WEBINAR | Implicated Subjects in the Landscapes of Injustice

Free and open to all

Registration and details

Join preeminent Holocaust scholar Michael Rothberg (UCLA) and Landscapes of Injustice Project Director, Jordan Stanger-Ross (Uvic) with moderator Charlotte Schallié (UVic) for a conversation about the legacies of historical injustice.

Reflecting on the intersections and differences between their respective areas of research, they’ll discuss the present imperatives that emerge from histories of harm. Rothberg’s recent work has explored the transformative possibilities of recognizing that most of us are implicated, in one way or another, in past wrongs. Stanger-Ross’s focus on the dispossession of Japanese Canadians has led him to conclude that we are “heirs to landscapes of injustice.” In this session, students and members of the general public are invited to ask where they fit into the histories that they inherit.

Presented in association with Landscapes of Injustice and the US Holocaust Memorial Museum.

ABOUT THE BOOK

In 1942, the Canadian government forced more than 21,000 Japanese Canadians from their homes in British Columbia. They were told to bring only one suitcase each and officials vowed to protect the rest. Instead, Japanese Canadians were dispossessed, all their belongings either stolen or sold.

The definitive statement of a major national research partnership, Landscapes of Injustice: A New Perspective on the Internment and Dispossession of Japanese Canadians reinterprets the internment of Japanese Canadians by focusing on the deliberate and permanent destruction of home through the act of dispossession. All forms of property were taken. Families lost heirlooms and everyday possessions. They lost decades of investment and labour. They lost opportunities, neighbourhoods, and communities; they lost retirements, livelihoods, and educations. When Japanese Canadians were finally released from internment in 1949, they had no homes to return to. Asking why and how these events came to pass and charting Japanese Canadians' diverse responses, this book details the implications and legacies of injustice perpetrated under the cover of national security.