In Matt's essay, he analyzes the differences between adults and children in pictures from internment. He explains this discrepancy by asserting that the adults are trying to be the model minority for the press and also, if the adults are aware that the children are looking to them as examples, they want to seem as happy as possible. This agrees with my thesis in that there are noticeable differences between children and adults in these pictures. The one picture from my photo series that most clearly functions with both papers is the one of the mother and her children outside the barracks. The mother is gathering her children and smiling at the camera, in direct contrast with their bemused expressions. Perhaps the reason for her cheerfulness stems from her desire to be a good role model for her children or perhaps she is trying to pose for the camera in an effort to maintain the "model minority" label.
Bainbridge Island Japanese American Community was the first to be sent to internment camps. As such, the inhabitants of this area had no warning of what was to happen to them. This makes them the perfect subjects for a photographic study of the children, because their confusion, their sadness was the truest. The little boy on the train with the American flag was their whole community, convinced that this was a mistake, that they were American, that surely someone would figure it out. As the days became months, the truth set in that they were to remain interned until such time as the government decided to let them out. Their neighbors, whom they had lived beside for their entire lives, knew what was happening and made no moves to change it. These children were left hopeless, listless, as seen in the photographs. Everything they had been told about the world, about fairness and happily ever after, was shattered the longer they were in the camps, sending them into a spiral of disbelief and confusion. However, when they were liberated, the world made sense again. They were free, someone had come for them, they once again had a shot at the American dream. The children were still too young to be jaded, and immediately after they received news of their impending freedom, they bounced back to the animated, multidimensional children they had been before internment. They finally looked like children again because they were finally able to be childish and encounter the world with childlike wonder.
Bainbridge Island Japanese American Community was the first to be sent to internment camps. As such, the inhabitants of this area had no warning of what was to happen to them. This makes them the perfect subjects for a photographic study of the children, because their confusion, their sadness was the truest. The little boy on the train with the American flag was their whole community, convinced that this was a mistake, that they were American, that surely someone would figure it out. As the days became months, the truth set in that they were to remain interned until such time as the government decided to let them out. Their neighbors, whom they had lived beside for their entire lives, knew what was happening and made no moves to change it. These children were left hopeless, listless, as seen in the photographs. Everything they had been told about the world, about fairness and happily ever after, was shattered the longer they were in the camps, sending them into a spiral of disbelief and confusion. However, when they were liberated, the world made sense again. They were free, someone had come for them, they once again had a shot at the American dream. The children were still too young to be jaded, and immediately after they received news of their impending freedom, they bounced back to the animated, multidimensional children they had been before internment. They finally looked like children again because they were finally able to be childish and encounter the world with childlike wonder.