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University of San Francisco (online) – Day of Remembrance Keynote Speech - The Irei Names Monument: A Memorial to Persons of Japanese Ancestry Incarcerated in the U.S. during WWI

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The Manzanar Ireito (Consoling Spirits Tower) is an iconic symbolic of the forced removal and indefinite incarceration of over 125,000 persons of Japanese ancestry during WWII. An interfaith monument built in 1943 in time for the Buddhist summer ancestral festival of Obon, it was designed by a Catholic architect Ryozo Kado, built by the Young Buddhist Association and residents of Block 9, and dedicated by the Holiness Church’s Rev. Junro Kashitani and Buddhist priest Rev. Shinjo Nagatomi, whose calligraphy adorns the monument built at the cemetery to honor the spirits of those who had passed away in the camp. Today, at a moment when controversial monuments are being pulled down in a national reckoning about America’s history of racial violence and exclusion, the Irei Names Monument is a new initiative that memorializes the names of all persons of Japanese ancestry who experienced incarceration during WWII in Army, DOJ, WCCA, WRA confinement sites and temporary detention facilities. Duncan Ryuken Williams will speak about the making of the names list, the construction of an installation, and the building of an online memorial website.