Japanese Eyes, American Heart

Politics of Race, Nation, and Masculinity in Japanese American Veterans’ WWII Narratives

Bibliographic Data

ID2387900
AuthorsMire Koikari (0000-0002-1767-0671, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, corresponding author)
Year2010
Volume12
Issue5
Pages547-564
Publication date2010-08-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueMen and Masculinities (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1097-184X • E-ISSN: 1552-6828
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/1097184x09337092
OpenAlexW2128446495
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited21

Japanese American veterans' narratives of World War II (WWII) constitute a dynamic discursive site where heterogeneous and contradictory understandings of masculinity, military service, and national allegiance are articulated. While loyalty and patriotism often stand out as dominant themes in their narratives, their retelling of wartime military service by no means provides a uniform picture of heroic masculinity and patriotic nationalism. Having suffered from race- and gender-based dislocation as colored immigrant men in US history, Japanese American veterans' narratives necessarily include moments of ambiguity, contradiction, and disruption and reveal the complex nature of minority men's assertion to national belonging. By examining diverse and often contestatory voices of Japanese American veterans, this essay illuminates how minority men's retelling of military service contradicts and even subverts the dominant understandings of war, masculinity, and nation

Allegiance · Art · Contradiction · Literature · Loyalty · Masculinity · Military service · Narrative · Nationalism · Patriotism · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Vietnam War · World War II · Asian American and Pacific Histories · Gender Studies · Law · Race, History, and American Society · World Wars: History, Literature, and Impact

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