Click on the links below for Lesson Plans, Project Ideas, and Additional Resources.

LESSON PLANS (Middle School-High School):

MAX EBEL Internment, Culture, Freedom, and Government

Grade Level: High School

History, English Language Arts, English Literacy

The World War II Alien Enemy Program: An Overview
Developed by the German-American Internee Coalition. Used with permission.

The Alien Enemies Act, Explained / Brennan Center for Justice

Smithsonian Education / Dear Miss Breed / Letters from young, incarcerated Japanese Americans, coupled with Smithsonian’s Japanese-American Internment, How Young People Saw It

When the Emperor was Divine by Julie Otsuka. Published 2002, Alfred A. Knopf.Awards: American Library Association’s Alex Award in 2003 and also an Asian American Literary Award.National Endowment for the Arts “The Big Read” / Reader Resources / When the Emperor Was Divine

LINKS OF INTEREST:

Library of Congress, Ansel Adams photographs of Manzanar War Relocation Center

The Library of Congress, The FDR Library and Museum, New York Public Library and other online sites have valuable primary-source material that relate to WWII internment. Some of these resources have a mix of public domain and copyrighted resources. Always read terms and conditions of use!

Search the Library of Congress Collection

Search the FDR Library and Museum

Search the New York Public Library Collection

SUGGESTED READING:

Imaging Japanese America: The Visual Construction of Citizenship, Nation, and the Body by Elena Tajima Creef.

As we have been reminded by the renewed acceptance of racial profiling, and the detention and deportation of hundreds of immigrants of Arab and Muslim descent on unknown charges following September 11, in times of national crisis we take refuge in the visual construction of citizenship in order to imagine ourselves as part of a larger, cohesive national American community.

Beginning with another moment of national historical trauma—December 7, 1941 and the subsequent internment of 120,000 Japanese Americans—Imaging Japanese America unearths stunning and seldom seen photographs of Japanese Americans by the likes of Dorothea Lange, Ansel Adams, and Toyo Mitatake.

Farewell to Manzanar / The true story of one spirited Japanese American family’s attempt to survive the indignities of forced detention.

When the Emperor was Divine by Julie Otsuka. Published 2002, Alfred A. Knopf.Awards: American Library Association’s Alex Award in 2003 and also an Asian American Literary Award.

Return to All Chroniclers of American History >