Hey Everybody! We started off the day with our second (and last thank
goodness) substitute, Mrs. Ritzdorf. She went around the room and checked
your sticky note questions, and if she didn't like them, she would tell you
that they were not the correct chapters. This happened to me and I had to go
through each of my questions and find them in the text before she would give
me credit. : ( But to continue, we followed up by circling up.
Our questions were (in order of occurance):
1. Why did papa stay in the barracks for 5 months.
-the class generally felt that he was either too depressed about being in
the inturnment camp to leave, or he was embarassed that he had nothing to do
and nowhere else to be
2.Why was each family presented with an X-Mas tree?
-our response was that Americans generally think they know what people of
all races and types want. We also assume that we can give it to them. It was
an action similar to the presentation of apricots on rice. It was the
American way of Americanizing the Japanese while giving them what WE thought
THEY needed.
3. Would Americans have responded the same way if we were put in the same
position as the Japanese? If we were inturned in Japan...
-we said that we would not respond in a similar way because we are too used
to dominating everything. We would find our own way to turn our inturnment
to our benefit. Also, many of the class members seemed to think that the
majority of Americans would defect and return to America. I know I probably
would.
4. Why does the adjective "inu" offend papa?
-the class responded with the thought that papa was offended because "inu"
basically meant he was disrespectful towards his mother country. In a
culture where respect means everything, being called disrespectful would be
a deep jab to his self esteem.
5. Why does papa want Woody to abstain from going to war?
-The class seemed to think that papa is of the mind that if the American
Gv't wont trust him, why trust his child?
6. Why didn't we imprison other cultures?
-the truth is we did. There were also noted Italian inturnment camps, and I
would bet there were others for other races. But not in the volume of
Japanese Inturnment camps. Japanese people were easily recognized and
isolated whereas lighter skinned europeans would not be as noticeable. The
Gv't just wanted to seem like they were doing something so they put a
noticable effort into isolating those who were different from the typical
American person. Another thought was that we were not directly at war with
the Germans and the Italians and whatnot. Though the Germans did torpedo a
couple ships carrying "passengers" when either coming into or leaving the
United States, what really pushed us over the edge was Pearl Harbor. A
Japanese offensive.
7. If papa doesn't like Japan, why does he cry when he hears songs from his
childhood?
-The general statement of the class was that papa remembers the old times
before he came to America, before the war. And now seeing what a desolate
place he is in now, and how he can't return to what he had set out to
America to become, he breaks down and cries for his past. He could also have
been crying about the war with his home country and his future country. He
could see it as an unfair attack on democracy.
8.Would you give up your ties to the homeland?
-what I wrote down as the class sentiment was "no, you're stuck either
way..." I don't really remember what that meant, but I will take a stab at
it. If one disowns their country, they have nowhere to return to if they are
kicked out of their country of residence. Terminating your ties to a country
does not necessarily mean that the country you are in will give you rights.
So either way you are stuck.
9. In the chapter dealing with the ballots, why were the choices talked
about only "YES ,YES" or "NO, NO?" Why such an extreme point of view either
way? Why not anything in between?
-The class believed that the government would want sufficient evidence to
whether the person in question was loyal to the U.S. or to Japan. The class
also though that saying "YES, NO," or "NO,YES," would be contradictory based
on the questions.
10. Would women have to fill out the ballot and would they be subsequently
drafted based on their answers?
-The class felt that it was just for men, and women could not be drafted at
the time.
The following questions were asked by the substitute:
1.Why would you be willing to die for something?
-We seemed to feel that you would die for something important to you like
family if it was in danger and the only way to remove it from such danger is
through death, this question lead to a further one from the sub...
2. What would dying for your country accomplish?
-As this was an almost personal attack on Natali, she was one of the only
people who answered. She said that it would accomplish death in honor.
Others thought that it would help uphold the country's beliefs system and
make a difference in the world. We also seemed to believe that fighting for
what you believed in is a worthy cause to die.
3. Is this the way people go into Iraq?
-The class seemed to think from second hand experience, that soldiers tend
to not to want to fight but to avenge 9/11. It is 6 years after the fact and
fighting for somehting that happened that long ago is generally seen as
pointless.
13.What differences are seen between the Japanese song in the book and our
national anthem?
-theirs is about growing as a country and becoming better united and ours is
about prevailing in battle. Theirs is also very peaceful and ours is about
bombs and smoke and our flag standing after a bloody battle.
Our homework was to read through chapter 15. Or at least that is what I did.
It might have been through 16... I don't know.
In Gassho,
Emma Steinebrey
