UC to award honorary degrees to interned Japanese American students

[Coventina]

Source: Los Angeles Times

Reporting from San Francisco -- Grace Obata Amemiya was a pre-nursing student at UC Berkeley in 1942 when she, her family and 120,000 other Japanese Americans were forced from their schools and homes and sent to federal internment camps. The wartime relocations destroyed her childhood dream of a University of California diploma.

Amemiya, now 88, joyfully returned to UC on Thursday and was named a graduate six decades late.

The UC Board of Regents agreed Thursday to grant honorary degrees to all Japanese Americans who were students at the university during World War II and whose educations were interrupted by the forced relocations. The decision at the board's meeting in San Francisco marked the first time in 37 years that the regents have bestowed such degrees, making an exception to a moratorium intended to help avoid political pressures or the appearance of favoritism.

"I felt so honored. I've been floating way up there and my two feet have not come down yet," Amemiya told the regents in a speech that held her audience spellbound.

She said she and many Japanese American classmates regretted that they had never been able to return to the campus she still affectionately calls "Cal." "So it's been a part of our lives and expectations were not complete," Amemiya said.


Read more: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-uc-japanese17-2009jul17,0,3410225.story

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This story wins my "bittersweet" award for the day....

[no_hypocrisy]

1. And if the Gimo inmates survive 60 more years, will they get their degrees too?

[Paladin]

2. Memo To Michelle Malkin: Fuck You. (n/t)

[WriteDown]

3. Good.

Something that is never really talked about.

[Igel]

5. Depends where you are.

In the '90s, the UCLA student paper managed to discuss the internment camps in California fairly often.

[LeftishBrit]

4. Good

Over 60 years late; but still a bit of good news, and touching in a way.