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Table of contents
Language of Material:
English
Contributing Institution:
University of California, Davis General Library, Dept. of Special Collections
Title: Isao Fujimoto Papers
Creator:
Fujimoto,
Isao
Identifier/Call Number: D-601
Physical Description:
85 linear feet
Date (inclusive): 1960-2015
Abstract: Isao Fujimoto (1933-) is Senior Lecturer Emeritus
of Asian American Studies and the UC Davis Graduate Program in Community Development. He joined UC Davis in 1967 as a
founding member of the community development program and later was a founding member of the Asian-American Studies program.
His papers include correspondence, personal journals, and publications related to farm worker and immigrant rights,
development of the Northern California food movement, green technology, and community and rural development.
Physical Location: Researchers should contact Special Collections to request collections,
as many are stored offsite.
Isao Fujimoto (1933-) is Senior Lecturer Emeritus of Asian American Studies and the UC Davis Graduate Program in Community
Development. He joined UC Davis in 1967 as a founding member of the community development program and later was a founding
member of the Asian American Studies program. In 2016, his long history of work in social justice and civil rights earned
him the University of California system's Constantine Panunzio Distinguished Emeriti Award.
Isao Fujimoto's early life was shaped by anti-Japanese legislation. The California Alien Land Laws prevented his family
from leasing or owning California land; the family farmed on Yakama reservation land in southeastern Washington instead.
During World War II, Executive Order 9066 resulted in the Fujimoto family's imprisonment first in Heart Mountain, Wyoming,
and then in Tulelake, California. Following the war, the family moved to Santa Clara County, California, where they
sharecropped strawberries.
In 1951, Fujimoto began his undergraduate work at UC Berkeley, where he led a delegation of student activists making made
connections between student activists in California and student activists in south and south-east Asia. In 1960, Fujimoto
earned his Master's in Education from Stanford and in 1961 enrolled in Cornell University's program in Rural Sociology.
In 1967 Isao Fujimoto was was recruited by UC Davis to teach a new program in community development. Fujimoto soon made
connections with farm labor organizations in the Central Valley and became a trusted link between farm labor organizers and
student activists. In 1968, Fujimoto, his colleagues, and their students shaped the first course on Asian American history.
The course invited guest speakers, among them farm labor organizers Larry Itliong and Philip Vera Cruz. The growing program
of Asian American studies at Davis included the Asian American Research Project (AARP), which sponsored several projects
including one on the impact of Japanese immigrants on California agriculture and one on the impact of the Filipino American
community in Stockton. Together with his students, Isao Fujimoto launched the Rural Research Access Project to "[improve]
conditions in rural areas and rural communities by organizing residents of these areas into co-operatives" and introduce
sustainable technologies.
Isao Fujimoto's many contributions to the Davis community include his work with the Davis Farmer's Market and the Davis
Food Co-op and making his home available as a meeting space for local organizations and student groups. Beyond Davis, he has
worked with the Central Valley Partnership for Citizenship, the Rural Development Leadership Network, the National Center
for
Appropriate Technology, which he helped found, the Asian Rural Institute in Japan, and the Micronesian Occupational College
in Palau, Micronesia. Although Isao Fujimoto retired from UC Davis in 1994, he continues to teach and is active in the Davis
community and in international projects.
Sources:
"Isao Fujimoto." (Biography on Asian-American Studies Department website)
https://asa.ucdavis.edu/people/faculty/isao-fujimoto . Accessed 20 October 2017.
"Isao Fujimoto is a Distinguished Emeriti".
Dateline, April 27, 2016.
http://www.caes.ucdavis.edu/news/articles/2016/04/isao-fujimoto-receives-uc2019s-constantine-panunzio-distinguished-emeriti-award
.
Accessed 20 October 2017.
Features Editor, "Isao Fujimoto Fosters Student Tradition of Agricultural Action".
The California Aggie, February 14, 2014.
https://theaggie.org/2014/02/14/isao-fujimoto-fosters-student-tradition-of-agricultural-action/
. Accessed 20 October
2017.
Kitaura, Cody, "Market Value: Davis Farmers Market Celebrates 40 Years".
UC Davis News, 20 December 2016.
https://www.ucdavis.edu/news/market-value-davis-farmers-market-celebrates-40-years
. Accessed 20 October 2017.
Magagnini, Stephen. "Isao Fujimoto was too busy helping people to complete his Ph.D. until age 76".
Sacramento Bee, September 6, 2010.
http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/education/article2573074.html
. Accessed 20 October 2017.
Welga! Filipino American Labor Archives, "Fujimoto (Isao) Oral History Interview," Welga Project Digital Archive and
Repository, accessed 20 October 2017,
http://welgadigitalarchive.omeka.net/items/show/99
.
The Isao Fujimoto Papers include correspondence, personal journals, and publications related to farm worker and immigrant
rights, the development of the Northern California food movement, green technology, and community and rural development.
Due to preservation concerns, at this time, only the portions of the collection listed in this finding aid are available
for research.
Liz Phillips processed this collection and created and encoded the finding aid with the help of student assistant Julie
Jeon.
Gift of Isao Fujimoto, 2016.
[Identification of item], Isao Fujimoto Papers, D-601, Department of Special Collections, General Library, University of
California, Davis.
All applicable copyrights for the collection are protected under chapter 17 of the U.S. Copyright Code. Requests for
permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Head of Special Collections. Permission
for publication is given on behalf of the Regents of the University of California as the owner of the physical items. It is
not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained by the researcher.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Community
development
Rural development
Agricultural laborers
Sustainability
Renewable energy sources
Food cooperatives
Fujimoto, Isao --
Archives
University of California, Davis
-- Faculty -- Archives