relocation

years ago the term used to describe the internment was 'relocation.' That it is still used in textbooks to describe the internment is discouraging (Mark Sweeting, in Rethinking Schools). "Relocation center" was the term used by the federal government to describe the 10 camps where more than 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry were held without charges for three years during World War II. West-coast Japanese Americans (two-thirds of whom were U.S. citizens) were forced into hastily built prisons in western desert regions. Among violated Constitutional rights were freedom of speech, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures, the right to be informed by charges, the right to a speedy and public trial, the right to legal counsel, the right to a trial by jury, and the right to equal protection under the law. Instead of "relocation," use the factually accurate term, which might be: internment, incarceration, imprisonment, genocide. "Relocation" (with "some untoward incidents") is also the term used by the Turkish Historical Society for the slaughter of more than a million Armenians between 1914 and 1918 (Elif Safak, The Bastard of Istanbul). See also Armenian genocide, resettlement.