Farewell to Manzanar by SparkNotes

Author:SparkNotes [SparkNotes]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 11

Summary—Yes Yes No No

In December the new camp director gives a Christmas tree to each family, but Jeanne is disappointed with Christmas because of the poor presents, the wind, and Papa’s drunkenness. In February conditions worsen when the government begins to require that everyone over seventeen swear a Loyalty Oath. The oath consists of two yes-or-no questions: the first concerns whether one is willing to serve in the U.S. military; the second concerns whether one will swear allegiance to the United States and renounce allegiance to Japan.

The oath becomes a topic of debate in camp, and even Papa emerges from his five-month isolation. He argues with the block organizers who come to his barracks, as well as with Mama, Granny, and Woody. Woody says he would be willing to fight, but Papa argues that a soldier must believe in that for which he is fighting. The Japanese Americans do not know how to respond to the Loyalty Oath. Answering “No No” will result in being shipped back to Japan, but answering “Yes Yes” will result in being drafted into the U.S. military. A third option, relocation, allows families to leave camp if they have a sponsor and are willing to leave the West Coast. The Loyalty Oath is intended to speed up the relocation paperwork and determine which Japanese are loyal enough to serve as soldiers in the war. Many Japanese become very anti-American, but Papa decides to answer “Yes Yes” because he thinks America will win the war and does not want to be sent back to Japan.

A meeting is called to discuss a collective “No No” vote, and Papa attends even though the others will call him an “inu” for supporting the “Yes Yes” position. At about 4:00 p.m., Jeanne is playing hopscotch in the wind when she hears a commotion. She hears Papa yelling “eta,” meaning “trash,” and she sees him tackle another man who is running out of the meeting. Papa has defended the “Yes Yes” position, and the man has called him an “inu.” A sandstorm arises, and back inside the barracks Papa is silent. A friend of Chizu’s arrives, and she sings the Japanese national anthem, Kimi ga yo, with Papa, who begins to cry. Wakatsuki narrates that the national anthem, which is actually a Japanese poem from the ninth century, speaks of a small stone that becomes a massive rock covered by thousands of years of moss. In Japan, Papa’s family had a stone lantern over which they poured a bucketful of water each day to keep the moss growing.

Analysis

The Loyalty Oath is a psychological reflection of the physical imprisonment that the camp represents. Wakatsuki calls the Loyalty Oath a “corral”—a pen for livestock—because it pins the Japanese into a limited range of choices. Like the camps, the oath seems to the U.S. government a practical solution to the uncertainty about Japanese-American loyalty. But like the camps, the oath does not give the Japanese any satisfactory path out of their situation. They

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