[News] Yuri Kochiyama Biography Reading, UC Berkeley and Oakland

[Anti-Imperialist News]

Press Release for Yuri Kochiyama and Diane Fujino Author Event

Authors: Diane Fujino and Yuri Kochiyama

Diane Fujino, author of Heartbeat of Struggle: The Revolutionary Life of
Yuri Kochiyama will present the newly published biography with her honored
guest Yuri Kochiyama.

2 Book Reading Events
1. Saturday, September 10 at 2 pm at UC Berkeley
2. Thursday, September 8 at 6:30 pm at the African American Museum and
Library in Oakland

See below for more information

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UCB Asian American Studies and Asian Pacific Student Development at UC
Berkeley are hosting the free event to honor Yuri Kochiyama.

Date: September 10, 2005 Saturday 2:00 pm

Where: Heller Lounge, located in MLK Student Union Building , UC Berkeley,
Bancroft Ave.and Telegraph Ave. Berkeley

Yuri Kochiyama’s life has inspired generations. She has recently been
nominated for the “1,000 Women for the Nobel Peace Prize 2005”. Diane
Fujino has written the first biography of this courageous champion of
freedom and equality.

On February 21, 1965, in the Audubon Ballroom, Yuri Kochiyama cradled
Malcolm X in her arms as he died, but her role as a public servant and
activist began much earlier than this pivotal public moment. Heartbeat of
Struggle is the first biography of this courageous woman, the most
prominent Asian American activist to emerge during the 1960s. Based on
extensive archival research and interviews with Kochiyama’s family,
friends, and the subject herself, Diane C. Fujino traces Kochiyama’s life
from an “all-American” childhood to her accomplishments as a tireless
defender of­and fighter for­human rights.

Growing up in a Japanese immigrant family in California during the 1920s
and 1930s, Kochiyama was active in sports, school, and church. She was both
unquestioningly patriotic and largely unconscious of race and racism in the
United States. After Pearl Harbor, however, Kochiyama’s family was among
the thousands of Japanese Americans forcibly removed to internment camps
for the duration of the war, a traumatic experience that opened her eyes to
the existence of social injustice.

After the war, Kochiyama moved to New York. She began her activist career
in the vibrant Black movement in Harlem in the 1960s, where she met Malcolm
X, who inspired her radical political development and the ensuing four
decades of incessant work for Black liberation, Asian American equality,
Puerto Rican independence, and political prisoner defense. Kochiyama is
widely respected for her work in forging unity among diverse communities,
especially between Asian and African Americans.

Fujino, a scholar and activist, offers an in-depth examination of
Kochiyama’s political awakening, rich life, and impressive achievements
with particular attention to how her public role so often defied gender,
racial, and cultural norms. Heartbeat of Struggle is a source of
inspiration and guidance for anyone committed to social change.

Diane C. Fujino is associate professor of Asian American studies at the
University of California, Santa Barbara.



Eastwind Books of Berkeley
2066 University Avenue; Berkeley, CA 94704
phone: 510 548-2350 fax: 510 548-3697
www.ewbb.com


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Thursday, September 8, 2005
6:30 p.m.
African American Museum and Library at Oakland

Join us for an Evening with Diane Fujino, author of Heartbeat of Struggle:
The Revolutionary Life of Yuri Kochiyama

with Special Guest Yuri Kochiyama

African American Museum and Library at Oakland
659 - 14th Street Oakland, CA 94612
510.637.0200





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