Form HE(S→O)
GSAPS THE SUMMARY OF DOCTORAL THESIS
The “Japanese” Locals of Davao and of Guam:
Shifting Belongings amidst Successive Empires during and after the Pacific War
4017S308-5 Maria Cynthia B. Barriga
Keywords: Japanese locals, Davao, Guam, shifting belongings
Introduction
This dissertation examines the experiences of Japanese locals of Davao and
of Guam to understand the shifting belongings of people amidst the
changing US-Japan empires in the 1940s. Living in US territories invaded
and occupied by the Japanese military in December 1941, the Japanese
locals of Davao and of Guam had the unique experience of being part of the
locality, then declared enemy aliens at the outbreak of the war, then
co-patriots of the new imperial masters after the Japanese invasion, and then
again as enemies to be shipped out at Japan’s defeat. Existing histories of
the overseas Japanese are Japan-oriented. The Japanese in Davao are treated
as Japanese, even those born of mixed Filipino-Japanese parentage. The
Japanese of Guam, because they were numerically insignificant and barely
any of them (if at all) stayed in Japan postwar as repatriates, are largely
ignored. This study questions the current portrayal of them as belonging
solely to Japan. Using a postcolonial historical perspective, the study holds
that notions of “Japanese,” “Filipino,” and “Guam Chamorro” are shifting
and unsettled. Employing historical analysis and comparing Davao and
Guam, it seeks to answer: How did the Japanese locals’ belongings shift
during the turbulent 1940s when the US and Japanese empires alternated in
dominance?
Findings
It finds that before the war, the Japanese locals were classified either as
Japanese or as otherwise, with racially mixed persons fitted into one or
another. At the war’s outbreak, civilian hostilities between Filipinos and
Japanese broke out in Davao, but amidst the violence, Filipino-Japanese
prewar ties mediated allowing locals in both clashing armed forces to
survive. During Japanese Occupation, Japanese locals serving Japan fought
against Filipino guerrillas, though a few gave and received information that
allowed them and fellow Filipino locals to survive. As the war worsened for
Japan, the Japanese evacuated en masse to the hinterlands, while Filipinos
fell victim to Japanese war crimes. Postwar, they were shipped out and were
unable to return for decades, while new Filipino settlers poured in. As the
physically separated people continued to narrativize Davao, two histories of
the same locality were created. In the Japanese Davao, the place was
Dabao-kuo and Japanese mestizos were Japanese. In the Filipino Davao, the
Japanese were minute and demonized. Outside history, however,
cross-racial ties persisted and traversed the gap between Davao and Japan.
In contrast, neither civilian hostilities nor contending armed forces clashed
in Guam. Japanese locals served as a bridge between the two disconnected
worlds of the Japanese military and the Chamorros. At Japan’s defeat, they
were shipped out along with other POWs, but immediately came home
thanks to their Chamorro families. Rather than a physical divide, a
polarized grand narrative of us-versus-enemy was created as a result of
postwar racial discourses. In this divide, Japanese locals were embraced by
their Chamorro families as part of “us,” separating them from “the enemy,”
E. Chief Advisor: Prof. Shinzo Hayase, PhD
hence creating the contradiction of being Japanese but not “The Japanese.”
Despite differing experiences, histories of both Davao and Guam were
polarized into us-versus-enemy, a polarization that leaves no option to be in
between. Outside history, however, several Japanese locals and their
families continued to live between conflicting poles or to live with both
poles conflicting within their persons.
Conclusion and Implications
The dissertation argues that successive empires classified peoples of hybrid
spaces into mutually exclusive racial categories which were actualized
socially during the war. However, it was the locals’ participation in the
imperial war and their acquiescence to its total war ideologies that gave
these racial labels social force and embedded these into history. Having
shown this, the dissertation supports the capacity of the locals to write their
own histories and address the social-historical ruptures that emerged
because of imperialism. Moreover, it converses with Japanese historical
studies for which “Japanese” is a defined category, albeit heterogenous and
transforming. Seen from a postcolonial perspective, “Japanese” is racial and
thus is relational and contested alongside other belongings. The dissertation
contributes to the resolution of locals’ conflicting belongings as well as to
furthering Japanese diaspora studies’ notion of overseas Japanese and the
localities where they lived.
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