Redress and Resolution: Future Choices for Japanese Canadians

Join Dr. Audrey Kobayashi for insight and context to the 1988 Redress for Japanese Canadians in the 2026 Gordon Hirabayashi Lecture.
About this Event

This lecture celebrates the legacy of Dr. Gordon Hirabayashi whose work centred on human rights and ethnic minorities in Canada. Dr. Hirabayashi was posthumously awarded the US Presidential Medal of Freedom for his principled stand against Japanese-American internment.
Dr. Audrey Kobayashi has a long history of research on the Japanese Canadians and in addition to her participation in Landscapes of Injustice, she is also involved in the “Right To Remain” project that includes a number of university researchers and graduate students in partnership with community advocacy organizations in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver, where rapidly increasing property prices and gentrification threaten the precarious residents in hundreds of single occupancy residences (SROs). Many of these buildings were erected by Japanese Canadians, who were forced from their homes during the 1940s.
A native of British Columbia, Audrey Kobayashi completed a B.A. (1976) and M.A. (1978) at the University of British Columbia, and a PhD (1983) at UCLA. She taught in Geography and East Asian Studies at McGill University from 1983 to 1994. She came to Queen’s, initially as Director of the Institute of Women’s Studies (1994 to 1999) and thereafter as Professor of Geography. She has spent time as a visiting professor at the University of British Columbia, University College London and, most recently, Canterbury University, Christchurch, New Zealand. In 1994, Audrey was a Fulbright Fellow at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington, DC. Other positions include President of the Canadian Association of Geographers (1999-2001), and Editor, People Place and Region, Annals of the Association of American Geographers. She is also a former President of this association.
—-
The 2026 Hirabayashi Lecture is organized by University of Alberta, Edmonton Japanese Community Association (EJCA), National Association of Japanese Canadians (NAJC), and the University of Victoria – in collaboration with campus and community organizations nationally including: Calgary Japanese Community Association (CJCA); Nikka Yuko Japanese Garden; Nikkei Cultural Society of Lethbridge; and the University of Lethbridge.