Redefining Japaneseness: Japanese Americans in the Ancestral Homeland Author/Speaker: Jane H. Yamashiro ICAS public lecture series videos are posted on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLAA67B040B82B8AEF

1. Tuesday, July 4, 2017
Temple University Japan
www.redefiningjapaneseness.com

2. Today’s talk
I. My Background
II. How I Came To This Topic
III. Research Questions
IV. Contributions
V. Methodology
VI. Three Findings
VII.Conclusion
VIII.Other Findings In The Book

3. My Background
sansei (third generation) and
yonsei (fourth generation)
Japanese American
Berkeley, CA

4. My Background
1995-98
CIR (Coordinator of International Relations
on JET (Japan Exchange and Teaching)
Program
2004-2009
language study in Yokohama;
PhD fieldwork, teaching in Tokyo while
living in Chiba
1992-93
College exchange student in Tokyo
Lived in Japan 3 times, total of 9 years

5. How I Came To This Topic
1. Noticed that Japanese Americans don’t fit
into mainstream “Japanese” and “foreigner”
categories in Japan.
Japanese (nihonjin) foreigners (gaijin)

6. How I Came To This Topic
2. Noticed that “Asian American” has no
meaning in Japan.
?

7. Research Questions
• As people who are both “Japanese” and
“foreign,” how do Japanese Americans learn
to identify in Japan?
• How do Japanese American experiences and
strategies for identifying in Japan change over
time?
• How does living in Japan affect how Japanese
Americans identify?

8. Contributions to Previous Research
Previous Work
• Japanese Americans
– In the US, WWII
incarceration,
Americanization
• Japanese Americans in
Japan
– On prewar nisei
This Book
• Japanese Americans
– Beyond incarceration
– In globalizing world,
experiences outside of
US, shaped by internal
diversity of Japanese
Americans
– In contemporary Japan

9. Contributions to Previous Research
Previous Work
• Asian Americans
– Transnational lens to
examine migration to
the US
– Asian Americans as
diaspora “returning” to
ancestral homeland
This Book
• Asian Americans
– Question “return”
paradigm, reframe as
“ancestral homeland
migration” of members
of “global ancestral
group”

10. Contributions to Previous Research
Previous Work
• Race, ethnicity, and
migration
– Migration causes shift in
positioning from racial
majority to racial
minority (e.g.,
immigrants from Korea
becoming “Asian”)
This Book
• Race, ethnicity, and
migration
– Migration can cause shift
in positioning from racial
minority to racial
majority, too

11. Contributions to Previous Research
Previous Work
• Japanese society
– Assumes
Japanese/foreigner
categories
– Looks at foreigners in
Japan as low-skilled, non-
white, non-western
“foreign workers” OR at
western migrants who are
white
This Book
• Japanese society
– Complicates understanding
of Japaneseness and
foreignness
– Looks at high-skilled
western foreigners from
highly industrialized
nation, but Japanese
Americans not completely
white/foreign

12. Methodology
• Ethnographic research in Tokyo area (2004-09)
• Conducted formal and informal interviews
– 50+ Japanese Americans living in Japan (2004-09)
– 30+ Japanese Americans living in US (most had
previously lived in Japan) (2005-15)
– 30+ others (Japanese, non-JA foreigners, JAs who had
not lived in Japan) in Japan and US
* For this study, “Japanese Americans”: people of Japanese
ancestry born and raised in the United States

13. Finding #1
• Japanese American experiences and strategies
for identifying in Japan illuminate and are
shaped by what I call “the hierarchy of
foreignness” in Japan.

14. The Hierarchy of Foreignness in Japan
• Two intersecting axes that do
not meet
• “Japanese” on horizontal axis
(acknowledging internal
stratification, Nakane 1970 tate
shakai)
• “foreigners” on vertical axis,
above and below Japanese
• Based on meanings associated
with phenotype, language,
behavior, and citizenship
• Contextually shifts
Japaneseness
foreignness
foreignness

15. Categorized as Japanese*
Masato (36-year-old from New York):
“In America, the way you look is like your
uniform…it’s the first thing people notice…In
Japan you just fit in…I’m not wearing any
uniform.”
* focusing on Japanese Americans who phenotypically blend

16. Miscategorized as Asian immigrants
Henry (38-year-old from NJ):
“the first question most people ask is ‘Are you
Chinese? Korean? Filipino? Never oh, are you
Japanese American? Never that.’ ”

17. Asserting American Identities
• Joe (44-year-old from California) says that
when riding trains, he reads books or
newspapers or does crossword puzzles in
English to let people know that he speaks
English.
• Several Japanese Americans told me they use
English in restaurants to receive better
treatment.

18. Asserting American Identities
Russell (39-year-old from Hawai‘i):
“In Japan they think you’re lower if they think
you’re Chinese…when you’re American, you’re
above them.”

19. Conclusion #1
• Through shifting positioning as Japanese,
Asian immigrant, and American, Japanese
Americans are able to see firsthand
differences in how people of different
nationalities are treated in Japan.

20. Finding #2
In contrast to Japanese Brazilians who
develop stronger national identities as
Brazilians in Japan, Japanese Americans
reconstruct “Japanese American” and
“Hawai‘i” identities.

21. Previous research on nikkeijin in Japan
• In Japan, Japanese
Brazilians develop
stronger identities as
“Brazilians.”
* Nikkeijin: descendents
of Japanese emigrants

22. “Japanese Americans” from the US
continent
• Image of “Americans” is
of people who look
“white.”
• When Americans look
“Japanese,” must
explain background.
• Learn to identify as
“Japanese American.”

23. Japanese Americans “from Hawai‘i”
• Image of people from
“Hawai‘i” includes
people who look
Japanese.
• No need to explain
background.
• Learn to identify as
“from Hawai‘i.”

24. Conclusion #2
• The different ways that nikkeijin learn to
identify in Japan are shaped by Japanese
views of where they are from.

25. Finding #3
As Japanese Americans interact with
Japanese people, become more fluent in
Japanese, and more knowledgeable about
Japanese society, they idealize fitting into
Japan less and less.

26. Idealizing Japan
• When Japanese Americans are new to Japan
and speak limited Japanese, they tend to
idealize someday fitting into Japanese society.

27. Idealizing Japan
Gary, (36 year-old sansei from Chicago):
“I feel very comfortable here in Japan and I know my wife
[who is Irish American] doesn’t and I think the reason why
is because I look like everyone else in Japan and I think I
think like most everyone else here but I don’t speak the
language. So it’s that discomfort because I think like I’m in
the United States but we’re living in Japan. That’s kind of
like the opposite, in a sense, discomfort. It’s not like the
whole not looking like everyone else discomfort or
discrimination or racism that you get in the United States.
But it’s the whole…it’s the language. I think if I spoke
Japanese I’d feel comfortable living here all my life…”

28. Hitting a Point of Diminishing Returns
• Japanese Americans who develop fluency in
Japanese and are immersed in Japanese
society can hit a point where they lose
motivation to improve their Japanese.

29. Hitting a Point of Diminishing Returns
Masato, (36-year-old shin-nisei from New York):
“I think I might have stopped my development of my
Japanese skill because…I don’t want to be seen
completely as Japanese because I would be
handicapped because I find that being completely
Japanese from a business perspective, or even
socially is a disadvantage for Japanese Americans
because you don’t know exactly how to act in given
situations or you can’t act at the same sophistication
level you can in your native tongue.”

30. Conclusion #3
• Idealizing fitting into Japan less and less
reflects Japanese Americans shifting from
comparing themselves with white foreigners
to comparing themselves with “Japanese.”

31. Conclusion
• Living in Japan highlights ancestry, phenotype,
and place-based identity (i.e., U.S. or Hawai‘i), as
Japanese Americans compare and are compared
to other groups of people in Japanese society.
• Ironically, living in Japan leads Japanese
Americans to feel less “Japanese” by Japan-based
standards.
• Through living in Japan, Japanese Americans
redefine what it means to be “Japanese.”

32. Implications for Japanese Studies
• Understanding the complexities of Japanese
American experiences in Japan requires
deessentializing Japaneseness and
decentering Japan.
• The dynamic strategies that Japanese
Americans develop highlight intersecting
structures of race, nation, and culture that all
international migrants to Japan must
negotiate.

33. Other findings in the book
 Name writing (which Japanese alphabet) in Japanese
reflects identification in Japan.
 Japanese Americans of mixed heritage grapple with
hāfu category in addition to “Japanese” and
“foreigner.”
 I developed the concepts of “global ancestral groups”
and “ancestral homeland migration” to offer an
alternative framework to “diasporic return” and
challenge the idea that Japanese Americans are
“returning” to Japan.

34. www.redefiningjapaneseness.com