When the Emperor Was Divine #9

Although this story is about a Japanese-American family who had to relocate to an internment camp it has a lot to do with the idea of the American dream.  The family in the book had lived in the United States for many years and even raised the children to speak only English because they wanted to become known as American citizens.  Most of the people of Japanese descent had well paying jobs and lived a very American lifestyle.  They admired the culture and all they had always wanted was to be recognized as members of the American lifestyle.  The American dream is to have a good job, live in a nice house, and be recognized as someone who is well respected and successful.  The family in the story makes a decent income and lives in a nice neighborhood in a regular American community.  The only part of the American dream they were missing was that they were not recognized as members of the country and they were looked upon as less than the white citizens.  When the relocation signs were first posted around town a man ran into the boy in the family and asked him, "Are you a jap or chink?" The fact that he asked him where he was from using crude language shows the lack of respect he had towards the boy's ethnicity and treated him as if he were less of a person.  I believe the author is trying to say that sometimes it takes more than money and a nice house to achieve the American dream, and that if people don't respect you than it is hard to feel like you've achieved the American dream.  When talking about the history of the United States people rarely mention the hardships that Japanese-American people had to go through.  People usually refrain from mentioning any events that have occurred in our society that are now frowned upon.  If anything this story could help people see what it was like for the Japanese and how it is morally wrong to generalize a whole race of people just because the nation is in panic mode.