Densho: The Japanese American Legacy Project Programs
Densho Digital Archive
Free searchable database containing over 700 transcribed and indexed video oral histories and 10,700 photos and documents that trace Japanese American history from immigration to wartime detention to civil rights-era redress. Users include teachers, students, historical preservationists, journalists, legal scholars, documentary makers, and the general public.
Densho trains hundreds of classroom teachers every year on how to teach with primary sources about the World War II incarceration of Japanese Americans.
Densho Online Encyclopedia
The Densho Encyclopedia is a free and publicly accessible website that provides concise, accurate, and balanced information on many aspects of the Japanese American story during World War II. It is designed and written for a non-specialist audience that includes high school and college students and instructors, multiple generations of Nikkei community members, confinement sites preservation groups, amateur and professional historians, librarians, journalists, documentarians, and the general public. The Encyclopedia is thoroughly cross indexed and articles are linked to relevant primary and secondary materials from the Densho archive and from other websites that include still and moving images, documents, databases, and oral history interview excerpts as well as standard bibliographical sources.
Recent Successes and Current Challenges
Over the last two years, Densho has added over 200 new oral histories to its online archive, launched a new 350 article online encyclopedia, and trained over 500 classroom teachers. Densho's work in historic preservation and education has been recognized by awards from NPower, the Washington State Historical Society, the Japanese American Citizens League, Humanities Washington, the American Library Association, Microsoft Technology for Good, and the Microsoft Alumni Foundation
A current need of Densho is to support the marketing of Densho's resources to a nationwide audience of teachers, librarians, historians, and creators of educational media.