Susan H. Kamei

A public historian, Susan H. Kamei is an adjunct professor (teaching) with the Van Hunnick History Department and affiliated faculty with the USC Shinso Ito Center for Japanese Religions and Cultures in the Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences at the University of Southern California.

She is the author of the award-winning book "When Can We Go Back to America? Voices of Japanese American Incarceration During World War II" (Simon & Schuster 2021). A descendant of incarcerees, she draws upon family and community stories to convey the continuing relevance of this tragic episode in our history to contemporary issues of racial identity, immigration, and citizenship, and the threat to civil liberties today.

Recognized as one of our country’s most prominent scholars on the Japanese American incarceration, she has appeared in national and international broadcasts by news outlets such as NPR, NBC, the PBS NewsHour, C-SPAN, BBC, and France 24, and her articles have been published in syndication across the country. She is a sought-after speaker for events presented by community organizations, libraries, museums, K-12 schools, universities, detention sites, bookstores, churches, and book clubs and conducts teacher training workshops.

She has a juris doctorate degree from Georgetown Law and bachelor of arts degrees from the University of California, Irvine.