notice of Intent with regard to the way language abilities are assessed for citizenship applications.
We are concerned that notice of these consultations came via media releases and required a very short time frame in which to respond. The press release about the online survey was issued on August 29th and survey responders had until September 19th to respond. According to the CIC website the consultations had taken place starting in July and continued until September. We were not aware of these group consultations. The most recent Notice of Intent came out on October 15th and the public had until November 14th to respond.
My mother, brother and I experienced our first Christmas and met a sailor dressed as Santa Claus aboard the Japanese ocean liner Hikawa Maru destined for Vancouver. We left Yokohama on December 1958—a journey of two weeks.
The Hikawa Maru (named after the Shrine in Saitama) was built in 1929 in Yokohama for the Nippon Yusen KK line and made its maiden voyage from Kobe to Seattle on May 13, 1930. I imagine that many Nisei are familiar with this ship since it plied the Pacific Ocean carrying Japanese immigrants to North America. It also carried Jewish refugees escaping Nazi Germany. During World War II, the Japanese military converted it into a hospital ship. In 1954, the boat was refitted and returned to carrying passengers until her termination from service in 1960. It began a new life in 2008 as a restaurant in Yokohama Bay.
As I prepared to leave Kagoshima, my well meaning grade two classmates at Taniyama Shogakko Elementary School gave me cultural advice on what awaited me in North America (of course none of them were speaking from experience). Some warned me about something called snow and how much it fell there—I had never seen snow before! Shockingly, someone added that Canadians ate raw vegetables. An unthinkable act since we used human waste to enrich the soil. Later in January—surrounded by snow—I recall that the first letter to my cousins was confirmation of this horrific Canadian dietary practice. I am sure that it was a source of much discussion with my former classmates. As for the skinny Japanese sailor dressed as Santa aboard the Hikawa Maru, I could not understand at the time why a man would dress in a red attire; fly through the air; break into a house through a chimney (no chimneys in Japanese homes) all in order to leave gifts for children. Why not use the front door, I thought.
Retired dentist Norikazu Nishio was at home in Nanaimo when he got word that the University of British Columbia had agreed to award honourary degrees to UBC students who were forced to leave university and their studies in 1942.
Now 88, Dr. Nishio was eighteen and in his first year of studies at UBC when Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. As one of several Japanese Nationals on campus, he was given twenty-four hours to leave not only the University but the west coast. In all, seventy-six students of Japanese descent were eventually affected, of whom the majority were Canadian citizens.
During the 1940-41 session, with the war heating up overseas, military training had become compulsory for all students, including Japanese Canadians, making them the only Japanese Canadians taking military training. This changed with the December 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. In her 1977 paper A University At War: Japanese Canadians at UBC During World War II, Elaine Bernard notes, “The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and Canada’s entry into the war against Japan occurred at the beginning of the Christmas break. There was no coverage of the declaration in the student press, which had shut down for the break. When Japanese Canadian students arrived back at school in January, they were asked to turn in their uniforms. The COTC (Canadian Officers’ Training Corps) daily orders for 7 January 1942 “Struck off Strength” (released from service) forty-three Japanese Canadians enrolled in the Basic Group and the six enrolled in the COTC Group. The decision to discharge the trainees was made by the university Senate’s Committee on Military Education, which was the body that had governed the training and military affairs on campus.”
As government plans to remove all Canadians of Japanese origin from the coast progressed, the rest of the students—including those born in Canada—were forced into exile. It wasn’t until the fall of 1948 that fifteen Japanese Canadians received permits to enrol at UBC again.
I spoke to Dr. Nishio by phone at his home in Nanaimo.
From the 1940 Totem, courtesy of the UBC Alma Mater Society
The University of British Columbia Senate voted tonight to honour students and Canadians affected by a dark period in Canada’s history, and will be awarding them special degrees next spring as part of a three-pronged program to mark the 70th anniversary of the internment policy. “The University has taken seriously the need to find meaningful ways to provide solemn recognition of historical events,” says Sally Thorne, professor of Nursing and Chair of the UBC Senate Tributes Committee, which established a working group on the matter. “To acknowledge the 70th anniversary of the provincial internment policy in the spring of 2012, we want to pay tribute to UBC students and others impacted during this time, and also take steps to help future students learn from the past,” said Thorne. The UBC Senate Tributes Committee’s working group has been reviewing the issue since the fall of 2010, consulting with members of UBC and Lower Mainland communities in order to ensure UBC’s recognition is thoughtful and enduring. The Senate voted on three measures: to award special degrees to the estimated 76 UBC students whose studies were disrupted by internment; to develop initiatives to educate future UBC students about this dark episode in its history; and to have the UBC Library preserve and bring to life the historical record in its possession. “We have heard from members of the Japanese Canadian communities through letters and discussions,” says Thorne. “The University is deeply grateful for the feedback we have received, and we hope that our tribute will consolidate the strong relationship between UBC and the Japanese Canadian community.”
Hastings Park Wall of Names
The Hastings Park Commemoration Project Committee as part of the education/interpretive presentation about our history in Hastings Park will include a wall of names of detained families. We are asking community members and descendants to forward the full names of family members who were detained in Hastings Park to: Hastings Park Wall of Names, GVJCCA, #200 – 6688 Southoaks Crescent, Burnaby, BC V5E4M7 or email gvjcca@shaw.ca.
On Sunday, October 23, 2011, Hastings Park Commemoration project committee members Mary and Tosh Kitagawa, Lorene Oikawa, Lily Shinde, Dan Tokawa, Grace Thomson, David Iwaasa, Donna Nakamoto and Judy Hanazawa met in Hastings Park. The group reviewed various relocation possibilities for the Parks Canada ‘Internment’ plaque and toured Momiji Garden and the Livestock Barn. We met with Vancouver City Councillor Kerry Jang and sincerely appreciated Kerry’s enthusiasm and wholehearted support for this project. Kerry gave us a tour of the proposed Hastings Street garden walkway which could include a Japanese Canadian gateway and the upgrading of the surrounding area to better feature Momiji Garden. The comprehensive greening phase, further to the present work being done to Empire Field, creekside and Hastings Park greenways, is commencing in 2012 which is sooner than originally outlined in the Master Plan. Kerry also referred to an October 20 motion passed by City Council outlining the critical need to immediately engage Hastings Park stakeholders to determine the long term governance of Hastings Park. Instead of the PNE Board, the Vancouver Park Board may likely assume responsibility for overseeing all green area park development and maintenance in Hastings Park.
My name is Alejandro Yoshizawa and I am a graduate student in History at Concordia University in Montreal.
I am a 2011 SEAD grant recipient for my film/project about matsutake hunting (past and present) in the JC community. I have been interviewing people in British Columbia for the film. I have gone to Vancouver Island, Kamloops, Hope, Kewlona, Vancouver, etc. I am currently in Montreal attempting to secure interviews here, but will be heading to Toronto from about November 8th-12th, and hope to talk to some people there as well.
I am looking for anyone who goes, or has been, matsutake hunting. It doesn’t matter if you have only gone once, or have gone every year for the last 70 years. All experiences are unique, and all experiences are interesting! Any age, any gender of course! Also, I am looking for pictures as well . . .
Like the iconic Japanese song of immigrants, Watari Dori (Birds of Passage), we are all transients looking for a place to alight and to call home. Fortunately, I have returned to Japan numerous times, but the Japan of my youth has long disappeared . . . [...] Read more →
At the National Association of Japanese Canadians AGM held in Edmonton Alberta on October 16, 2011, the NAJC unveiled the Dr. Gordon Hirabayashi Human Rights Award at the AGM Dinner. Gordon had been a Professor of Sociology at the University of Alberta during the sixties, seventies, and eighties. [...] Read more →
MISSION STATEMENT:
To promote and develop a strong Japanese Canadian identity and thereby to strengthen local communities and the national organization; and To strive for equal rights and liberties for all persons-in particular, the rights of racial and ethnic minorities.
VISION:
A strong, unified community founded on diversity and committed to human rights for all for the enrichment of Canada
I was brought up in Kitsilano so as youngsters all our friends were English-speaking, apart from a few other Japanese Canadian families. I went to Lord Tennyson Elementary and then Kitsilano Junior and High Schools. [...]
It is not enough just to have a birth certificate, certifying one’s birth in Canada. It is not enough to be a native Canadian and expect that mere birth alone is everything: privileges, responsibilities, pride, allegiance. One must grow into citizenship; one must shoulder the responsibilities before there is any real joy in the privileges; one must be vigilant for the honour of one’s country, its integrity, else how can one say with pride: "I am Canadian." Muriel Kitagawa
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