Rice bowls and resistance: Cultural persistence at the ManzanarWar Relocation Center, California, 1942--1945

Abstract

Evidence for everyday resistance by Japanese American internees can be identified at the Manzanar War Relocation Center, California through an archaeological analysis of refuse deposits left by the internees. The center landfill contains ceramic tablewares in traditional Japanese forms such as rice and tea bowls, Japanese "dishes," and tiny and sake cups, indicating that internees maintained traditional Japanese foodways despite assimilation pressure from the War Relocation Authority and European American society. The cultural context of Japanese American internment and resistance is reconstructed using ethnographic, oral history, documentary, and archaeological data. This analysis of resistance at Manzanar suggests limitations of existing models of resistance and acculturation in historical archaeology and methods for exploring strategies of cultural persistence as resistance.