Sei What?

By coming to North America, my parents and I became shin-issei (new first generation) post-war immigrants. I was so young at the time that I might as well be shin-nisei (new second generation), and my knowledge of Japan and Japanese is like that of a sansei (third generation).

Among the Nikkei (people of Japanese heritage living outside Japan), generations are expressed not only in relation to the first landing of a Japanese in Canada, but also the World War II evacuation of Japanese Canadians from the West Coast to inland internment camps, since it has had such a lasting disruptive effect on the structure and mentality of the community.

After the War, the Nikkei were dispersed across Canada and to Japan. Many distanced themselves from the heritage that had been used as the basis for their internment. Communities did not regain their former vitality, as a critical number of people did not exist in some places. Passing on culture and language to the next generation was downplayed in favour of assimilation, in many cases as a hopefully pre-emptive measure against future discrimination.

The campaign for internment redress, led by the National Association of Japanese Canadians, began during the late seventies and culminated in the signing of the Redress Agreement with the federal government in 1988.

As a teenager at the time, I didn't do much to support the redress cause. After all, my family and I hadn't been interned. On the rare occasions that my family interacted with the then-small Japanese community in Edmonton, it was with new immigrants, so I didn't know any former internees.

Maybe it was denial, or maybe self-preservation -- subconsciously knowing that the Internment was an issue full of hurt and loss that I was not ready to deal with. I felt I didn't have anything in common with those seeking redress. I thought it was "their" fight.

Only later did the inescapable, genetic truth that I was (or at least, fifty years or so ago, could easily have been) one of "them" become apparent to me, along with the responsibility to educate others to ensure that history never repeats.