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3 of 3 Premium Clicks used this month SUBSCRIBE Print + Online Subscriber Activation | Register x Forgot Password | Need an Account? subscribe | newsletter | deals Home News Latest Stories Mt. Ashland hopes coming storm will reopen ski area Should Ashland homeowners be able to rent rooms short-term? Beetles taking toll on Ashland pines Forum to explores data gathered in National Monument Northwest Pizza to raise money for Ashland Schools Foundation Education Northwest Pizza to raise money for Ashland Schools Foundation Prisoners in their own home Louie's to donate sales to Helman Hug Fund Ashland High School Drama Club to host Showcase Night on Thursday Ashland Kiwanis recognizes Samara Diab Environment Mt. Ashland hopes coming storm will reopen ski area Wild Side: Selfish and other reasons for saving endangered species Mt. Ashland Ski Area: Low snow closes 'bunny hill' chairlift for beginning skiers With pre-season conditions worst in 25 years, catastrophic wildfires expected in region this summer Legislature might be divided on clean fuels bill, but these Ashlanders weren't Business Breaking ground on organic vineyard practices Southern Oregon University: Recent and pending projects at SOU total about $132 million Test Drive: 2015 Subaru Outback Limited Silvio Calabi: 2015 Cherokee is a modern Jeep Ride & Drive: 2015 Hyundai Genesis Politics and elections Arthur I. Cyr: Iran – a crisis without end Short-term rental restrictions kept in some areas, loosened in others Arthur I. Cyr: South Korea represents long-term triumph – for them and for US Mark L. Hopkins: Looking for a political straight shooter Oregon's governor appoints new secretary of state State News Oregon's governor appoints new secretary of state Kate Brown sworn in as Oregon's 38th governor Nation - World Leonard Nimoy, famous as Mr. Spock on 'Star Trek,' dies Obituaries James Ellis York Death Notices Death Notices Shiela R. Ettlich Karen June Shaw Shareable Bank of America is predicting a massive Tesla collapse Mars One attracts science fiction geeks and people who hate society Sports Latest Stories Weber, Smith earn All-American honors Oregon's Altman used to rebuilding, reloading Wade scores 32, Heat rally to beat Blazers AHS grad Bailey claims national wrestling title Ashland boys capture another Sato Cup snowboard title at Mt. Bachelor High school Ashland boys capture another Sato Cup snowboard title at Mt. Bachelor Fredrickson leads Grizzlies to season-opening romp Grizz alpine skiers finish strong at state Ashland High's Honsinger tops field in final nordic ski meet Grizz snowboard team heads to state with repeat potential Southern Oregon University Weber, Smith earn All-American honors Oregon's Altman used to rebuilding, reloading AHS grad Bailey claims national wrestling title Thompson, Weber to play in all-star game Beavers get No. 3 seed, host NCAA games Voices Latest Stories Bert Etling: A homegrown news diet Arthur I. Cyr: Iran – a crisis without end Antionette Kerr: Some items shouldn’t fly with TSA Our View: Tuition trauma Letters to the Editor, March 19 Editorial Our View: Tuition trauma Our View: SOU's economic clout Our view: Keep it simple in developing marijuana rules Our View: Ashland is at risk as a bad fire season looms Our View: Ashland backs residents over visitors in lodging decision Letters Letters to the Editor, March 19 Letters to the Editor, March 18 Letters to the Editor, March 17 Letters to the Editor, March 14 Letters to the Editor, March 12 Guest opinions Guest Opinion: Ashland is asking for trouble with new room rental rules Guest Opinion: More reasons to oppose Jordan Cove Guest Opinion: It's Groundwater Awareness Week; test your well Guest Opinion: Ashland schools failed to protect my son from bullying Guest Opinion: There is nothing uniform about the Uniform Crime Report Columns Bert Etling: A homegrown news diet Arthur I. Cyr: Iran – a crisis without end Guest Opinion: Ashland is asking for trouble with new room rental rules Council Corner: City considers the sharing economy Herb Rothschild Jr.: Demonizing Putin makes case for war Chris Honore Council Corner Editor's Notes Jeffrey Gillespie Herb Rothschild Revels Latest Stories Improv rock and folk band hosts a dance party at the Ashland Community Center Best bets for entertainment around Ashland, March 19 Andrew Lloyd Webber's lush musical 'Sunset Boulevard' opens at Camelot Theatre in Talent Community blog: Herzog scholarship for young writers Movie listings: March 13-18 Theater Ticket Availability Ticket Availability Andrew Lloyd Webber's lush musical 'Sunset Boulevard' opens at Camelot Theatre in Talent Oregon Shakespeare Festival designer for a half-century says he's still learning Ashland High School Drama Club to host Showcase Night on Thursday Music Album reviews: Recent and recommended for March The Farr Side: New format for ‘American Idol’ as show continues a strong run Improv rock and folk band hosts a dance party at the Ashland Community Center The Farr Side: Madonna — ever the trendsetter Nitty Gritty Dirt Band co-founder John McEuen performs at the Unitarian Fellowship in Ashland Visual Art Ashland's First Friday Art Walk showcases new exhiits by regional artists Movies Movie listings: March 20-26 More wonderful wrinkles at 'The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel' 8 must-see spring films Movie review: ‘Wrecking Crew’ is a look at the people who really put the bomp Movie review: ‘Cinderella’ is an instant classic Food and Drink Cruelest Month: Poetry Blog Lifestyle Latest Stories A better bedtime Studying stress Eat this, not that Peanut allergy breakthrough Stargazing is a fun, free family activity Aging Happens Inner Peace Column Inner Peace Blog Rogues: Tales from the Valley Classifieds Jobs Autos Real Estate FEATURED » Obituaries Photos Videos Blogs Business Business Services NEWS NOW Bert Etling: A homegrown news diet ... Mt. Ashland hopes coming storm will reopen ski area ... Ticket Availability ... Bert Etling: A homegrown news diet ... Mt. Ashland hopes coming storm will reopen ski area ... Ticket Availability ... WORLD WAR II Prisoners in their own home SOU professor Yamaguchi pens book about Japanese-American internment camps By Joe Zavala Ashland Daily Tidings DailyTidings.com By Joe Zavala Ashland Daily Tidings Posted Mar. 18, 2015 @ 8:05 pm By Joe Zavala Ashland Daily Tidings Posted Mar. 18, 2015 @ 8:05 pm What do you think? --> Have an opinion on this story? Send a letter to the editor at www.dailytidings.com/sendletter  » Read more X What do you think? Have an opinion on this story? Send a letter to the editor at www.dailytidings.com/sendletter   » Social News p bs:newslist StartDate="20121121" EndDate="p bs:datecalc Months="3"" DateSort="1" UseObjects="1" ObjectClass="81" Taxonomywords="2324,665" ExactTaxonomyMatch="1" Image="1" Count="4" --> Los Angeles, 1942. A teenage girl returns home from school one day to find her mother screaming at her father. "Pack your suitcase," mom says. "We all have to leave." Soon they’re dragging their bags down a dirt path alongside other families, trailed by the yelping of dogs left to fend for themselves. They board a bus bound for Poston, Ariz., and as it begins to pull away the girl looks out the window. “The image of a boy waving, almost mechanically, as the buses depart stays in the girl’s mind as the stagnant landscape of Brawley and the Imperial Valley fades into the distance under a black night time curtain.” That nightmare scenario and what followed — life in a Japanese-American internment camp — is the focus of Precious Yamaguchi’s first book, “Experiences of Japanese American Women During and After World War II — Living in Internment Camps and Rebuilding Life Afterwards,” a 114-page work of nonfiction that can be purchased at Amazon.com and rowman.com ($75 hardback, $74.99 e-book). Yamaguchi, Southern Oregon University’s assistant professor of communications, wrote a version of the book as her dissertation at Bowling Green State University then re-tooled it for public consumption, cutting redundant accounts and improving the narrative flow. For Yamaguchi, 34, it was both a requirement for her doctorate and a labor of love. The teenage girl she describes in the opening pages is Toshi Tabata, Yamaguchi’s grandmother. The black-and-white cover photo shows Tabata standing next to her daughter, Patricia Yamaguchi. And on Patricia Yamaguchi’s right hip, wearing a white dress with her hair done up in pigtails, is 1-year-old Precious Yamaguchi. “I’ve always been interested in it from when I was a child but when I entered into my doctorate program I felt that if I didn’t research this very important subject that I would be doing an injustice as a researcher,” Precious Yamaguchi said. “So I really tried to focus on this because I’ve always felt like this is a field that a lot of books and research didn’t go very far into depth. And what I wanted to get across to people was that it wasn’t just about the internment camp itself, it was about after they were let go from the camps and how they were able to rebuild their lives.” Though personally connected, Yamaguchi didn’t know what life in an internment camp was really like nor did she understand the obstacles her grandparents faced post-camp until after she rounded up 16 subjects and started asking questions. What she discovered was both jarring and inspirational. Following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, through executive order 9066, authorized the forced relocation from the West Coast of all people with Japanese ancestry. Most of the estimated 120,000 people affected by the order moved during the spring of 1942. In a mass exodus, Yamaguchi writes, they “were forced to leave their homes, businesses, and all their belongings except for one suitcase or what they could carry, and were placed in barbed-wire camps patrolled by armed police.” The War Relocation Authority closed the camps two years later on June 30, 1945, but with no homes or jobs to go back to, most of the Japanese-Americans who were finally set free struggled for years to carve out a meager existence. Those struggles and the resiliency required to overcome them became a prominent theme in Yamaguchi’s book, which took roughly eight years to complete from the time she began researching to its printing in January. Using a digital voice recorder, Yamaguchi, who started teaching at SOU seven months ago, conducted each of the interviews in person. Talking to her subjects face-to-face, she said, was necessary in order to gain trust and reach a certain comfort level with the interviewees. But even then, it was difficult to draw out every painful memory and acquire the sort of details that Yamaguchi hoped would separate her book from the dozens of others already written. For one, most of her subjects were 80 to 90 years old and, in some cases, confronting a painful part of their history in depth for the first time. A second, and in some ways larger barrier was the deeply ingrained Japanese belief, a sort of cultural watermark, that equates any recounting of hardship with whining. Yamaguchi overcame both those obstacles with perseverance, conducting multiple sit-downs with each subject wherever they felt most comfortable. “Most of the time I came into their homes and it was a very good experience,” she said. “Many of them had pictures, documents, journals, and sometimes they would share that with me.” Many of her subjects were reluctant to open up initially, but in time most of Yamaguchi’s questions were answered. Sometimes, it took some convincing. “The Japanese culture is very much modest and humble,” she said, “so they would say, ‘My life is so boring, I don’t think you want to hear about it.’ I would say, ‘No, I just want to listen.’ So I’d ask about their childhood and then they’d tell me a really interesting story about their life in an internment camp. Some of them had miscarriages while in the camps, and all of them had really interesting stories to tell. They were just young girls themselves who had no idea how to take care of a family or cook or anything.” But they had to learn, quickly. The stories of how they accomplished that against a tide of anti-Japanese sentiment were transcribed from recorder to word processor over the course of several months, a process that was exhausting for Yamaguchi both physically and emotionally. Her grandmother died while Yamaguchi was in the throes of that transcribing and, following a break to recover, she revisited the pain of that loss with every press of the “play” button. There was also a certain amount of pressure which, for somebody whose goal was to humanize an entire generation of Japanese-Americans, could not be avoided. “It was so exciting, but at the same time it’s hard to write about your family,” she said. “We are what you would call a collectivist culture, so when one person speaks it’s not only one person who’s speaking, they are really trying to speak for a collective group. I wanted to do justice to my family and other families represented in the book, so I was a little nervous about that.” Was she satisfied with the finished product? Yamaguchi says she’s proud to have completed the book — her second, which will dive deeper into the same subject, is already in the works — and is pleased with how it turned out, but was most encouraged by some of the reactions to the stories inside. Some of the children of her subjects were introduced for the first time to their parents’ suffering, and their responses provided Yamaguchi with a resounding confirmation. “A lot of the children, they had never heard the stories and didn’t know how much their parents had struggled and all the things they had accomplished,” she said. “Some of them said that they had never thought of their parents as accomplishing much because they weren’t famous or wealthy. But they said when they think about it now they’re like, ‘Wow, they had nothing at all and were able to rebuild their lives.’” Joe Zavala can be reached at 541-821-0829 or [email protected]. By Joe Zavala Ashland Daily Tidings DailyTidings.com By Joe Zavala Ashland Daily Tidings Posted Mar. 18, 2015 @ 8:05 pm » Comment or view comments /* $( document ).ready(function() { // Jquery mobile is trying to style the button and leaving a blank gry button on top of a white button $("#viafouracoms .vf-comment-controls li.vf-right").html(' Submit '); });*/ » STAY INFORMED Email NewsLetter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. calendar Connect with DailyTidings.com Facebook Twitter RSS Back to top Reader Services Reader Services home Subscriptions Subscriber controls Contact us Submissions Photos Events Letters to the editor Corrections Alerts Email alerts RSS feeds Text Alerts Advertise Media Kit Home Products and services Ad rates Advertising contacts Mail Tribune Daily Tidings The Nickel Shop Our Valley Blogs Stay Informed Email newsletter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. 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