Kyoko Omori, associate professor of East Asian Languages and Literatures (Japanese), curated a short story about early 20th-century Japanese migrants in the US, titled "White-Collared Migratory Birds."
The story appears in a recent anthology, The Collection of Masterpieces from New Youth Magazine (Shinseinen Meisaku Korekushon: April 2021), published by Chikuma Shobo. In her notes to the story, Omori introduces the" 'Merican-Jap Business Textbook" series written by Tani Joji and initially published in 1927.
Known for its linguistic mash-ups of English (slang) and Japanese, the series portrays Japanese migrants surviving in American society by fighting against racial discrimination and ignorance with intelligence and humor.
