I don’t blame people, because if you’re writing a story people want some sort of narrative which is natural. I mean race was touched on in that story but it was almost as touched on as being gay was. It came up a lot with Skim-people want to pin a story on you and tie up the narrative and make you a stand-in. But it is kind of sad that I have like no connection whatsoever.Īnne Ishii: Is that something that comes up at all in your career? That got stripped away partially because they assimilated so aggressively. It doesn’t make him feel uncomfortable that he knows nothing about the language or the food. He doesn’t speak the language he doesn’t want to go there.

And now my dad, he doesn’t know anything about Japan anymore. They all became lawyers because that’s what you do, you hyper-assimilate back into the culture and say: I’m more Canadian than all of you. But my grandfather did not want reparations-he thought that was really insulting that you would give us some thousand dollars or whatever and that’s your “sorry” and you can feel absolved. They were interned and all their property was taken away. Jillian Tamaki: My great grandfather came to Canada when he was a kid, so they’re like super Canadian. This One Summer by Jillian Tamaki and Mariko Tamaki. At the time of our conversation, social media was scrambling for responses to a couple political issues big in social media-Ta-Nehisi Coates “The Case for Reparations” at the Atlantic and hashtag calls to #CancelColbert after a racialized tweet from the show host’s account. We are running Part II of our interview with Jillian to congratulate her, along with Mariko Tamaki. Since running the first part of our interview with Jillian last October, This One Summer was awarded the Caldecott Honor, making it the first graphic novel in the institution’s history to be commended with the distinction. The duo includes Jillian’s cousin, writer/performer Mariko Tamaki.

Jillian Tamaki is the illustrator-half of the graphic novelist dyad behind the critically acclaimed Skim and the unparalleled This One Summer, which debuted last May. AAWW board member and resident comics expert Anne Ishii is back with the second half of her interview with Jillian Tamaki.

Skim jillian tamaki