Memory is an important underlying thematic element as the story acknowledges that many Issei and Nissei, first and second generation Japanese Americans, wanted to move past this painful history and become more American and less Japanese. “A memory is too powerful a weapon” she writes after a memorial to a murdered incarcerated Japanese man was quickly taken down by the camp director. Her character is also the one wearing a muted blue that stands out. Her drawing lines are crisp but the colors are muted and in brown and beige tones whenever the story is transported to the past. She also ties it to what’s happening in current time as our country’s openly antagonistic attitude towards immigrants and those of Muslim faith are harbingers of a repetition of history. It is a shameful part of our history and Hughes uses her grandmother’s and great grandparents’ experience as a focal point for understanding this event. Displacement is the first graphic novel I have read that deals with the Japanese American internment during WWII.
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