R2 Excerpts - Angie Woodmansee

Veronica Bruscini:

“Historical accounts and literary representations share the weight and burden inherent in combating the specter of ‘historical erasure.’ Dominant society masks events embarrassing or damaging to its reputation, while the passage of time silences ‘dissenting’ narratives by solidifying popular familiarity with an ‘official’ version of history. Yet the power of one voice – one willing to counter and contradict constructions of discourse by revealing the untold reports of eyewitnesses to history – creates indelible impressions and cracks open a door, inviting others to join in telling the story…Recreating historical evidence through a fictional lens adds further nuance to the storytelling power of the dissenting voice. Fiction provides a snapshot of the protagonist’s innermost thoughts, an unconscious level of confession which captures both the audience’s attention and imagination… [in ‘Wilshire Bus’] Esther’s sudden recognition of her indifferent ‘us vs. them’ dismissal is coupled with the abrupt remembrance of her own repressed experience in reversed circumstances. The implications are great for the individual (Esther, Yamamoto, the reader) and politically at a national/international level as well.”

Anna Sophia Moran:

“However, can one say the same about Asian-American fiction? Have there been many famous literary pieces blatantly depicting the horrors and injustices that Japanese-American Nisei underwent in World War II, or the challenges Chinese immigrants faced when constructing the railroads during the Gold Rush? In my opinion, there are significantly fewer Asian-American politically charged works of fiction compared to those of other ethnic minorities…In Rabbit in the Moon, those interviewed talked about how the Japanese confinement faded in the background as it was not as extreme as the other atrocities that were going on during the war. Some also believed that Asian cultures by practice dislike attracting attention and creating disorder, hence the submissiveness of Asian-American voices throughout history (we see a prime example of this in Yamamoto’s “Wilshire Bus”)…after reading all these pieces, I found myself appreciating pieces like Kingston’s and Yamamoto’s even more because, though many may criticize their lack of political will, their style of writing had an ability to take me to these places – from Gold Mountain to the heart of an internment camp – and let me understand on my own what these characters suffered for the equality of future generations of Asian-Americans.”

Anushka Zafar:

“But why is it that I had no knowledge of Japanese internment camps in the United States during WWII? Is it simply because of my educational background in a school in Bangladesh? It was an American school! Or is it actually the lack of focus on such an important part of American history in any textbook anywhere in the world? It is truly a ‘sin of omission’…I assumed [Miss Sasagawara] was distrusting of those around her maybe because she thought people were spying on her due to her heritage and so her loyalties could have lied elsewhere. But eventually it occurred to me that she was simply traumatized from her past experiences and from being subjugated to stay in an internment camp. In fact, just like the narrator, I too was committing the sin of omission; as Elliot point out about this particular story, ‘Kiku…too is rather naïve and self-absorbed youth who, though without any malicious intent, commits sins of omission by contriburing to the camp-wide practice of evading and misreading signs of the trauma of internment evident in the character of Miss Sasagawara.’ (63)”

Keen Hahn:

“Instead of the response of sympathy and compassion that she wishes to exhibit, Esther feels ‘detached’ and finds herself ‘wondering whether the [racist] man meant her in his exclusion order or whether she was identifiably Japanese’ (Yamamoto 36). The trauma of the camps and the ‘exclusion’ exhibited on the bus taken to an extreme level towards her people has left Esther unable to react to the situation on the bus properly. She is incapable of action because the prescriptions of the white culture have placed her in a position of subalternity, thus rendering her voiceless. As Elliot states, the story ‘explores the submerged personal and historical trauma that precipitates [Esther’s] silence and cultivates [her] consent’ toward the interpellative and Orientalist white gaze (55, 56). This gives the reader a physicalized/emotionalized image of the impact of internment on the psyche of the Japanese people and the conditioning that resulted from it. Thus, through an emotionally charged narrative, Yamamoto drives home the terribleness of internment without any statistics or objective figures.”

Tin-Yan Chan:

“Although in ‘Wilshire Bus,’ Esther does not take a stance in defending the couple on the bus, it does not go against Yamamoto’s opinion on political will. She acknowledges Ester’s cowardliness in her writing. There is more to the story than merely silence…The racism Esther experiences on the bus reminds her of her time spent at the internment camp, and she therefore detaches herself from it…[Yamamoto] includes the oppression subtly in the story, therefore including her own political will without blatantly announcing it through Esther’s actions. The moral of the story is to speak up for what one believes in. Due to Esther’s repressive past, she is unable to do so. Yamamoto sees Esther’s silence as a lack of political will. Although the protagonist of her story lacks political will, Yamamoto makes it apparent that Esther is a coward for not speaking up, therefore indicating that she does not live her life like the women she writes about in her stories.”