Prejudice And Discrimination In Snow Falling On Cedars Essay

How does Guterson present the prejudice and discrimination against the Japanese Americans in chapter 1-15 of play false F entirelying on Cedars.This book shows a great difference among cultures on the island of San Piedro. To range with the island is a rattling cosmopolitan island with its residents every last(predicate) from different backgrounds and countries, Japan, England, Ger galore(postnominal), Spain and Denmark to foretell a few. We can tell this from the long lists of shops and their owners on page three.Chapter one tells us more intimately San Piedro. It tells us of the great beauty of the island. The solitary palm and vales of alfalfa, careless roads and the animals. It also tells us more around the residents. It says that they are close knit, a lot are deeply religious, they are reverent and are of limited means. The island in very quiet and so the trial is a very big event for them, San Piedro generally lay clear of frenzy. They also seem serious minded and c onservative and traditional in their way of thinking.With the story being coiffe after the Second World fight and the bombing of Pearl Harbour the battalion of Japanese origin are experiencing the most discrimination on the island. In chapter four there is a video with the fishermen at Amity Harbour. When they are talking about the accused man Kabuo Miyamoto also a fisherman, Dale Middleton referred to him as Miyamoto, not his first name. He then goes on to call all Japanese suckers and says Never could tell them guys apart. The term Jap is used throughout the book to refer to the Japanese. This is very insulting and sounds kinda racialist and rude. The first time this is used is by fellow fisherman William Gjovaag. This is the first real indicator in the book of the Japanese status on the island.Ishmael Chambers is the islands reporter and he is of Irish and Scottish descent. His function in the book is to be the person who experiences an inter-cultural relationship with a Japanese American girl. He isnt a racist and his job as journalist is to give a fair view in the paper. He cant be seen as discriminating in the paper. We learn more about this relationship as we read into the book.When Horace Whaley the coroner and the local G.P. sees Carls injury on his head he speculates straight away. He says of Sheriff Art Moran he ought to start looking for a Jap with a bloody gun exactlyt a right-handed Jap to be precise. He suggested all this from one wound in Carls skull, and instantly thinks it was a Jap. We learn from chapter five dollar bill that Whaley is a war veteran and he feel bitter about the Japanese and this causes him to discriminate without any proof that it was a Jap to blame for the wound. Whaley wouldnt say any of this in court, under oath, because he had no strong evidence, but he would speculate if he didnt live to back it up.In chapter seven we learn that the Japanese people who are attending the trial sat at the back of the of the court room it says that they didnt have to bait at there but did so because San Piedro required it of them without calling it a law. The chapter then continues to talk about the racism inflicted on the Japanese in the work place. They werent referred to by their Christian names, but by numbers or names that the census taker decided for them, such as Jap recite 1 or Dwarf Jap. This was very racist and disrespectful for them, aswell as embarassing and hurtful. We pity this verbal abuse. They were given the worst, most dangerous jobs.As if they were so insignificant it didnt matter if they got injured. If this wasnt bad enough the Japanese werent even paid the same as the other workers. They were do to eternal sleep in barns and were treated like animals. They were on the same level as the Red Indians and treated with same amount of disrespect. Then in 1942 the government deported all of the Japanese workers out of San Piedro because of the start of the Second World War, they were s een as a threat or the enemy. Even though they were natives, it was thought that they could be spies for he Japanese government, and were therefore deported.Although many of the islanders were racist towards the Japanese some of the Japanese had their own views about the white people. To contrast Mrs. Shigemura taught Hatsue that white men were dangerous egomaniacs and that they had fantasises about Japanese girls and that it distorted their sex drives. Hatsue should marry a boy of her own kind whose heart is strongand good.This shows us that all Japanese people beginnert take the abuse. They practice their views like the white racists.The book carries a lot of detail about the Second World War and has many explanations and feelings during and after the war. Also in this chapter we learn about Kabuo, his Buddhism and beliefs. These beliefs say that everything has a soul and shouldnt be harmed and so he feels he carries the burden of war. The Americans didnt think about, or take in to consideration the fact that the Japanese Americans would be going out to fight their own kind, people from their homeland. Kabuo feels enormous guilt about this and carried it through out his whole life.Carls beget, Etta is asked to give evidence for the prosecution in chapter nine. She is a farmers daughter who was brought up in southwestern Germany and she is very hardworking and proud. From the evidence she presented in court we feel she isnt emotional in any way and that her traditional views make her seem set in her ways. It also becomes apparent that she is extremely racist and feels that the Japanese are below her. She negotiation about her husband who doesnt share her racist views and Kabous father and about how they had an agreement, when her husband died she totally ignored the agreement, which is what she unavoidablenessed to do in the first place.Carl was like his father in that he wasnt racist either, he was friends with Kabuo and worried about them and their sa fety when they are told top leave the country. He relates to them and sees them as individuals rather than one awful race, like Etta. Carls and his mothers views sometimes clashed. For example when he brought the fishing rod home that Kabuo gave him, she told him to take it back. Etta never gave Zanichi- Kabuos father and his family a guess and she always talked subject to him, even though he was evermore polite. This highlights the contrast between the two characters well and shows Etta to be old, bitter and twisted and very close-minded.When Etta tells the court about her and Kabuos conversation in chapter ten it emphasise Ettas cold hearted, selfish, pathetic ways. She says that Kabuo has a mean face. She doesnt realise that this is what the Japanese look like, and that it is unachievable to read their faces. Yet she doesntwant to learn or try either way. Ettas character conveys racism very clearly and depicts how low, hurtful and quite an an petty some of the islanders a ctually are. We see how these attitudes effect the Japanese and how they cause problems and conflict, yet these people feel that it is their right to act this way toward them.A description of Pearl Harbour is given in chapter thirteen. It also tells us of what happens to the Japanese after and how they are discriminated against. Their bank accounts were stopped because there is a slight chance that they may be traitors. Also in chapter thirteen we learn more about Arthur Chambers, like his son he isnt a racist at all and is a friend to the Japanese. He feels confusion when he hears the story of the bombing and doesnt know what to print in his paper, because he doesnt want to support or defend the actions of either the Americans or the Japanese. Instead he prints stories of Japanese contribution to the community. He is a balanced, stable character and isnt racist in any way and therefore contradicts other characters in the book such as Etta and Horace.We learnt that Ishmael wasnt rac ist right at the start of the book and here we start to find out why. Ishmael had his first relationship with Hatsue Imada who is Japanese. To Hatsue when she was growing up her relationship with Ishmael felt young, innocent and fun. They both(prenominal) enjoyed each others company and most of all liked each other. They found sanctuary in a hollowed out Cedar shoetree in the woods earlier on in the book. There they were hidden away from the world and werent effected by anything going on in the outside.There they could be themselves and it wouldnt matter that their love for each other was forbidden. Now in chapter thirteen the fortress of the cedar tree start to bechance apart. The war starts it and now the fact that their countries are against each other upsets Hatsue and she realises that they have to stop meeting, especially as the relationship is starting to get sexual. Ishmael doesnt see it that way he is naive and doesnt see the problem as clearly as Hatsue as she starts to feel she is deceiving her parents.The F.B.I search on the Imadas property takes place in chapter fourteen.They come at iniquity for the search. This instantly suggests they dont have the decency to come during the day they arrive at night to cause upset and grief. The family is referred to as the enemy and aliens which misplaces them from the San Piedro community instantly. The men take away guns, dynamite and swords they say that they are violent weapons and dont listen when they tell them that they are only used to assist them with farming the land.The big men also take cultural objects, like a flute, some medicament and hatsues scrapbook. This is unjust and they are abusing their authority and their warrant. ThEy root through their draws and rummage in their underwear, this is embarrassing and very disrespectful. One of the officers deliberately says Hisaos name incorrectly, this is very rude and must be frustrating because he said it wrong even when corrected. When the men un justly arrest him they try to justify it as a sacrifice, even though none of this mess was their fault.Everything is taken away from the Japanese and they are then sent away to camps. The baseball team lost its outflank players and this saddened many people so they dedicated the match to them. This makes us realise that most people in San Piedro dont want them to leave.Hatsue and her mother Fujiko have a conversation about the discrimination she has been suffering or that she will suffer later in life, Fujiko is a bias character because she has suspicions about all white people and she has a very pessimistic outlook. She tells her how she and Hatsues father were embarrassingly poor yet they got through it with dignity. She explained about how she feels invisible to the whites of the island and that she was and is constantly ignored, but they should all except this because that was how it was and nothing was going to change. She tells Hatsue that the Japanese are worthless to the w hites and their value is like dust in a strong wind.The expedition to Manzanar is discussed in chapter fifteen. There is no comfort and they are treated like animals and we feel for these people because they dont know the outcome of their fate, but they had to line up to the rules of the American Government. Fujiko tries to show she is strong by sufferinginwardly. The fact Manzanar is a desert we know there will be no escape and the hostile, barren, baking hot landscape will be a total contrast to San Piedro. Also in this chapter Fujiko finds out about Hatsue and Ishmaels relationship. This is quite hypocritical because she talks to Hatsue about how white always discriminate against them but here a white person is being kind and loving to her daughter and she gets so upset. This is quite a contrast and shows that the Japanese can be just as bad at discriminating.In these fifteen chapters we see the suffering of the Japanese at the hands of the white islanders. The Japanese could not help many of the reasons at all and a minority of Japanese Americas punished for a war between the country they currently live in and the country they originated from. We pity the Japanese throughout and understand why some of them are suspicious. Some of the islanders are constantly hateful, spiteful and rude, with no respect for their fellow human beings. Whereas others are polite and kind and treat them as they would anyone else. Guterson conveys this pity in many of the nasty comments made by the whit islanders. Like the term Jap and many of the awful things they were subject to at work. Even though a couple of the Japanese characters dont like whites. Much of the pity in the book is directed at the Japanese Americans.