Author's Department

Sociology

Language

English (en)

Date of Award

1944

Degree Type

Open Access Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (AM/MA)

Abstract

In the spring and summer of 1942, 110,000 persons of Japanese ancestry were removed from their places of residence in California and the western half of Washington and Oregon and placed in temporary assembly centers, which were close to their former homes. They were then moved to the ten relocation centers under the supervision of the Relocation Authority. It has been from these relocation centers, which from the beginning have been intended to provide only basic living until jobs and the absences of hostility could be found in places outside of the military area defined by the Western Defense Command, that more than 26,000 persons have resettled, primarily in urban communities of the Middle-west and the East. 110,000 persons of varying degrees of integration into the larger American society were subjected to certain set of uniform events and factors which clearly differentiated them from that society after the outbreak of the war. All persons evacuated had some proportion of Japanese ancestry in their background, which was the sole determiner in whether or not persons were to be moved. The procedures and rules und regulations were to be applied to all such persons restricting their behavior in the assembly centers. The elements of crowded living in barrack dwellings and block mess halls, isolation from the racially heterogeneous society they once knew, and the conscious or unconscious sense of stagnation or retrogression in the relocation centers were common to the entire evacuated population. But of primary interest to the sociologist was the common shattering of the forms of behavior among individuals, groups, classes, communities, and institutions—almost complete dissolution of the various patterns of interpersonal and social behavior that had slowly evolved and had become differentiated from birth among marginal population. The 436 newcomers of Japanese ancestry in Saint Louis since the war hove all experienced these events and situations and that of venturing from the superficially absolute security of the relocation centers. The only exceptions were the five or so evacuees who left the military area before the restriction of voluntary movement. However, all have seen the disintegration of their place in society as they knew it before the war.

Comments

Physical version held by Special Collections for library use only: https://catalog.wustl.edu:443/record=b1439441~S2

Download

Share

COinS