Translation, estrangement and identity in Joy Kogawa's 'Obasan' and Hiromi Goto's 'Chorus of Mushrooms'

the dominant group, whilst the "foreigners" had to accept to be separated from them and live in bad housing.Incoming immigrants and their families were often put together in ghettos. Native AmerindiansThe Canadian economy grew quickly, the problem was, however, that not everybody had access to wealth.Cook (1997: 434-437) points out the traumatic shock the Indians had to face when their land was taken away from them.They were put into reservations and had to sign treaties.The aim of the politicians was to assimilate the Amerindians into the dominating ethnic group-the whites.In this case we could speak of a "melting pot", this simile would only work, if Amerindians were given the same rights.They existed physically, but not politically.The assimilation process initiated by the whites was very prescriptive, they were not allowed their traditional dances any more and were told to change their social structure.Agriculture, formerly in the hands of women, was forced upon the men.This was humiliation because it was hard for them to give up hunting and trapping, doing women`s work instead.A further imposition in the life of Amerindians was christianization.Religious beliefs and traditional dances were replaced by Christian religion.Many escaped the reservations, heading for the cities where they ended up as alcoholics or prostitutes. Japanese CanadiansBoyko (1995:123-125) takes an even more critical approach concerning Canada` s immigration policy.The title of his book already suggests its position "Last steps to freedom: the evolution of Canadian racism".When Pearl Harbor was attacked on December 7, 1941 The United States of America declared war and entered WW II.This represented a traumatic event in the history of the US, and led to deep hostility toward Japanese in the US as well as in Canada.Canadian officials feared attacks on North America` s west coast and deported or imprisoned Japanese Canadians living on the coast, -6 -because they feared that Japanese Canadians might be loyal to the Japanese military.A further argument was that Japanese Canadians had to be removed from the coast in order to be saved from racist attacks.The arguments for deporting Japanese Canadians were various, but they did not justify the fact that Japanese Canadians were treated as a collective whilst German and Italian Canadians were charged and sentenced individually.Boyko continues his argument by stating that the attack on Pearl Harbor had just been the event to trigger off aggressions against Japanese that had already existed before and could now justify the imprisonment of "Japs", as they were called.Now, one could ask the question why the Japanese people had to face so much intolerance and hostility.One possible answer may be found in the the bad conditions on board the steamers which brought them from the different Japanese territories like Wakayama, Shiga, Kagoshima and Hiroshima to Canadian soil.The journey took the heterogeneous group of Japanese emigrants one to three months and they had barely anything to eat.What is more they could not even wash their clothes or bathe.By the time the Japanese community arrived on the Canadian shore, a bad smell was the consequence of the unhygienic conditions aboard the ships.This led to stereotypes concerning Japanese immigrants that they were a dirty and uncivilized people.According to Boyko (1995: 127-129) Canadian citizens made no distinction between Japanese and Chinese immigrants, calling them the "yellow peril".Different immigration policies were, however, applied to these two peoples.There seems to be a close relationship between immigration policy and economic and military power of a country.Japan had, in contrast to China, a flourishing economy as well as a strong military force.This was the reason that Britain signed a Treaty of Commerce and Navigation with Japan in 1894.British Columbia` s provincial politicians and religious and labor leaders, however, wanted to ban Oriental immigration and wrote letters to Laurier, who was Premier Minister at that time.The problem was that the politician had to find a compromise between two perspectives: the British Empire, which reminded him of the Treaty of Commerce and Navigation, and local political forces which wanted a smaller number of immigrants to enter Canada.Laurier chose an unusual way by negotiating an informal gentleman` s agreement with the Japanese government.He did not back down to racist provincial politicians who did not want any Asian immigrants any more, and agreed with the Japanese government to allow four hundred emigrants per year.Japan`s political influence grew because of its defeat of Russia in a war between 1902 and 1905.This structured and organized Konzentrationslager, which were basically internment camps, was notorious, because of its cruelty.The Geneva Conventions were not respected at all by Germany , however, only little is known about the Japanese internment camps; Japan had not wanted to ratify the Geneva Conventions and committed many inhumane crimes.This is strongly connected with the fact that, according to bushido, which is an antique samurai code, being captured by the enemy is the most dishonorable event imaginable and should not happen to a warrior.The Japanese military was still influenced by this traditional way of thinking, and in order not to be a disgrace to their nation, soldiers committed suicide in order not to be captured.Dying on the battlefield was honorable, including suicide, called hara-kiri by the Japanese.This explains why Japanese soldiers did not even think of hesitating when it came to crashing airplanes into military targets, as it was the case in the Pearl Harbor Attack in 1941.Since being captured was seen as a disgrace, prisoners of war were tortured and in many cases killed.Many Japanese-Canadians were put into internment camps.For reasons of national security these internment camps were not placed in British Columbia, which is directly at the pacific coastal line, but in northern Ontario, cf.Boyko (1995:144).By 1942, 758 Japanese Canadians were imprisoned because the Department of National Defence had decided that they were a threat to national security.The number of Japanese Canadians in British Columbia diminished from 23,224 in 1941 to 7,169 in 1951, which was a consequence of the mass deportation of Japanese Canadians.Another sad fact is that due to national security measures, British Columbia` s percentage of Japanese Canadians, which was ninety-five percent before WW II, had diminished to thirty-three percent in 1946.Canada was, however, one of the states that treated its prisoners of war well compared to other nations during WW II, cf.Auger (2005:147).No prisoner of war was killed during their stay in Canadian internment camps and, in contrast to German and Japanese camps, no sadistic experiments were conducted on the inmates.Interestingly, they could choose whether they wanted to work or not, the reason why many chose to work was that they actually got paid.What is more, prisoners were supplied with enough food and they were also allowed to have sex.One big group of German prisoners in Europe consisted of soldiers who surrendered and chose to be captured.Their treatment in Europe was of course not as good as in Canada and one major problem Europe had to face was the big number of new prisoners, but there were neither closer look at the words, his use of explicit racism is obvious: "The people of Canada do not wish, as a result of mass immigration, to make any fundamental alteration in the character of our population." Pratt (2005:75).This means basically that the norms and values of the ruling people should remain, and this people is of course white, whilst "invaders" from other cultures are not given any right to enter the country.The last official Immigration Act was that of 1910, and a change of the immigration law was necessary. Level of understanding-Japanese linguistic disorientation Insertions of Japanese words in translationHenceforth I will use the abbreviation O for the novel Obasan and CM for Chorus of Mushrooms.In contrast to O, the text of CM includes numerous Japanese words.We can argue that these words generally used by characters of the older generation, like Obachan in the text of CM.In some cases explanations are provided that help the reader understand the foreign words, in others, however, the reader is left alone with the "cultural barrier" and the Japanese words remain unexplained.It is, however, always the case that the Japanese word stands before the English word.This creates the effect of plunging into the world of the Japanese culture and thinking.Some concepts and cultural frames remain concealed and the reader does not get access to them.In the novel CM, the Japanese words are always written either in italics or in bold letters in order to underline their outstanding nature.In contrast, the novel O is written exclusively in normal unaltered letters, one similarity, however, is that English explanations are given after the Japanese word.A further similarity that can be seen in O is that the Japanese words are very often spoken by the older generation, the translation, however, is given promptly afterwards.Interestingly, even with the translation provided, it is still a difficult task to enter the Japanese mind in the form of literary characters; but at this point I am going to give a few examples.Naomi´s uncle in O is one example of the older generation frequently quoted in Japanese.When Aunt Emily, Naomi`s aunt holds one of her speeches where she tries to convince her family members to remember the injustice that had been done to the Japanese community, Uncle simply shakes his head and answers: "Nisei muzukashi"; O (1981:38).

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