February 19th, 2008 marked the 66th anniversary of the signing of Executive Order 9066 which put 120,000 West Coast Japanese Americans into concentration camps. Our organization has commemorated this signing for the past three years (or four years?) with events on campus to educate the greater student body about the camps.
This year we invited an artist/community organizer named Traci Kato-Kiriyama to come and conduct a storytelling workshop, intended to give students the tools to tell their stories in ways many people could not after the camps. With a perfect attendance that wasn't too big but wasn't too small, we played a lot of theater and improv games that led into a writing session where we got to write on a variety of topics, allowing participants to speak to many experiences in ways that often times we don't get the chance to. We really enjoyed having Traci and hope she can come back later on the semester!
Tonight is going to be the big, most publicized event we've held this year. We were even on the front page of the Rafu Shimpo and the main USC webpage with this one! Tadashi Nakamura, a filmmaker from UCLA (but we won't hold that against him) will be coming to screen his Sundance Selected film, 'Pilgrimage'. I saw this film last year and am really looking forward to seeing it again. 'Pilgrimage' is basically about how a group of students took a trip up to Manzanar and ended up sparking this annual pilgrimage to the site as well as a lot of student activism. I went once while I was in middle school and have been wanting to for a while...
So that's our week. There were a few more events, but I'll save that for a full on Week of Remembrance look back. Hope to see you tonight!
2k out!
- Sean
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