War Memories, Imperial Ambitions: Commemorating WWII in the U.S. Pacific National Park System

Rusty Bartels
Cultural Studies
UC Davis

This project is concerned with empire, representation, and the on-going state of settler colonialism within the United States and its territories. It focuses on World War II National Parks in the US Pacific World, and claims that as institutions, they help perpetuate and justify the American military presence and occupation throughout the Pacific. These sites include: World War II Valor in the Pacific National Monument (which consists of nine sites in three states: California, Hawai’i, Alaska), Aleutian World War II National Historic Area (Alaska), War in the Pacific National Historic Park (Guam), and American Memorial Park (Saipan). Within California, the site examines the Tule Lake Unit – a site of Japanese-American Internment – and its historical memory in this context of the militarization of places and communities as connected to the larger campaigns of WWII.