University of Iowa Iowa Research Online Theses and Dissertations 2005 "Bitter sweet home": celebration of biculturalism in Japanese language Japanese American literature, 1936-1952 Junko Kobayashi University of Iowa Copyright 2005 Junko Kobayashi This dissertation is available at Iowa Research Online: http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/97 Recommended Citation Kobayashi, Junko. ""Bitter sweet home": celebration of biculturalism in Japanese language Japanese American literature, 1936-1952." PhD (Doctor of Philosophy) thesis, University of Iowa, 2005. http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/97. Follow this and additional works at: http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd Part of the History Commons “BITTER SWEET HOME”: CELEBRATION OF BICULTURALISM IN JAPANESE LANGUAGE JAPANESE AMERICAN LITERATURE, 1936-1952 by Junko Kobayashi An Abstract Of a thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in History in the Graduate College of The University of Iowa July 2005 Thesis Supervisor: Professor Stephen G. Vlastos 1 ABSTRACT My dissertation “‘Bitter Sweet Home’: Celebration of Biculturalism in Japanese Language Japanese American Literature, 1936-1952” explores Japanese-language Japanese American literature as a discourse of identity politics among Japanese Americans between 1936 and 1952. Shūkaku, the first Japanese American translocal and multi-genre literary journal, published its inaugural issue in November of 1936, and 1952 marked the publication of Ibara aru shiramichi (Thorny path) by Asako Yamamoto, which was one of the earliest sustained literary accounts either in English or Japanese of the wartime experiences of Japanese Americans. One of the major goals of this dissertation is to uncover the muffled voices of Japanese Americans whose primary language was Japanese. I further scrutinize the ways in which Japanese Americans valued the tradition of English-Japanese bilingualism, and how bilingualism played a central role in the formation of Japanese American identity. From the 1930s through the Pacific War when the relationship of Japan and the US was the most hostile, and even after the war when Japan-US relations changed dramatically, Japanese Americans felt acute pressures to suppress Japanese language and culture which had become associated with political sympathizer with Japan, the enemy, and therefore disloyalty to the US. Even under such intense pressure, however, bilingualism remained a critical tool for Japanese Americans to maintain and reconfigure their identity. They carefully guarded the tradition of biculturalism grounded in bilingualism to preserve a distinct identity against the intensified pressures of Americanization with the emphasis on English-only monolingualism. The wartime political environment imposed a racially polarized discourse of American identity that singled out Japanese Americans as disloyal group and gave new impetus to Americanization programs. I argue that Japanese language literature provided 2 writers protected space within which they engaged politically charged discussions on such topics as racialized and gendered politics of loyalty and retaining biculturalism under the increasing pressure of Americanization. After the war, as the issue of disloyalty receded, Japanese language literature acquired a new role as a critical resource for Japanese Americans to commemorate wartime experiences, and to rebuild cultural and psychological ties with Japan and Japanese culture. Abstract Approved: ____________________________________ Thesis Supervisor ____________________________________ Title and Department ____________________________________ Date “BITTER SWEET HOME”: CELEBRATION OF BICULTURALISM IN JAPANESE LANGUAGE JAPANESE AMERICAN LITERATURE, 1936-1952 by Junko Kobayashi A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in History in the Graduate College of The University of Iowa July 2005 Thesis Supervisor: Professor Stephen G. Vlastos Copyright by JUNKO KOBAYASHI 2005 All Rights Reserved Graduate College The University of Iowa Iowa City, Iowa CERTIFICATE OF APPROVAL ____________________________ PH.D. THESIS _____________ This is to certify that the Ph.D. thesis of Junko Kobayashi has been approved by the Examining Committee for the thesis requirement for the Doctor of Philosophy degree in History at the July 2005 graduation. Thesis Committee: ___________________________________ Stephen G. Vlastos, Thesis Supervisor ___________________________________ Linda L. Kerber ___________________________________ Paul R. Greenough ___________________________________ Shelton Stromquist ___________________________________ Scott R. Schnell To my family of blood and of relation 血縁と結縁の家族に捧げます ii In writing this book I was sustained by my admiration for and sympathy with people who found themselves at odds with Japanese society as they were experiencing it. I was attached to them and to the idea of a society different from the one currently silencing them. Attachment can come from birth and literal kinship, shared experience, intellectual empathy, or sheer fantasy. It doesn’t guarantee the quality of the criticism, its rightness, but it can explain why one brothers to criticize a structure, a set of practices, in the first place. Bothers, that is, for reasons other than or in addition to economic concerns, which I do not mean to dismiss inasmuch as economic well-being is essential to our capacity to think, to give and take pleasure, to live humanly. To reduce all criticism of Japan to bashing is to congeal a complex of people, places, food, cars, movies, estures, longings into a ridid singularity, “Japan,” populated by “the” Japanese. Ditto for America. It kills the possibility of declaring a complicated love. Norma Field, In the Realm of a Dying Emperor: Japan at Century’s End ことばはいきもの。世界は限りなく濃密。このいきもの を手にして世界に向かっていくのが文学。文学は人間が精一 杯世界と向き合ったときの一つのかたち。 ノーマ・フィールド、『祖母の国』 iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS May I continue to live consciously and humbly to acknowledge my debt to all the people who have made me who I am. Thank you for all your support and guidance from the bottom of my heart. In particular, I wish to acknowledge my gratitude to: Chako-chan, my sister who has taught me the deepest meaning of our lives; Mitsuru and Kiminobu Kobayashi, my parents; Yūko Taniguchi, my sister; Masae Tadachi, my grandmother. They have patiently waited for nine years to witness me obtaining the Ph.D. When I informed my grandmother about my graduation, she stated that she had known this would happen one day, since my late grandfather Yoshikazu Tadachi had predicted it long ago. Thank you, Ojīchan. I wish you were here with us. I also wish to acknowledge my gratitude to Aminta I. Pérez, my partner, who believed in me when I could not even trust myself. Without your belief in me, support and love, I could not have done it. I would also like to express my deepest gratitude to Mr. Alejandro Pérez and Mrs. Minerva Pérez, my parents-in-law, who welcomed me into the Pérez clan from the very beginning as an honorary Mexican. My sincere gratitude for each and every members of the Pérez clan for your warm acceptance of me as a member of the clan. I would like to acknowledge my genuine appreciation and honor to Grand Master Yong Chin Pak and Master Min Seok Kang for guiding me with patience in becoming a better martial artist and human being. Without learning the “indomitable spirit” and the concept of perseverance, I could have never reached the place I stand now. I also would like to thank Mrs. Jing-shu Zhu Kang for your support, friendship, and patience when we often keep Master Kang from going home on time. My gratitude extends to Master Brian iv Hayes, Master Scott Williams, and fellow martial artists in the University of Iowa Hap Ki Do club and Kang’s Martial Arts Academy. I feel very fortunate and honored to have Dr. Stephen Vlastos as my advisor for the past eight years. I would like to express my gratitude and intellectual debt to Dr. Vlastos, Dr. Linda Kerber and Dr. Paul Greenough for their guidance and encouragement in becoming a historian. My gratitude extends to professors, fellow graduate students, and most importantly to Mary Strottman, Jean Aikin, and Pat Goodwin in the Department of History at the University of Iowa. Since I have not been professionally trained in English-Japanese translation, translation of Japanese literature, particularly poetry, into English was an ardent and often overwhelming task. Without the support and friendship of Marilyn Adildskov, Robin Tierney, and Dr. Adrienne Hurley, I could not have accomplished the daunting task of translation as exhibited in this study. However, all the mistakes and short-comings are strictly my own. Living on a minimum income as a graduate instructor with the additional financial support from my family, financial supports at crucial points enabled me to complete this project. I wish to acknowledge the generosity of the James and Sylvia Thayer Short-term Research Fellowship at the University of California at Los Angeles. Without the supports of Jeffery Rankin, Supervisors of Reader Services at the Charles E. Young Research Library at UCLA and other staff members, my archival research would not have been as pleasant and fruitful. I would also like to extend my gratitude to two Japanese Studies librarians at the Main Library at the University of Iowa, Ellen Hammond and Chiaki Sakai for their assistance in navigating the maze of Japanese language materials. Many people outside of the Department of History at the University of Iowa