SPARTAN SPOTLIGHT
Giving Voice to Wisdom
By Julia Halprin Jackson Photography by Robert C. Bain
SPARTAN SPOTLIGHT
Giving Voice to Wisdom
By Julia Halprin Jackson Photography by Robert C. Bain
Erin Nicholson is the first SJSU Strauss Foundation Scholar.
Erin Nicholson, ’26 Anthropology, is the first Spartan to receive a scholarship from the Donald A. Strauss Scholarship Foundation. This scholarship is a $15,000 award given to undergraduates to support innovative year-long, service-oriented community projects. As part of an ongoing effort to create digital exhibits for the Japanese American Museum of San José (JAMsj), Nicholson will dedicate the next year to filming interviews with Japanese Americans whose family members were incarcerated in camps during World War II, together with San José State Anthropology Professor A.J. Faas.
An enterprising researcher, Nicholson was originally interested in working with Faas in order to build upon the social science research skills she’d been developing in the Culture, Economy and Environment (CEE) Lab under the tutelage of Associate Professor of Anthropology Melissa Beresford. When Faas recruited Nicholson to assist him in collecting the stories of JAMsj docents and touring museum exhibits, she realized that the project’s scope had the potential for even greater impact.
“Since summer 2024, Erin has met with community participants to discuss and debrief on project updates and outcomes,” says Faas. “Erin shadowed me while conducting four of the ‘object biography’ oral history interviews in her project proposal, and by the following week was scheduling and conducting nine of her own.”
Nicholson is employing an applied anthropology approach that involves embedding within a community and building lasting relationships that can lead to real social change. She and Faas have been interviewing Nissei, second-generation Japanese Americans who were born in the U.S. and raised by Japanese-born parents. The researchers’ goal is to understand how different generations of Japanese Americans have absorbed the trauma of war, including the economic, social and cultural impacts of being forcibly removed from their homes or losing their livelihoods, businesses and property.
One of Erin's favorite installations at JAMsj are the birds crafted by people incarcerated during World War II.
“My conversations with participants taught me how to listen, and showed me how my perspective on belonging, community and culture are fluid and ever-changing, just like theirs. I find this method of education and storytelling can be applied and adapted for a number of groups, causes and cultures. I’m realistic that these changes do not happen overnight, but the conversations help lay the foundation of seeing each other as people.”
— Erin Nicholson, '26 Anthropology
With Faas’ support, Nicholson asks participants to relate to objects in the museum as a way to trigger meaningful memories. She works with JAMsj staff and volunteers to record and edit oral history interviews to compile them into digital videos for exhibit in the museum and online. Their goal is to create educational resources for teaching and learning about Japanese incarceration that are more inclusive of the range of positionalities and perspectives on this historical injustice.
Some participants reacted to military clothing, while others connected with pieces of art made by incarcerees.
JAMsj Executive Director Vanessa Hatakeyama adds that exhibits like Ni Do To, a collaborative storytelling and memory project created by Associate Professor of Asian American Studies Yvonne Y. Kwan’s students, in collaboration with choreographer and artist Yayoi Kambara, often inspire Nicholson’s subjects.
“Erin has approached her work with humility, curiosity and sensitivity in a way that has drawn out people's stories,” says Hatakeyama. “We're truly grateful for her partnership on this project, which adds another dimension to how we see our exhibits and artifacts through both a storytelling and an academic lens.”
The Japanese American Museum of San José has a framed original of the Executive Order 9066 that was posted in Japantown in 1942.
Erin Nicholson and Vanessa Hatakeyama at the Japanese American Museum of San José.
The power of conversation
“We walk through the museum with our subjects and record their oral histories on camera,” Nicholson says. “They tell us why they connect with an object in the exhibit.”
Nicholson says her project has given her a fuller picture of the cultural divisions during the war and beyond. “We’re looking at the historical, systemic and social tensions within the Japanese American community at that time,” she explains.
People of Japanese descent who were incarcerated during World War II were often divided into two categories, Nicholson says: The “no-no boys” were those who refused to sign loyalty oaths to the United States; many of them were segregated from other incarcerees, separated from their families and forced to live in different camps. The “yes-yeses” signed the loyalty oaths. The oaths themselves created divisions within the Japanese American community which, Nicholson surmises, had unintended consequences for generations to come.
In addition to opening her eyes to the untold stories of incarceration and war, the interview process has also encouraged Nicholson to reflect on her own lived experiences and identity.
“My conversations with participants taught me how to listen, and showed me how my perspective on belonging, community and culture are fluid and ever-changing, just like theirs,” she says. “I find this method of education and storytelling can be applied and adapted for a number of groups, causes and cultures. I’m realistic that these changes do not happen overnight, but the conversations help lay the foundation of seeing each other as people.”
In a perfect world, she believes applied anthropology could lead to increased empathy and potential systemic change. She’s hopeful that with the help of the Strauss Foundation scholarship, she and Faas can capture conversations with community members that will inspire people to learn and grow.
“People are often so fast to judge history and others’ lived experiences,” she reflects. “I started [this project] feeling like I didn’t know anything, and now it feels like anything I do will help me learn something and grow as a person. There’s so much that can be shared, internalized and learned even in one conversation.”
