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Voices from the Canefields: Folksongs from Japanese Immigrant Workers in Hawaii

Folk songs are short stories from the souls of common people. Japanese workers in Hawaii's plantations created their own versions, in form more akin to their traditional tanka or haiku poetry. These holehole bushi describe the experiences of one particular group caught in the global movements of capital, empire, and labor during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Former Wilson Center fellow Franklin Odo situates over two hundred of these songs, in translation, in a hitherto largely unexplored historical context.

Date & Time

Thursday
Sep. 19, 2013
4:00pm – 5:00pm ET

Location

4th Floor, Woodrow Wilson Center
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Overview

Folk songs are short stories from the souls of common people. Some, like Mexican corridos or Scottish ballads, reworked in the Appalachias, are stories of tragic or heroic episodes. Others, like the African American blues, reach from a difficult present back into slavery and forward into a troubled future. Japanese workers in Hawaii's plantations created their own versions, in form more akin to their traditional tanka or haiku poetry. These holehole bushi describe the experiences of one particular group caught in the global movements of capital, empire, and labor during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In Voices from the Canefields author Franklin Odo situates over two hundred of these songs, in translation, in a hitherto largely unexplored historical context.

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Speaker

Franklin Odo

Former Public Policy Scholar;
Founding Director, Asian Pacific American Program, Smithsonian Institution
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Hosted By

Asia Program

The Asia Program promotes policy debate and intellectual discussions on U.S. interests in the Asia-Pacific as well as political, economic, security, and social issues relating to the world’s most populous and economically dynamic region.   Read more

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