Bibliography of the Japanese American Internment during World War II

This is a bibliography of the Japanese American internment during World War II. It includes English-language academic books, including translations, and journal articles surveying the history of the Japanese American internment.

During World War II, about 120,000 people of Japanese descent were forcibly relocated and incarcerated in ten internment camps in the United States, operated by the War Relocation Authority (WRA), mostly in the western interior of the country. About two-thirds were U.S. citizens. These actions were initiated by Executive Order 9066, issued by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on February 19, 1942, following Imperial Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. About 127,000 Japanese Americans then lived in the continental U.S., of whom about 112,000 were removed from the West Coast. About 80,000 were Nisei ('second generation'; American-born Japanese with U.S. citizenship) and Sansei ('third generation', the children of Nisei). The rest were Issei ('first generation') immigrants born in Japan, who were ineligible for citizenship. In Hawaii, where more than 150,000 Japanese Americans comprised more than one-third of the territory's population, only about 1,330 were incarcerated.

Works listed here are cited in the notes or bibliographies of scholarly sources. Each is published by an academic or major press, written by a recognized expert, or substantially reviewed in scholarly journals; borderline cases are omitted. A selection of primary sources are included. Many of the books below carry their own bibliographies; see the Further reading section for other bibliographies, and the External links section for historical sites, academic sites, and museums.

Citations follow APA style. Book have citations to academic journal or mainstream published reviews when available. For books only partly about the subject, relevant chapter or section titles are provided when useful and available. Translators of the original-language edition are included when possible. In cases where a title or name has appeared with more than one English spelling, the most recent published form is used and a footnote documents any earlier title under which the work appeared.

Bibliography

General studies Abe, F., & Cheung, F. (Eds.). (2024). The literature of Japanese American incarceration. Penguin Classics. Abe, F., Nimura, T., Ishikawa, R., & Sasaki, M. (2021). We hereby refuse: Japanese American resistance to wartime incarceration. Chin Music Press. Adachi, K. (1976). The enemy that never was: A history of the Japanese Canadians. McClelland and Stewart. Alinder, J. (2009). Moving images: Photography and the Japanese American incarceration. University of Illinois Press. Allen, G. (1950). Hawaii's war years, 1941–1945. University of Hawaii Press. Austin, A. W. (2004). From concentration camp to campus: Japanese American students and World War II. University of Illinois Press. Azuma, E. (2005). Between two empires: Race, history, and transnationalism in Japanese America. Oxford University Press. Barbour, A. D. (2017). "For the good of our country": Ruth Watanabe and the "good that is in music" at the Santa Anita Detention Center. Notes, 74(2), 221–234. Blankenship, A. M. (2016). Christianity, social justice, and the Japanese American incarceration during World War II. University of North Carolina Press. Bloom, L. (1947). Transitional adjustments of Japanese-American families to relocation. American Sociological Review, 12(2), 201–209. Bloom, L., & Riemer, R. (1949). Removal and return: The socio-economic effects of the war on Japanese Americans. University of California Press. Burton, J. F., Farrell, M. M., Lord, F. B., & Lord, R. W. (1999). Confinement and ethnicity: An overview of World War II Japanese American relocation sites. Western Archeological and Conservation Center, National Park Service. Camp, S. L. (2016). Landscapes of Japanese American internment. Historical Archaeology, 50(1), 169–186. Camp, S. L. (2018). Vision and ocular health at a World War II internment camp. World Archaeology, 50(3), 530–546. Chee, T. (2020). We are not free. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Chiang, C. Y. (2018). Nature behind barbed wire: An environmental history of the Japanese American incarceration. Oxford University Press. Chin, A. (2005). Long-run labor market effects of Japanese American internment during World War II on working-age male internees. Journal of Labor Economics, 23(3), 491–525. Coffman, T. (2021). Inclusion: How Hawaii protected Japanese Americans from mass internment, transformed itself, and changed America. University of Hawaii Press. Coleman, R. K. (2023). "Public enemy number one": The resistance of Japanese Americans in concentration camps, 1942–1946. Armstrong Undergraduate Journal of History, 13(2), Article 7. Conner, N. N. (2006). From internment to Indiana: Japanese Americans, the War Relocation Authority, the Disciples of Christ, and citizen committees in Indianapolis. Indiana Magazine of History, 102(2), 89–116. Copeland, J. (2016). Stay for a dollar a day: California's church hostels during the Japanese American resettlement, 1945–1947. California History, 93(4), 42–66. Crawford, C. (2013). From desert dust to city soot: Environmental justice and Japanese American internment in Karen Tei Yamashita's Tropic of Orange. MELUS, 38(3), 86–106. Daniels, R. (1971). Concentration camps USA: Japanese Americans and World War II. Holt, Rinehart and Winston. Daniels, R. (1975). The decision to relocate the Japanese Americans. Robert E. Krieger Publishing Company. Daniels, R. (1981). Concentration camps, North America: Japanese in the United States and Canada during World War II. Robert E. Krieger Publishing Company. Daniels, R. (1993). Prisoners without trial: Japanese Americans in World War II. Hill and Wang. Daniels, R., Taylor, S. C., & Kitano, H. H. L. (Eds.). (1991). Japanese Americans: From relocation to redress (Rev. ed.). University of Washington Press. Eisenberg, E. (2003). "As truly American as your son": Voicing opposition to internment in three West Coast cities. Oregon Historical Quarterly, 104(4), 542–565. Fiset, L. (1999). Public health in World War II assembly centers for Japanese Americans. Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 73(4), 565–584. Foster, K. (2015). Teaching literacy behind barbed wire in WWII: Elementary schools in Japanese-American internment camps in Arkansas. Childhood Education, 91(5), 378–387. Friedlander, E. J. (1985). Freedom of press behind barbed wire: Paul Yokota and the Jerome Relocation Center newspaper. The Arkansas Historical Quarterly, 44(4), 303–313. Gesensway, D., & Roseman, M. (1987). Beyond words: Images from America's concentration camps. Cornell University Press. Girdner, A., & Loftis, A. (1969). The great betrayal: The evacuation of the Japanese Americans during World War II. Macmillan. Greenberg, C. L. (1995). Black and Jewish responses to Japanese internment. Journal of American Ethnic History, 14(2), 3–37. Grodzins, M. (1949). Americans betrayed: Politics and the Japanese evacuation. University of Chicago Press. Grodzins, M. (1955). Making un-Americans. The American Journal of Sociology, 60(6), 570–582. Hansen, A. A. (2023). Manzanar mosaic: Essays and oral histories on America's first World War II Japanese American concentration camp. University Press of Colorado. Harth, E. (1993). Children of Manzanar. The Massachusetts Review, 34(3), 367–391. Hayashi, B. M. (2004). Democratizing the enemy: The Japanese American internment. Princeton University Press. Hinnershitz, S. (2019). The 1942 Santa Anita detainment center labor strike and Japanese American incarceration during World War II. Southern California Quarterly, 101(3), 285–316. Hinnershitz, S. D. (2021). Japanese American incarceration: The camps and coerced labor during World War II. University of Pennsylvania Press. Ichioka, Y. (2006). Before internment: Essays in prewar Japanese American history (E. Azuma & G. H. Chang, Eds.). Stanford University Press. Ivey, L. L., & Kaatz, K. W. (2017). Citizen internees: A second look at race and citizenship in Japanese American internment camps. Praeger. Iwamura, J. N. (2007). Critical faith: Japanese Americans and the birth of a new civil religion. American Quarterly, 59(3), 937–968. Jensen, G. M. (1999). System failure: Health-care deficiencies in the World War II Japanese American detention centers. Bulletin of the History of Medicine, 73(4), 602–628. Kashima, T. (2003). Judgment without trial: Japanese American imprisonment during World War II. University of Washington Press. Kumamoto, B. (1979). The search for spies: American counterintelligence and the Japanese American community, 1931–1942. Amerasia Journal, 6(2), 45–75. Leighton, A. H. (1945). The governing of men: General principles and recommendations based on experience at a Japanese relocation camp. Princeton University Press. Leonard, K. A. (1990). "Is that what we fought for?" Japanese Americans and racism in California: The impact of World War II. The Western Historical Quarterly, 21(4), 463–482. Linke, K. (2009). Dominance, resistance, and cooperation in the Tanforan Assembly Center. Amerikastudien / American Studies, 54(4), 621–655. Mirikitani, J. (1978). Awake in the river. Isthmus Press. Mirikitani, J. (1987). Shedding silence. Celestial Arts. Muller, E. L. (2001). Free to die for their country: The story of the Japanese American draft resisters in World War II. University of Chicago Press. Muller, E. L. (2019). The War Relocation Authority and the wounding of Japanese American loyalty. Social Research, 86(3), 821–839. Muller, E. L. (2023). Lawyer, jailer, ally, foe: Complicity and conscience in America's World War II concentration camps. University of North Carolina Press. Nagata, D. K. (1990). The Japanese American internment: Exploring the transgenerational consequences of traumatic stress. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 3(1), 47–69. Nagata, D. K. (1990). The Japanese American internment: Perceptions of moral community, fairness, and redress. Journal of Social Issues, 46(1), 133–146. Nagata, D. K. (1993). Legacy of injustice: Exploring the cross-generational impact of the Japanese American internment. Plenum Press. Nagata, D. K., Kim, J. H. J., & Nguyen, T. U. (2015). Processing cultural trauma: Intergenerational effects of the Japanese American incarceration. Journal of Social Issues, 71(2), 356–370. Nagata, D. K., Kim, J. H. J., & Wu, K. (2019). The Japanese American wartime incarceration: Examining the scope of racial trauma. American Psychologist, 74(1), 36–48. Nagata, D. K., Trierweiler, S. J., & Talbot, R. (1999). Long-term effects of internment during early childhood on third-generation Japanese Americans. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 69(1), 19–29. Ng, W. L. (2002). Japanese American internment during World War II: A history and reference guide. Greenwood Press. Nobe, L. N. (1999). The Children's Village at Manzanar: The World War II eviction and detention of Japanese American orphans. Journal of the West, 38(2), 65–71. O'Brien, D. J., & Fugita, S. S. (1991). The Japanese American experience. Indiana University Press. Okada, J. (1957). No-no boy. Charles E. Tuttle. Okihiro, G. Y. (1984). Religion and resistance in America's concentration camps. Phylon, 45(3), 220–233. Okihiro, G. Y. (1996). Whispered silences: Japanese Americans and World War II. University of Washington Press. Okihiro, G. Y. (1999). Storied lives: Japanese American students and World War II. University of Washington Press. Okihiro, G. Y. (Ed.). (2013). Encyclopedia of Japanese American internment. Greenwood. Okihiro, G. Y., & Sly, J. (1983). The press, Japanese Americans, and the concentration camps. Phylon, 44(1), 66–83. Pak, Y. K. (2002). Wherever I go, I will always be a loyal American: Schooling Seattle's Japanese Americans during World War II. RoutledgeFalmer.