This year’s L.A. Day of Remembrance will be live-streamed via the Japanese American National Museum’s YouTube channel on Saturday, Feb. 19, at 2 p.m. PST.
Focusing on the theme of “Power of Communities: Building Strength Through Collective Action,” the virtual event will honor the resilience and fight of the community over the 80 years since the signing of Executive Order 9066, and explore the next steps for ensuring a just and equitable future for all.
The annual event commemorates President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s signing of Executive Order 9066 on Feb. 19, 1942, which resulted in the unjust incarceration of over 120,000 Japanese and Japanese Americans in American concentration camps and other confinement sites during World War II. The event aims to educate attendees on the history of EO 9066 and its impact on the Japanese American community, while also creating dialogue around supporting black and brown communities.
This year’s programming will be headlined by a conversation between Japanese American activists, traci kato-kiriyama and Kathy Masaoka, and Dreisen Heath, an expert on reparations and reparatory justice, about the need for solidarity around reparations work.
“I’m excited that we’ll get to speak in person alongside Dreisen,” said kato-kiriyama. “We’ve been working closely together for the past year and I’ve learned so much from her research, advocacy, and legislative work on reparations. It will be great to actually sit down and discuss what the next levels of our solidarity work will need and entail. It seems especially fitting to have this important conversation as we reflect on 80 years after EO 9066 and this critical year for reparations work that lies ahead.”
“I’m honored to be in community with my Japanese American brothers and sisters on the Day of Remembrance of the issuing of Executive Order 9066, a time to reflect and remember the lives and experiences previously lost and to take joy in solidarity and survival,” said Heath. “It’s been a privilege to learn from and build with various generations of Japanese American activists and organizers as we press forward on the fight to secure reparations for the legacy of slavery for the Black community. Systemic racism is a common enemy to both of our communities, and the only way to end and overcome it is by supporting each other and moving collectively.”
“Although Japanese Americans received very little support during their WWII incarceration, we felt the great strength that came from the Black, Latinx, and other communities in support of our redress movement,” said Richard Katsuda, co-chair of Nikkei for Civil Rights & Redress (originally known as National Coalition for Redress/Reparations). “Now we must again build that strength from collective action in support of Black reparations and the fight against systemic racism.”
Organizers of the 2022 Los Angeles Day of Remembrance are: Go For Broke National Education Center, Japanese American Citizens League-Pacific Southwest District, Japanese American National Museum, Little Tokyo Service Center, Manzanar Committee, Nikkei for Civil Rights & Redress, Nikkei Progressives, OCA-Greater Los Angeles, Progressive Asian Network for Action, Visual Communications.
For more information, call (408) 510-1460 or email rchutachikawa@ltsc.org.