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Seen and Unseen: What Dorothea Lange, Toyo Miyatake, and Ansel Adams's Photographs Reveal About the Japanese American Incarceration



by
Elizabeth Partridge
illustrated by
Lauren Tamaki

Edition
Hardcover edition
Publisher
Chronicle Books
Imprint
Chronicle
ISBN
9781452165103
POTENTIALLY SENSITIVE AREAS
Discrimination: Racial Insensitivity/Racism , Violence: War/Harsh Realities of War
$23.57   $19.64
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This important work of nonfiction features powerful images of the Japanese American incarceration captured by three photographers—Dorothea Lange, Toyo Miyatake, and Ansel Adams—along with firsthand accounts of this grave moment in history.

Three months after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941, US President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered the incarceration of all Japanese and Japanese Americans living on the West Coast of the United States. Families, teachers, farm workers—all were ordered to leave behind their homes, their businesses, and everything they owned. Japanese and Japanese Americans were forced to live under hostile conditions in incarceration camps, their futures uncertain.

Three photographers set out to document life at Manzanar, an incarceration camp in the California desert:

Dorothea Lange was a photographer from San Francisco best known for her haunting Depression-era images. Dorothea was hired by the US government to record the conditions of the camps. Deeply critical of the policy, she wanted her photos to shed light on the harsh reality of incarceration.

Toyo Miyatake was a Japanese-born, Los Angeles–based photographer who lent his artistic eye to portraying dancers, athletes, and events in the Japanese community. Imprisoned at Manzanar, he devised a way to smuggle in photographic equipment, determined to show what was really going on inside the barbed-wire confines of the camp.

Ansel Adams was an acclaimed landscape photographer and environmentalist. Hired by the director of Manzanar, Ansel hoped his carefully curated pictures would demonstrate to the rest of the United States the resilience of those in the camps.

In Seen and Unseen, Elizabeth Partridge and Lauren Tamaki weave together these photographers' images, firsthand accounts, and stunning original art to examine the history, heartbreak, and injustice of the Japanese American incarceration.



Map of Japanese American internment camps during WWII. “After the War.” “Why Words Matter.” “Citizenship Violated.” “Civil Liberties and the Constitution.” Brief biographies of the three photographers. Author’s note. Illustrator’s note. “The Damage of the Model Minority Myth” by Lauren Tamaki. Notes. Black-and white-photographs. Full-color illustrations. 

POTENTIALLY SENSITIVE AREAS
Discrimination: Racial Insensitivity/Racism , Violence: War/Harsh Realities of War

Details

Format

Print

Page Count

132

Trim Size

10" x 8"

Dewey

940.53

AR

0: points 0

Lexile

990L

Genre

NonFic

Scholastic Reading Counts

0

JLG Release

Apr 2023

Book Genres

Narrative Nonfiction

Topics

Toyo Miyatake (1895–1979). Dorothea Lange (1895–1965). Ansel Adams (1902–1984). Manzanar War Relocation Center. California. Twentieth-century US history. Forced removal and internment of Japanese Americans, 1942–1945. World War II (1939–1945). Incarceration. Photographs and photography.

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Praise & Reviews

School Library Journal

School Library Journal

Library Journal

Gr 5 Up—Art reflects the harsh realities of life in this emotional look at the World War II incarceration of Japanese Americans, filtered through the lenses of three very different photographers. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which forcibly relocated all Japanese immigrants and their descendants, many who were American citizens, into concentration camps. The War Relocation Authority commissioned photographer Dorothea Lange to capture images of the internment to prove the process was being done ethically. Lange, who opposed the fear-mongering endeavor, instead used her camera to show the absurdity of calling these average Americans "threats." Toyo Miyatake, himself a Manzanar prisoner, used a secretly constructed camera to take candid shots of the bleak facilities, but also of the supportive community that surrounded him. Ansel Adams had not opposed the incarceration, but by the end of the war felt that loyal citizens should be welcomed back to society. Adams used carefully posed portraits to show exactly what Lange's work initially underscored—how ridiculous it was to suggest a child or grandfather was a dangerous spy. In stark contrast to the heartbreaking subject matter, Tamaki's gorgeous black, white, and red illustrations work in tandem with Lange, Miyatake, and Adams's photographs to paint a devastatingly beautiful picture of both the injustice of the incarceration and the right to humane treatment, which they were denied. Coupled with Partridge's simple, perfect writing and back matter that deepens the text, this is a work that will haunt readers. VERDICT An essential first purchase.—Abby Bussen

Praise & Reviews

School Library Journal

School Library Journal

Library Journal

Gr 5 Up—Art reflects the harsh realities of life in this emotional look at the World War II incarceration of Japanese Americans, filtered through the lenses of three very different photographers. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, which forcibly relocated all Japanese immigrants and their descendants, many who were American citizens, into concentration camps. The War Relocation Authority commissioned photographer Dorothea Lange to capture images of the internment to prove the process was being done ethically. Lange, who opposed the fear-mongering endeavor, instead used her camera to show the absurdity of calling these average Americans "threats." Toyo Miyatake, himself a Manzanar prisoner, used a secretly constructed camera to take candid shots of the bleak facilities, but also of the supportive community that surrounded him. Ansel Adams had not opposed the incarceration, but by the end of the war felt that loyal citizens should be welcomed back to society. Adams used carefully posed portraits to show exactly what Lange's work initially underscored—how ridiculous it was to suggest a child or grandfather was a dangerous spy. In stark contrast to the heartbreaking subject matter, Tamaki's gorgeous black, white, and red illustrations work in tandem with Lange, Miyatake, and Adams's photographs to paint a devastatingly beautiful picture of both the injustice of the incarceration and the right to humane treatment, which they were denied. Coupled with Partridge's simple, perfect writing and back matter that deepens the text, this is a work that will haunt readers. VERDICT An essential first purchase.—Abby Bussen

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