Monthly Archives: November 2015

Hey bloggers!

For the last few weeks in ASTU, we have been reading and analyzing Joy Kogawa’s novel Obasan. Obasan is a novel about a Japanese family and their struggles in Canada during the Second World War. Although the novel is fiction, it is based on true events of Japanese mistreatement at the time. Most recently, we went to the Rare Books Archives in the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre to take a look at the Kogawa fond. The Kogawa fond consists of a collection of documents and letters related to the works of Joy Kogawa. As we have been reading Obasan by Joy Kogawa, seeing these documents and letters really brought the book to life.

In the Kogawa fond there are many boxes that contain orginal documents that Joy Kogawa herself used as well as fan letters and respondant letters from publishing companies. What surprised me that most was the amount of rejection letters that Kogawa received and the amount of drafts she had written before her novel was published. Although the novel itself is fictional, many people have acknowledged the effectiveness in which it delivers testimony of the mistreatment of Japanese people in Canada at the time. What had intruiged me about the novel was the fact that it was fiction, but still influenced the recording and remembering of an event that had actually taken place. In the Kogawa fond were many letters from people who had read the book and wanted to let Kogawa know the power and influence that Obasan had concerning real life events. There were also letters from people suggesting that the novel be translated in other languages so that it could be shared across the world.

By being able to see for ourselves the documents in which Kogawa used herself to write the novel and the criticisms she receieved, I learned things about the novel that I would not have otherwise known. Regardless of whether it is fiction or non-fiction, I would argue that literature that explores the struggles that people face can have a significant impact and call for change in the lives of many. It does not matter if they have experienced the same struggles or not, by reading literature about the struggles people face can help them understand and maybe even advocate for change.

On a side note, hope you are doing well and lets power through the last two weeks of the term!

Elizabeth

Hello everyone! It’s been a while since I have last blogged and recently in ASTU we have been focusing on the novel Obasan by Joy Kogawa.

In the novel, Kogawa goes through the process of remembering what she had experienced during the Japanese internment in Canada. At ths time, many Japanese Candians were discrimnated against because they were thought to be unloyal traitors and many believed that the Japanese Canadians would side with Japan in the war. However, it was more than just racism that the Japanese faced. They were sent to work to camps in Northern BC, families were separated, and all of their belongings were impounded. What surprised me about all this is how they treated all the innocent people.

My brother and I were born in Canada, but our parents and grandparents came from Vietnam. The treatment that the Japanese received made me think what if it had been my family that this happened to? How would that have effected my life growing up? It makes me wonder if I would have been silent like Obasan and Naomi or have spoken out like Aunt Emily. There are so many questions that run through my mind when I think about if the same thing had happened to Vietnamese people.

Many people come to Canada so that they can live better lives. Canada is usually seen as a country that is multicultural, diverse, and accepting of other cultures. However, the reason that people see Canada that way is because that is how we remember our national memory. For years we have been trying to forget the cruel things that have happened in the past instead of remembering them. Finally now we are beginning to realize that in order to move on we cannot just forget. We must remember and learn from what has happened and try to mend the relationships that have been destroyed.