[BCMA] CMA Clip Serv: VIU students unearth cemetery mysteries

[Moderated BCMA subscriber listserv.]

Gotta be careful in reading this kind of reporting:

Either the journalist or the anthropologist has gotten carried away with the tendency to sensationalize fairly mundane historical subject matter (a run down "small cemetery") by injecting outrage ("wartime resentment and racism") in order to either gain attention or underscore the supposed importance of the task ahead.

Rather than confine the report to the fact that science-based reclamation of sacred remains in a small BC town is being planned, the author contextualizes the effort as rescuing the dead from hateful past depredations - both local and national.

"The story of the myth changes, but the characters are always the same," Gavin wrote. " The Aggrieved on one side, righteous, thirsting for justice, and Those to Blame, cruel and uncomprehending, on the other side."

>From this article, it doesn't appear that the Japanese are the aggrieved, but the VIU students instead, and by stuffing their project into that context, merely enshrouding graveyard neglect within the realm of present-day myth.

In other words, there was a strong climate of sanctioned anti-Orientalism (official racism, if you will) in BC before 1947; thousands of Japanese-Canadians were expelled from the West Coast to Interior and Prairie locations in 1942; their graveyards (and countless others) have been vandalized since time out of mind. But to imply the need to sort-out human remains and reclaim final resting plots for departed Cumberland BC Japanese is to correct earlier social injustices, looks as much to me like myth-building as a practical cemetery reconstructing.

As I said at the outset, we in museum work have to be careful in our reading . . . .

Dan Gallacher

----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Moderated BCMA subscriber listserv. 
  To: bcma at lists.vvv.com 
  Sent: Tuesday, December 21, 2010 10:14 AM
  Subject: [BCMA] CMA Clip Serv: VIU students unearth cemetery mysteries


  Vancouver Island University students unearth 
  mysteries of cemetery 
  Nanaimo Daily News, Monday, December 20, 2010 


  Vancouver Island University anthropology students want to unearth the mysteries of Cumberland's Japanese-Canadian cemetery in Coal Creek Historic Park. 


  In February 1942, the government of Canada ordered more than 20,000 residents of Japanese ancestry in Western Canada to relocate to "protected areas" in the B.C. interior. Japanese-Canadians in Cumberland were among those who lost their homes and most of their possessions as part of the security measure. 


  Fuelled by war-time resentment and racism, the small Japanese cemetery in Cumberland and others on Vancouver Island were vandalized and many of the grave markers were damaged or destroyed. 


  VIU professor Imogene Lim along with students in her Researching Community: A Practicum on Cumberland's Ethnic Landscape class, and Brent Schofield, a geography graduate who works at Lewkowich Engineering Associates in Nanaimo, have partnered with the Cumberland Archives and Museum to discover what lies beneath the soil, where approximately 198 Japanese people were buried. 


  Schofield is using a ground-penetrating radar and compiles technical data to create a map showing where the earth has been disturbed and possible location of human remains. With the results of the radar scans and Lim's students' research, they hope to provide details that could give visitors an idea of areas in the graveyard where members of specific families are likely buried. 


  "Every time I've gone to the cemetery, there have been flowers or mandarin oranges left by the gravestones (central memorial)," said Lim. "It's really a meaningful place of remembrance." 


  Fourth year VIU student Lise Garden is doing her field work in collaboration with museum staff to preserve the Saito House, the last remaining Japanese mining cabin in its original Comox Valley location. 


  Garden says it's important to recognize visible minorities who played important roles in Canada's past. 


  "When we ignore the contributions of these various minorities, we are denying their rightful claim for legitimacy in our collective history," said Garden. 


  ---   30   --- 



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