「美國西南」不僅是一個空間範圍或地誌名詞，更代表此區域在地理上的廣闊、圖製上的不可捉摸，以及文化上的異質。並且，美國西南有個鮮少被提及的要義——此地曾經作為二次大戰的囚禁日裔美國人的集中營。日裔美國人有必要重新審視美國西南，不只因為它是過去戰爭期間集中營的所在，更因為在此地域發生了一場歷史性的創傷。日裔美國人亦須從此地域重新檢視身份，即試圖於美國西南的地誌發掘出他們失落的身份特質。為此，我們可以在美國西南的空間區域上，不管是外觀的、想像的、或是文本上的，重新建構與宣示日裔拘留者經驗當中極重要的指標，為美國西南添入一種對於拘留地的視覺景況符號。

More than a spatial category or a topographical term, the American Southwest identifies a region geographically vast, cartographically elusive, and culturally heterogeneous. The Southwest, moreover, has a core barely remarked—it was once a site for internment camps. During World War II, approximately 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry were incarcerated in one of fifteen “assembly centers” or ten “relocation centers,” situated mainly in dusty and desolate areas of the West or the Southwest. Japanese Americans must reclaim the Southwest not only because internment camps once were located in it, but also because of the traumatic action performed with it. Japanese Americans must also recognize their identity in terms of spatiality and carve that identity back into the topography of the Southwest. Not only should internees turn this unknown, essentially unremembered space into cosmic nature and a communal environment but they also must assume the traumatic place as a nucleus of their being. To these ends, a spatial reading of the Japanese American internment narrative must create new signs, literally, new road signs directing all Americans to those unremembered features of the Southwestern landscape. Those narratives need to create new visual modalities to challenge those existing landmarks through which social agendas are imposed, identities are oriented, and specific desires are elicited.