Current projects:
Difficult Knowledge and the University: Race, Redress and (Re)presentation in the Exclusion Zone
UBC Hampton Established Scholar Award, 2015-2017
Amy Scott Metcalfe, PI
Description:
This project will examine textual and visual materials associated with ceremonies held from 2008-2012 on selected university campuses in the United States and Canada to confer honorary degrees to former students of Japanese ancestry who were forced to leave their studies in 1942 as part of WWII internment orders. The literature on institutional racism raises questions of institutional responsibility and the potential or limitation of redress efforts undertaken in part through honorary degree ceremonies, particularly considering the overlapping concerns of the racialized and marketized university.
Research Questions:
- How have leading research universities offered redress for their (in)actions toward Japanese heritage students during WWII? How do the responses compare within and between the institutions, and to what might these differences or similarities be attributed?
- How does the (re)presentation of Japanese internment align or not with university strategies and commitments toward community engagement and diversity?
Methods:
The project is designed as an international-comparative case study of five leading universities in British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, California, and Arizona, located in the areas that comprise the Exclusion Zone from which approximately 3,335 postsecondary students of Japanese ancestry were forcibly removed during WWII. Honorary degree ceremonies were held for the 1942 cohort at four of five case study universities during 2008-2012. The content and context of redress will be explored through inter-textual discourse analysis and critical content analysis of visual and textual materials, such as primary documents, web-based archives, photographs, web-based informational exhibits, videos, speeches, degree ceremony programs, biographies, news stories, and press releases.