final self reflection letter

Xinyu Shang

ASAM 100 BB

Reading Journal

This reflection is premised on the YouTube video entitled, “A community Grows

Despite Racism.” This is a 4 minutes 07 seconds video which showcase the growth of the

Japanese community in American despite the several efforts and legislations to

discriminate against them and limit their existence in the United States. The Japanese

went to the US in search of jobs more than 100 years ago whereby more than 3000

Japanese found their way into the United States. They migrated to the Haiwai mainland

to work as farmers, plantation workers, fishermen, and railway workers.

However, despite their hard work, the Japanese remained unwelcome. For

example, Frank Miyamoto explains what made his father left Carrington. He says that the

father found workplace harassment unpleasant as he was discriminated against by the

White workers. The Japanese were threatened both workers and their families. Besides

the harassment at work, the Americans passed laws that discriminated against the

Japanese and even the Supreme Court (in 1922) ruled that the Japanese could not be

naturalized in attempts to limit their growth. For example, the anti-alien laws in

California were enacted (in 1913) to bar Japanese from owning land. Congress also

passed the Immigration Act in 1924 which halted the Japanese migration to the United

States.

Nonetheless, despite all these efforts to restrict the number of the Japanese, the

community grew as the next generation was born. This generation were US citizens by

birthrights and adapted to the American way of life as they attended public schools and

grew up with their non-Japanese American children's classmates. However,

discrimination of this new generation continued in restaurants, theater and swimming

pools where they were treated differently as their fellow white American children

counterparts even in 1940 CRO. This is explained by Frank Yamasaki who gives an

account of how the new Japanese generation born in America continued facing

discrimination. He gives an account of how he was surprised when they had to be

discriminated against by the cashier because they were racially different.

Therefore, from this video, we get to understand how American’s were racists

against in other races more than 100 years ago. We get to learn that despite the

discrimination and biased treatment against the Japanese, their resolve to stay and grow

in America was never collapsed. They stayed foot and faced all the challenges but

ultimately remained in America. The moral lesson we can learn from this video is that

even if one is facing challenges, really tough ones in life, one should always stay focused

on their goals. The Japanese could have decided to leave America and get back home,

however, they would have meant that they gave up and hence could have not have

managed to accomplish their very first goal of migrating into the United States.

Therefore, this video presents me with a historically rich knowledge of how the Japanese

found their way into the United States more 100 ago and how this community persevered

to grow despite the apparent racism against them by their fellow American counterparts.