In this exchange, a commissioner pressed witnesses on whether the legacy of the WWII incarceration camps left a lasting “camp spirit” that continues to shape discrimination against Japanese Americans.

• Commissioner’s Question: Did the incarceration experience itself reinforce racism in U.S. society—denying Japanese Americans equal opportunities in jobs, housing, and education? Are present-day difficulties traceable to camp, or to broader institutional and personal discrimination?

• Witness’s Answer:

  
  

  • Camp experiences deeply influenced education and career paths.

  • Many Nisei avoided creative fields (writing, fine arts, liberal arts) where standards were subjective and vulnerable to bias. Instead, they pushed into sciences, engineering, and mathematics—fields with concrete, measurable benchmarks of achievement.

  • This was both recognition of discrimination and a carryover lesson from camp and resettlement: don’t stand out, don’t be “too Japanese,” and assimilate to survive.

  • Nisei parents passed these lessons on to Sansei children, channeling them into fields seen as safer and more defensible against prejudice.

  
  

Key Theme: The incarceration not only stripped Japanese Americans of homes and livelihoods—it also narrowed their children’s choices for the future, reinforcing assimilation pressures and steering generations away from creative fields.