Follow us:
DR. BICKMORE'S YA WEDNESDAY
  • Weekly Posts
  • WEEKEND PICKS 2023
  • Monday Motivators 2023
  • Weekend Picks 2021
  • Contributors
  • Bickmore's Posts
  • Lesley Roessing's Posts
  • Weekend Picks 2020
  • Weekend Picks 2019
  • Weekend Picks old
  • 2021 UNLV online Summit
  • UNLV online Summit 2020
  • 2019 Summit on Teaching YA
  • 2018 Summit
  • Contact
  • About
  • WEEKEND PICKS 2023

Dr. Bickmore's YA Wednesday has a new Feature-- A YouTube Channel

Don't worry, it is easy to find.  Just go to YouTube and search for Dr. Bickmore's YA Wednesday.

Check Out the YouTube Channel

Looking at George Takei's They Called Us Enemy By Jackie Mercer

5/27/2020

0 Comments

 
Today's post is by Jackie Mercer. Jackie is a great friend to Dr. Bickmore's YA Wednesday.  She makes sure it is shared on the Facebook page Teachers on the Move. I am deeply thankful that she takes the time to do it every week. I have a hard time remembering when I first met her. It seems like I have known her forever. She will ever be associated with all of the YA fans around Youngstown State and their wonderful English Festival that focuses on YA literature. In addition she will be presenting at the UNLV online 2020 Summit in a couple of weeks. Have you registered yet? Furthermore, Jackie had a post a just about a year ago. Check it out here.

Looking at George Takei's They Called Us Enemy By Jackie Mercer

It was a spring morning in 1942 when four-year-old George and his brother Henry awoke to their father telling them they must get dressed and wait in the living room while he and their mother finished packing. Shortly after, armed soldiers came knocking, telling the family they must leave their home in California immediately. Their crime? Being Japanese Americans after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. FDR’s February 19, 1942, executive order 9066 ordered all people of Japanese ancestry to be rounded up by the military and forced into internment camps for an undetermined amount of time. In the graphic novel They Called Us Enemy George Takei intricately weaves together retellings of his childhood experiences and his observations and realization looking back on those events. His shifting from the events of his childhood to experiences later in life, including present-day, allows the reader the opportunity to gain a clearer understanding of both the ways in which his experiences shaped him as a person and the realizations he has had about his own experiences reflecting back on them throughout his adulthood. 
Picture
Takei’s book provides readers with a unique look at an often forgotten piece of American history. Takei, as an adult, reflects back on his time as a child, so readers have not only his thoughts on his experiences as a child but also his realizations about these experiences as an adult. For example, as he reflects on his time on the train being taken away from his home and to an internment camp, Takei writes, “My bright, sharp memories are of a joyful time of games, play, and discoveries. Memory is a wily keeper of the past, usually dependable, but at times, deceptive. Childhood memories are especially slippery. Sweet and so full of joy, they can often be a misrendering of the truth. For a child, that sweetness, out of context and intensely subjective, remains forever real” (50-51). Takei spends much of the book reflecting on these vivid, fun memories of his time in the camp, but juxtaposes these happy memories with the harsh reality of his parents’ experiences during this time. He is upfront with the reader in recognizing that in some ways experiencing these events as a child has allowed him to romanticize these times, when in reality, these were probably some of the most horrific and uncertain times ever faced by his parents.
 
Both of Takei’s parents had had successful careers before being forcibly removed from their home. Takei notes the behavior of both parents on their initial train ride to the camps. He writes, “Mama was not going to allow anything, not even the United States government to affect her family’s well-being. I remember her obsessive concern and my father’s melancholy, but they are dusty, peripheral remembrances” (50). Obviously, as a child, Takei could not fully realize what his parents were experiencing or the ways in which they were ensuring their children’s safety and well-being, so his ability to consider these things as he writes adds a unique and important layer to the telling of the story. The reader has the privilege of not only seeing what Takei experienced as a child, but more mature readers (adults and young adults) can also gain understandings beyond a child’s view through Takei’s reflecting on his experiences as an adult. This also becomes important later as Takei, as a young adult, grapples with what he perceives as passiveness in his father’s behavior as Takei begins his work as an activist. The novel serves as not only a memoir recounting the impactful experiences of his life, but also functions as a coming of age story where the reader can see the ways in which Takei is grappling with the struggles that come with growing up, such as trying to understand his parents or feel understood by them.
​A particularly poignant moment in the book deals with Takei’s realization as a child of the racism he was going to face after leaving the camp. After four years of being held prisoners, Japanese Americans were freed. That freedom, however, certainly did not stop the government-approved racism that Japanese Americans were going to face. Before leaving the camp, Takei overhears adults expressing concerns about “white people welcoming us with open arms” (152). He notes, “The irony was that the barbed-wire fences that incarcerated us also protected us...if the fences were no longer there, we’d be in danger” (152). Takei quickly learned that just because laws are changed doesn’t mean people’s hearts are. Despite being haunted by those days in the camps and the difficulties that followed in his life, Takei recounts how those experiences motivated him and led him to the path of great success and ultimately his celebrity status. For the reader, it is particularly emotional to see a child as the victim of blatant racism and his lack of ability to completely grasp why someone would treat him in such a cruel manner simply because he is a Japanese American.
 
I would be remiss if I did not discuss how the choice of a graphic novel for this book as the format is so important to the telling of this story. I recently taught this book in an American Literature and Diversity course. I asked my students to consider how the genre impacted their understanding of and feelings about the book. Many of them noted that being able to “see” the characters, particularly the expressions on their faces, told more of a story than just the words on the page. While Takei focuses on his own experiences as a child, readers are able to see and understand the emotions of all of the characters, creating a more complete understanding of what this experience was like. 
​Geroge Takei provides us with hope people can overcome immense and senseless trauma and suffering in his book They Called Us Enemy, and I would highly recommend moving it to the top of your to-read stack.
 
Suggested Titles:
Between Shades of Gray, Ruta Sepetys
Internment, Samira Ahmen
March Book 1-3, John Lewis
Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi
Refugee, Alan Gratz
Salt to the Sea, Ruta Sepetys
Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You, Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi
Picture
Picture
Picture

Picture

Picture
Picture
Picture
Until next time.
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Dr. Gretchen Rumohr
    Chief Curator
    Gretchen Rumohr is a professor of English and department chair at Aquinas College, where she teaches writing and language arts methods.   She is also a Co-Director of the UNLV Summit on the Research and Teaching of Young Adult Literature. She lives with her four girls and a five-pound Yorkshire Terrier in west Michigan.

    Dr. Steve Bickmore
    ​Creator and Curator

    Dr. Bickmore is a Professor of English Education at UNLV. He is a scholar of Young Adult Literature and past editor of The ALAN Review and a past president of ALAN. He is a available for speaking engagements at schools, conferences, book festivals, and parent organizations. More information can be found on the Contact page and the About page.

    Co-Edited Books

    Archives

    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    June 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014

    Categories

    All
    Chris-lynch

    Blogs to Follow

    Ethical ELA
    nerdybookclub
    NCTE Blog
    yalsa.ala.org/blog/

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly