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Tuan Ngo
Laura Bradford
The Immigrant Experience through Literature and Film
November 09, 2014
Signature Assignment 1:
The Children of the Camps
The world we are living in today, especially in the western world, we expect peace, unity
and equality. As we are living in the now equal society where everyone has equal rights to each
other no matter what race they are or what gender they are but injustice still take place in
everyday life from smallest things, people still favor one over another just to get their way in life.
The in denial that everyone possesses in their personality traits, its not a good trait to have
although everyone has it but its the denial that not everyone is the same especially if you differ
in race. This bring me to a story about a boy on the night of February 26, 2012, in Sanford,
Florida, United States where an innocent African American 17 years old boy got shot by the
neighborhood night watcher because the night watcher felt that he was threatened and it was
self defense. The irony of this story was that the boy went to the shop for some skittles and a
bottle of iced tea during the break of an NBA game that he was watching and he was on the
phone to his girlfriend on the way back from the grocery store when the night watcher chased
him down and gunned him. Beforehand the night watcher warned all the residents in his
neighbor to beware of young black men, not once but multiple times. When he was questioned
by the police one question that caught my attention was if you could re live that moment, would

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you have changed anything? and the answer was simply no, it was gods plan. With that being
said and the investigator wanted him arrested for manslaughter but was overruled by the state
attorney's office. That pretty much sums up the corrupted so called equal world that we are
living in today, the fact that this only took place 2 years before today, it disgust me.
We are now living in the 20th century and we dont expect to see these heartless cases go
by wit without any action taking place, or any form of punishment held accountable to that
person, hes a free man he protests his innocent it was self defense, he felt threatened by an
innocent boy with a bag of skittles and a plastic bottle of iced tea. He took away a soul of a
family because he was different. This brings me back to the story of segregation and
discrimination back in the 1900 in the children of the camp documentary where Japanese
America was imprisoned without hearing of trial constitutional as the European reign America.
shortly after the Chinese left, the Japanese was the new flock of immigration, something
new that could take over from the unfinished work that the Chinese left behind, also, fill the void
that they had left. The Japanese fits the criteria perfectly and the segregation goes on. They felt
like the Japanese was a threat so all the well educated Japanese activist was arrested with no
reason whatsoever and family members are forbidden from seeing them, just because they felt
like the Japanese posed a threat. It got to the point where they would get framed for something
they didnt do, they confiscated everything that was valuable that the Japanese had, some
weapons was taken in and some of the Japanese was targeted especially the activist the leader of
the Japanese community they was framed to holding a weapon to the white police man and being
segregated and hatred by everyone they didnt have a voice, they had no chance of overturning
the charge.

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They was constantly on the move the segregation, they was the only group of minority
that had to move out because they was simply Japanese, moving from one state to another and
gradually got shut out of all states, no one would accept the presence of the Japanese. Their last
destination was life behind barbed wire located in delta, northern Utah. Life condition was
terrible you could see that they were suffering, men and women was separated from their family,
but they as a community believes that they have every right to be treated as equal as all the other
Americans, they call themselves Americans, they didnt speak Japanese until they was all
compiled into the camp, thats when it really hit home but they still call themselves Americans
they have every right to.
over half of the population were women and children, being behind the barbed wire
really limited the resources that they had, it was limited when they was outside but at least they
still have the freedom to move around in their area and area thats called the Japanese
town. The people that suffered the most are the children, they are the future of our world, even
though Japanese people wasnt valued back then, but we can let the children of our future suffer
like that, no education in the camp, that is just not acceptable.
A concentration camp is a place where people are imprisoned not because of any crimes
they have committed, but simply because of who they are. Following American entry into World
War II, approximately 120,000 Americans of Japanese descent and Japanese-born residents of
the West Coast of the United States were forced to leave their homes in California, Oregon and
Washington as a result of Executive Order 9066, signed by President Franklin Roosevelt. About
10,000 left the off-limits area during the "voluntary evacuation" period, and avoided internment.
The remaining 110,000 were soon removed from their homes by Army and National Guard
troops. First housed in places such as racetrack stables, eventually they were moved to various

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camps, hundreds or even thousands of miles from home. While many of the older generation
were from Japan, most of those under 30 years of age were Nisei, first-generation American
citizens of Japanese descent, and Kibei, Nisei who had been sent to Japan as children for periods
of traditional schooling.
Though built with a barbed-wire fence and seven guard towers, there were attempts to
make life at Topaz as "normal" as possible. Barracks were given "street addresses" and internees
were encouraged to create gardens. The barracks themselves had been built with sliding
windows, rather than the hinge-and-stick windows used at other camps, providing slightly better
weather sealing, but most were unfinished inside when the internees first moved in. Drywall
interiors walls were later added. Linoleum was also eventually laid down over the bare wood in
many barracks. "Survey information found former internees had a 2.1 greater risk of
cardiovascular disease, cardiovascular mortality, and premature death than did a non-interned
counterpart. California Nisei-age individuals, the proxy for internment, died 1.6 years earlier
than Hawaiians who represented non-interned status. I concluded traumatic stress has life-long
consequences even in the presence of efficacious coping strategies." Also research shows "Longterm health consequences included psychological anguish as well as increased cardiovascular
disease. Traumatic stress was buffered by culturally constructed coping mechanisms that were
less inculcated in the youngest detainees. They reported more post-traumatic stress symptoms of
unexpected and disturbing flashback experiences than those who were older at the time of
incarceration. "
"One of the most hauntingly pressing issues facing Japanese Americans today is their
concentration camp experience during World War II. Yet, the major group of survivors -- the
Nisei -- generally does not confront the implications of it within themselves or with their own

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children. In many respects the Nisei have been permanently altered in their attitudes, both
positively and negatively, in regard to their identification with the values of their bicultural
heritage; or they remain confused or even injured by the traumatic experience."
"Recognizing the great injustice that took place, they carry with them the legacy of their
parents' internment. Time has not severed the psychological ties to events that preceded them,
nor has the fact that their parents will not openly discuss the internment. On the contrary, the vast
majority of Sansei (third generation) feel that the incarceration has affected their lives in
significant ways...
"Trauma may directly or indirectly affect the children of trauma victims. The multiple
pathways of its effects create a variety of consequences. Despite the silence, or perhaps because
of it, the Sansei who had a parent interned felt the effects of that experience in numerous ways.
They are sad and angry about the injustice and attribute a number of negative consequences in
their own lives to their parents' internment. These include feelings of low self-esteem, the
pressure to assimilate, an accelerated loss of the Japanese culture and language, and experiencing
the unexpressed pain of their parents."
To sum it up, something like topaz can still happen today, in fact it is still happening but
without the segregation and the concentration camp, like I mentioned about the case of a young
innocent African American boy that got killed took place in 2012, what was that about?
Injustice? But yet he is still a walking free man this brings me to Milton Bennetts model of
Intercultural Sensitivity where he talks about the six stages. I believe you have to understand all
six stages very clearly to be able to apply to your everyday life especially because you are living
in a greatly diverse culture country like the United States of America. I have understood it fully

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and able to make it part of my everyday life because I am now more accepting and more
understanding than before and I learn to listen and not judge at my first sight.

Sources
PBS. PBS, n.d. Web. 09 Nov. 2014.
<http://www.pbs.org/childofcamp/history/health.html>.

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PBS. PBS, n.d. Web. 09 Nov. 2014.
<http://www.pbs.org/childofcamp/history/eo9066.html>.
"Topaz War Relocation Center." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 09 Nov.
2014. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Topaz_War_Relocation_Center>.
H I S T O R I C a L O v E R v I E W (n.d.): n. pag. Web. 09 Nov. 2014.
<http://www.jacl.org/edu/JAHistory.pdf>.
N.P., n.d. Web. 09 Nov. 2014. <http%253A%252F%252Fwww.pbs.org
%252Fchildofcamp%252Fhistory%252Fcamps.html>.