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Mistreating the Japanese community (Spanish)

(Spanish) A somewhat terrible situation developed terrible for those of us in the Japanese community. Why? The Peruvian government broke off diplomatic relations with Japan, and we were mistreated by our neighbors.

I was six years old and going to school; I was one of the youngest, dressed in a children’s military uniform, all dark clothes with a kepi and a shaved head. This was a rule back then, everything just so. The Second World War had not yet started; it was three years before the outbreak of the war [when] they [the Peruvians] started to bother the Japanese community. This is the saddest part of my story that I had to experience. Why do I have to run? Why do they hit me? Why do they make me cry?


discrimination interpersonal relations Peru racism

Date: September 6, 2007

Location: Lima, Peru

Interviewer: Harumi Nako

Contributed by: Asociación Peruano Japonesa (APJ)

Interviewee Bio

Venancio Shinki (born 1932 in Supe, Lima, Peru) is one of the most outstanding Peruvian painters. The son of a Japanese father (Kitsuke Shinki of Hiroshima Ken) and a Peruvian mother (Filomena Huamán), Venancio was raised on the San Nicolás hacienda in Supe, north of Lima, an area with a large concentration of Japanese immigrants in the early years. He studied at the National School of Fine Arts of Peru, and graduated with the best grade in his class in 1962.

His paintings recall Eastern, Western, and Andean traditions, with a distinctive surrealism that shows an unknown and intriguing universe, set off by a purified technique and a renovated figuration, which links Venancio with other great Latin American artists. Venancio has received many accolades and has participated in a variety of individual and group exhibits in Peru, Japan, Italy, United States, Colombia, Ecuador, Brazil, Venezuela, Panama, and Mexico, among others. In 1999, the year of the centenary marking Japanese migration to Peru, Venacio was invited to exhibit his work in the Museum of Man in Nagoya, Japan. His most recent works were displayed in November 2006 during the 34th Annual Japanese Cultural Week in Lima, Peru. He passed away in 2016. (October 2017)

Michelle Yamashiro
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Michelle Yamashiro

Parents leaving Peru to move to California

Okinawan American whose parents are from Peru.

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Mitsuru "Mits" Kataoka
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Mitsuru "Mits" Kataoka

Facing housing discrimination in Rhode Island

(1934–2018) Japanese American designer, educator, and pioneer of media technologies

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George Kazuharu Naganuma
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George Kazuharu Naganuma

Having nowhere to go postwar

(b. 1938) Japanese Peruvian incarcerated in Crystal City

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Mia Yamamoto
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Mia Yamamoto

Influence of Mexican culture after returning from camp

(b. 1943) Japanese American transgender attorney

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Roger Shimomura
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Roger Shimomura

A conversation with a farmer in Kansas

(b. 1939) Japanese American painter, printmaker & professor

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Fujima Kansuma
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Fujima Kansuma

Dancing in Japan as an American, in the US as Japanese

(1918-2023) Nisei Japanese kabuki dancer

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Fred Y. Hoshiyama
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Fred Y. Hoshiyama

Discrimination in San Francisco

(1914–2015) Nisei YMCA and Japanese American community leader

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Roger Shimomura
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Roger Shimomura

Collection of artifacts depicting racial stereotypes influences art

(b. 1939) Japanese American painter, printmaker & professor

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Frank Yamasaki
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Frank Yamasaki

Encountering racial discrimination at a public swimming pool

(b. 1923) Nisei from Washington. Resisted draft during WWII.

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Jack Herzig
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Jack Herzig

His testimony has more credibility because of his race

(1922 - 2005) Former U.S. Army counterintelligence officer

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Margaret Oda
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Margaret Oda

Gender discrimination in education field

(1925 - 2018) Nisei educator from Hawai‘i

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Mitsuru "Mits" Kataoka
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Mitsuru "Mits" Kataoka

Learned what it meant to be called “Jap” in Heart Mountain

(1934–2018) Japanese American designer, educator, and pioneer of media technologies

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George Katsumi Yuzawa
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George Katsumi Yuzawa

First impression of New York City during war time

(1915 - 2011) Nisei florist who resettled in New York City after WW II. Active in Japanese American civil rights movement

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Yuri Kochiyama
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Yuri Kochiyama

The day Pearl Harbor was bombed

(1922–2014) Political and civil rights activist.

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James Hirabayashi
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James Hirabayashi

Not bringing shame to family

(1926 - 2012) Scholar and professor of anthropology. Leader in the establishment of ethnic studies as an academic discipline

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