Gaman Art and Documentary

One Book, One Coast

Enjoy tea, watch "Defiant to the Last," and create bird pins!

Use Shrinky Dink paper to make small bird pins, inspired by gaman art, that represent beauty and individuality. The documentary Defiant to the Last will be screened during each craft session. It tells the story of the Tule Lake Segregation Center where dissident Japanese Americans were punished for speaking out against the false incarceration during World War II. 

Attend any session:

Thursdays, May 7, 14, 21, and 28
3:30–4:30pm

What is gaman art?

During WWII, Japanese Americans imprisoned in incarceration camps created what now known as gaman art, handmade objects fashioned from whatever limited materials were available to them. The word gaman roughly translates to “enduring the seemingly unbearable with patience and dignity,” and these works embodied that spirit. Gaman art served not only as a form of self-expression, but also as quiet resistance—an assertion of humanity, beauty, and agency in the face of injustice.

More about Defiant to the Last: 

For over 80 years, the iconic Tule Lake jail was a structure that remained a mystery. Why did the government build a jail inside the concentration camp? Piecing together government photos and reports, a chilling story of human and civil rights violations at the Tule Lake Segregation Center was revealed. Inmates were threatened and coerced into giving up birthright US citizenship, separated from their families, and removed to Department of Justice camps. Thousands were deported for daring to protest and resist the unjust WWII incarceration.

Documentary director, Emiko Omori, was incarcerated as a toddler with her family at Poston Concentration Camp, Arizona. She studied film at San Francisco State University. Producer Barbara Takei is a Sansei public historian raised in Detroit and is a graduate of Howard University, an HBCU.

This program is funded in part by the Friends of the Forks Library. 

This event is part of the One Book, One Coast program series and community book club.

One Book, One Coast brings together library systems across California, Washington State, and Oregon for a shared community reading program that celebrates literacy, learning, community, and civil discourse. All participating libraries will read and discuss They Called Us Enemy by George Takei.

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