Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Obasan, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Race, Identity, and Citizenship
History and Memory
Speech vs. Silence
Selflessness and Decorum
Summary
Analysis
Inside the parcel from Emily is a collection of documents, including Emily’s private diary from 1941. Aunt Emily is an activist who uses her education to be a “word warrior,” researching and documenting racism against Japanese Canadians. Naomi flashes back to a conversation she had with Emily. In the memory, Emily has just returned from a conference on race. She tells Naomi that Canada’s “capacity for racism” is greater than America’s, since during World War II Canada not only interned Japanese citizens the way the United States did, the Canadian government also liquidated the property of these citizens and dispersed them across the country.
Emily’s methods of activism demonstrate the importance of documenting oppression as an act of advocating against it, and the description of her as a “word warrior” highlights the power of words as a weapon for change. Emily’s belief in this power leads her to speak more openly about racism than the novel’s other characters. In this way, she becomes the point of view through which the audience learns about the specifics of the Canadian government’s racism, since Naomi prefers to obfuscate past trauma even in her own narration.
Themes
Naomi is unable to match Aunt Emily’s enthusiasm because she is uncomfortable with people who are vocal about being victimized. She believes these people are trying to use their suffering as weapons, and that often the most victimized people are the ones who remain silent. Aunt Emily continues that World War II was an excuse for the government to act upon racial prejudices that most white Canadians already harbored, and she voices her rage at a man at the conference who believed internment was justified. When Naomi tries to coax Emily to see the man’s point of view, Emily shuts her down, arguing that seeing both sides “neutralize[s] concern” and prevents people from taking action.
On one hand, Naomi is more predisposed to empathize with opposing points of view than Emily, whose black-and-white thinking might prevent her from engaging with people whose experiences differ from hers. On the other hand, Naomi’s tendency to prioritize others leads her to degrade or endanger herself for the sake of other people, as she agrees that the traumatic and racist Japanese internment might have been necessary to calm the anxieties of white Canadians. Naomi also believes that other people should adopt her mindset, viewing activists like Emily as inappropriately weaponizing their suffering.
Themes
Still in flashback, Aunt Emily and Naomi sort through Emily’s conference papers at the kitchen table at Uncle and Obasan’s house. These papers include a letter from government official “B. Good” rejecting Emily’s request for information about the house the government took from her mother. Naomi sees in this letter the ways in which the government denies Japanese Canadians the rights of citizens while demanding their obedience.
The name of B. Good satirizes the Canadian government’s expectation that Japanese Canadians will “be good” in the face of constant mistreatment and disrespect. The government robs the Katos of their property and refuses to provide any information about what became of it, and officials like B. Good expect Emily and other Japanese Canadians to accept this treatment without complaint.
Themes
Emily shows Naomi her manuscript of a book about the Nisei, in which she asserts, “I am Canadian.” Emily constantly works to tell Nisei stories to familiarize white Canadians with them and thus challenge the “yellow peril” that white people fear. Naomi asks why they can’t just let the past stay in the past, and Obasan and Uncle insist that they must be grateful for their lives in Canada, the best place in the world. Naomi agrees with them. Emily refuses to accept this, arguing that “the past is the future.”
“Yellow peril” refers to the white Western fear that Asian immigrants will take over Western nations. Emily works to challenge this prejudice by proving that white Canadians have nothing to fear from Japanese Canadians. Meanwhile, she continues to assert her own Canadian identity. While Emily sees living in Canada as her right as a citizen, Obasan and Uncle see it as a privilege, and they don’t understand Emily’s endeavors. Naomi also pushes against Emily’s work, since it dredges up traumatic memories, but Emily believes that failing to address the past will cause it to repeat itself.
Themes
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