WCSS 25

This workshop explores how to best teach about the Japanese American mass incarcerations of 1941 through 1946 during World War II. Specific emphasis will be on: 1) Racially-Targeted Forced Homelessness (125,284 Americans of Japanese descent of all ages were forcibly incarcerated and relocated without due process of law, habeus corpus, or legal representation solely because of their ancestry); 2) U.S. Citizenship (over 77,000 Japanese Americans incarcerated were United States citizens – 33,000 voluntarily served in the U.S. military during World War II with over 800 killed in battle); and 3) Costs of Economic Racism (a 1983 congressional commission documented $12.6 billion – in 2025 dollars - of property, businesses, and net income losses incurred by incarcerated Japanese Americans between 1941 and 1946).