Masako Fukawa
Masako Fukawa (nee Shinde) is a Sansei educator and writer. Born in Prince Rupert BC, she was removed from Steveston and relocated to the ghost town of Greenwood, BC in 1942. Returned to Steveston in 1951, she attended UBC, the University of Michigan, University of Victoria and taught in Japan and in Nanaimo. At Vancouver Island University (then Malaspina University College) she developed the international High School on the Nanaimo campus and served as Founding Principal until her retirement in 1999. Her work included recruiting students and building relationships with parents and schools. Fukawa and her husband Stanley also taught at Obirin University in Tokyo, a sister school to VIU and initiated a teacher exchange.
On retirement, Fukawa developed resources for teachers and students in the BC school system, the Nikkei National Museum and the City of Richmond Museum; and maintains a website: Japanesecanadianhistory.net.
Her articles have been published in Nikkei Images, (the Journal of the Nikkei National Museum and Cultural Centre), The Bulletin, (A Journal of the Japanese Canadian community, history & culture), Nikkei Voice, (the Japanese Canadian National Newspaper), Taiji on Distant Shore, (Taiji Historical Archives, Japan), and in BC Studies, (The British Columbian Quarterly).
Her works on the fishing industry in British Columbia, co-authored with husband Stanley, were recognized by the BC historical society: Nikkei Fishermen on the BC Coast: Their Biographies and Photographs (2007) and Spirit of the Nikkei Fleet: BC’s Japanese Canadian Fishermen (2009). Spirit was also awarded the Canada-Japan Literary Award by the Canada Council. Her book for young readers, Righting Canada’s Wrongs: Japanese Canadian internment (2011) was co-authored with Pam Hickman.
For her contributions to education and for community service Fukawa was awarded the Queen Elizabeth Diamond Jubilee Medal in 2013. In recognition of her many contributions to education and anti-racism initiatives in British Columbia, she was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Laws degree by Vancouver Island University in June 2023.
Fukawa currently serves on the Education Advisory Board of the Japanese Canadian Legacies initiatives of the BC government. This work stems from an apology by the Premier of BC along with a commitment to fund legacy initiatives to redress these injustices. Her lifelong commitment to justice and the telling of the truth continues.
Why this book
Much of what Canadians know about the wartime treatment of Japanese Canadians is told at the level of policy: the orders, the camps, the confiscations. Fukawa’s work goes behind that narrative — back to the villages people left, the communities they built on the coast, and the determination with which they rebuilt after the war — so that the record holds not only what was done, but who it was done to, in their own voices.