Japanese-American Internment

Compiled September 2002
Links verified June 2005

Japanese American Citizens League
"The Japanese American Citizens League (JACL) is a membership organization whose mission is to secure and maintain the human and civil rights of Americans of Japanese Ancestry and others victimized by injustice.

National Japanese American Memorial Foundation
Web site of the National Japanese American Memorial in Washington, D.C.–a memorial honoring the loyalty and courage of Japanese Americans during World War II.

Go For Broke Educational Foundation
The Go For Broke Educational Foundation's mission is to provide students and teachers with information about the involvement of Japanese-American soldiers in World War II, the Japanese-American internment, and related issues of civil liberties.

Online Exhibits and Archives

A More Perfect Union: Japanese Americans and the U.S. Constitution
From the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, Behring Center. "This online exhibit is a case study in decision-making and citizen action under the U.S. Constitution." Visitors learn about the history and issues surrounding Japanese-American internment through a combination of images, music, text, and first-person accounts. An online archive of over 800 artifacts, classroom activities, a bibliography, historical overview, and background reading about the exhibit are also provided.

Dear Miss Breed: Letters from Camp
An online exhibit from the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles of the letters sent by Japanese American children in the internment camps to Clara Estelle Breed, the Children's Librarian at the San Diego Public Library from 1929 to 1945. The online exhibit includes 18 letters, three Quicktime home movies, three audio files, and numerous other resource materials.

War Relocation Authority Photographs of Japanese-American Evacuation and Resettlement, 1942-1945
The Online Archive of California provides access to this collection of War Relocation Authority photographs at The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley. The archive includes over 7,000 photographs taken by War Relocation Authority staff during the period of 1942-19445. Click on "Container Listings" to view photos from all relocation centers.

Color Separations
From the microsoft.com art collection. Color Separations presents portions of Roger Shimomura's "Yellow No Same" series. The series "confronts popular (mis)perceptions of Japanese Americans." In addition to images of the artist's work, the site includes biographical information detailing the Shimomura family's struggle with Japanese-American internment and excerpts from his grandmother Toku Shimomura's diary from 1941-1945.

Curriculum

Teaching about Japanese-American Internment | Japan Digest
Part of the National Clearinghouse for U.S.-Japan Studies' online publications. Designed to provide educators with a supplement to current textbook offerings on the subject of Japanese-American internment.

Letters from the Japanese-American Internment
From the Smithsonian Center for Education and Museum Studies. This curriculum unit uses four letters from the Japanese American National Museum exhibition Dear Miss Breed: Letters from Camp as primary source materials to explore differing view points of the Japanese-American internment. An introduction, the letters, and links to other resources are also provided.

Heart Mountain Relocation Center
American Heritage Center Primary Sources in the Classroom

From the University of Wyoming's American Heritage Center. "A lesson using primary source documents to critically analyze the relocation of Japanese Americans to Wyoming." The lesson addresses the National Standards for United States History Era 8, Standard 3c: Evaluate the internment of Japanese Americans during the war and assess the implication for civil liberties. Primary source documents include letters, diary entries, photographs, and sketches. A "Written Document Analysis Sheet" is provided to help students analyze the materials.

The War Relocation Camps of World War II: When Fear was Stronger than Justice
From the National Park Service's "Teaching with Historic Places Lesson Plans." This lesson begins with an inquiry question, then provides historical context, maps, readings from primary source materials, photos and diagrams, four classroom activities, and information on supplementary resources.

Teaching with Documents Lesson Plan:
Documents and Photographs Related to Japanese Relocation during World War II

From the National Archives and Records Administration of the United States government. This lesson plan begins with an overview of Japanese-American internment followed by links to archived photographs and governmental documents such as a transcript of Executive Order 9066

The Densho Educational Web Site
From Densho, a nonprofit organization with "a mission to educate, preserve, collaborate and inspire action for equity." The section "Civil Rights and Internment," adapted for online use from a SPICE curriculum, provides readings and lesson plans covering "Immigrants and Civil Rights," "Prelude to Internment," "Internment Years," "Question of Loyalty," and "Legacies: Redress." Includes several primary source documents and video clips.