Yuki Tanaka's Japan's Comfort Women Essay examples

Consistent with Japanese propaganda the nationalist leaders held belief that Japan was “the leader, protector and light of Asia”. However, this perception of liberation from colonial rule was a façade as the civilians of occupied nations experienced harsher treatment under the Japanese than they did under the colonial authorities.

A person's identity cannot be given to her, instead a person must achieve a sense of her character through personal experience and self-reflection. In "No Name Woman", Maxine Hong Kingston recalls the events of her aunt's life in the vague world of her Chinese roots. The story of her aunt is told by her mother and Kingston recreates the events into an exploratory story to help herself figure out what part of her identity is Chinese and help her better understand the Chinese culture. In retelling her aunt's story, Kingston seeks to reconcile both her Chinese and American identities and mold her own identity as a result. Kingston, a first generation American, finds that as a result of her cultural

In 1910, Japanese are banned from marrying non-Orientals and the practice of arranging for picture brides began. During the first two decades of the 1900s, more than 20,000 Japanese women arrived, more often than not as picture brides (Mei T. Nakano, p. 24). These women only knew their future

During world war two, the Imperial Japanese army forced an estimated 200,000 women into sexual slavery. This is just one of the many atrocities committed by Japan during world war two. Even though many say that the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were inhumane, the US was completely justified because the future casualties were minimized and Japan and its allies committed atrocious war crimes.

In American history women were not given as many rights as men were. They were treated unfairly because of their gender. Throughout American history there were American women who took a stand and fought for women’s rights. Who were some American women right’s activists in American History that stood up for themselves and other women in throughout America?

“Farewell to Manzanar” After the disastrous event of Pearl Harbor, many Japanese families were suspected of contributing to the bombing and betraying the United States. In the book, “Farewell to Manzanar”, the authors, Jeanne Wakatsuki and James Houston, portray damaging influences of WWII and its consequences by discussing Jeanne's life before and after the internment camps. As the internment camps concluded, some rights of the Japanese residents were cut which impacted their lives drastically. When Jeanne revisits Manzanar with her family, she explains how her Papa’s life had ended there, although he lived a few years after coming out of camp.

War can be loud and visible or quiet and remote. It affects the individual and entire societies, the soldier, and the civilian. Both U.S. prisoners of war in Japan and Japanese-American citizens in the United States during WWII undergo efforts to make them “invisible.” Laura Hillenbrand’s Unbroken hero, Louie Zamperini, like so many other POWs, is imprisoned, beaten, and denied basic human rights in POW camps throughout Japan. Miné Okubo, a U.S. citizen by birth, is removed from society and interned in a “protective custody” camp for Japanese-American citizens. She is one of the many Japanese-Americans who were interned for the duration of the war. Louie Zamperini, as a POW in Japan, and Miné Okubo, as a Japanese-American Internee both experience efforts to make them “invisible” through dehumanization and isolation in the camps of WWII, and both resist these efforts.

The Fifteen-Year War was a time of great turmoil and uncertainty in Japan. Various facets of the country were tested and driven to their limits. During the occupation, race and gender began to evolve in ways that had not exactly be seen before. War had a tremendous impact on every part of the life of a Japanese citizen. Both men and women began to fill roles that were completely novel to them. Race became a part of the definition of who people were. As the war progressed and American troops landed on Japanese soil for occupation, more drastic changes occurred. Economic hardship and rations befell the people of the Land of the Rising Sun. Prostitution began to rear its ugly head and rape transpired. Through memory, research, and vivid

Wakatsuki-Houston presents an insightful portrayal of the Japanese-American internment camp in California known as Manzanar. She describes how her life changed throughout the experience as she grew from child to young woman. She captivates the reader's attention with intermittent interviews, describing the seemingly constant turmoil that each prisoner faced.

Camp life for Gruenewald and the others in the interment camps in California was hot, with bad food, and absolutely no privacy. Their showers were in one

The Buddha in the Attic by Julie Otsuka provides an interesting perspective to the American experience through the eye of Japanese women around the time of World War 2. The author uses a number of unique writing techniques which originally confused me, but once accustomed created an immersive and intimate reading experience. Otsuka also inserts a number of metaphors and symbols throughout the novel with various possibilities for explanation depending on the opinion of the reader.

Tsurumi says that only three options were given to most young women in Japan in the Meiji period: work at a textile mill, weaving house, or a house of prostitution. Tsurumi says that women in all three cases had effectively been “sold” by their parents into the workforce, and were without the ability to choose where they wished to work (Tsurumi, 187). To detail even further, Tsurumi says that girls working in any of these fields were effectively “purchased commodities” to their employers, and were treated as objects (Tsurumi, 188). This continues to support the idea that these women were victims of a society determined to society’s vulnerable populations for their labor and ignore their humanity. Despite this, the women of Japan’s textile mills worked tirelessly in harsh circumstances in an effort to support their families, and, as a result, also supported the larger local and national communities of which they were a part. In conclusion, Tsurimi says that a woman working in Japan’s textile mills “made [her contributions to the industrialized economy] for her family and herself, and not for the country or company” (Tsurumi, 198). Even if their contribution was not intentional, however, the impact the factory girls of Meiji Era Japan had on the industrialization of Japan’s economy is irrefutable, and showcases

The book Fly Boys written by James Bradley gives us many different stories and viewpoints during WWII. During this time Japan was in the dark compared to china or the U.S. They didn't like outside influences and thought the gaizin were ruining their religious beliefs, but the Japanese reacted to this in a bad way. The Japanese army was at war with china and would not only captured chinese soldiers but would also take the women from china. They would rape the women and spread disease from soldier to soldier. The reason for the spread of disease is that “ 1 women for every 35 soldiers,”(Bradley 61) and they viewed the women as military supplies. They kept the women for months on end and would only give them one day off to be checked by doctors.

Within Chinese Comfort Women: Testimonies of Imperial Japan’s Sex Slaves, Tan Yuhua, born in 1928, explains how as the only girl in her family, she was taken to become a comfort woman. Her father was disabled below the waist, and worked as a craftsman. Less than 20 days after her wedding, Tan Yuhua was kidnapped by Japanese troops. She recounts that they were unable to see them approaching, and

Fujitani does not solely describe the cruelty exhibited by the Japanese and the Americans; he includes positive measures that were taken by both as well. Fujitani claims that “A historically responsible and empirically sound critique of wartime racism in these two nation-state-based empires cannot simply deny their life-enhancing efforts, but must somehow account for the uneasy fit between what can only be recognized as their gross cruelty toward minority and colonial subjects and their apparent concern for the life, reproduction, welfare, and sometimes even happiness of these same peoples” (Fujitani 13). The paradox that exists is dutifully acknowledged as Japan and the United States are not treating the minority populations with complete respect, but consequently, respect them out of necessity.