Muslim, Japanese-American youth empowered by history

[AsahinaKimi]

LOS ANGELES (Kyodo) -- "Have you ever been called a racist name?" Mustafah Hawari, 17, asks Yuka Ogino, 23, a Japanese-American coordinator at the Bridging Communities Program.

"Yes, I have," she tells Hawari and the small group of students sitting on the floor at a mosque in Anaheim, California.

The students, most of them Muslim or Japanese American, spent five Saturdays throughout the spring of 2011 talking about tolerance and identity in the program organized by the Japanese American Citizens League, the Council on American-Islamic Relations and the Nikkei for Civil Rights and Redress.

Started in 2008, the program draws on the Japanese-American experience of World War II internment and redress in the 1980s to teach the youth of both communities about activism and civil rights. It also gives students a chance to share their cultures with each other.

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/features/news/20110430p2g00m0fe020000c.html