I can understand peoples objection to oriental because what the word came to be associated with But it is BS finding fault in the word itself. It comes from the LAtin word Oriens “to rise” ( which also means east as in the rising sun). I beleive asia means practicaly the same thing only in greek. So really it is one eurocentric word over another.
Some definitions from Concise English-Chinese Dictionary, one of the most practical dictionaries I have ever used for Mandarin Chinese. It is a “Mainland” dictionary. I have provided my literal translations with in the parenthesis.
Oriental = dongfang de (adj. of the orient)
= dongfangren (oriental person)
Asian = yazhou de (adj of Asia)
= yazhouren (asian person)
Ironically, when Chinese of China and Taiwan (probably Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia and HK although I am not positive) refer to themselves/Asian/Oriental/Far Eastern people, the word they use is
= huangzhong ren (a yellow type person)
When referring to whites or blacks they skip the word “zhong” or type. Thus
whites = bai ren (white person)
blacks = hei ren (black person)
So, what will the politically correct people have to say about Chinese calling people from this part of the world as “yellow type person”, which conjures up all sorts of pc incorrect terms to call an Asian or Oriental.
Since China Guy asked…
In the UK “Asian” is used pretty much exclusively to refer to those hailing from the Indian subcontinent.
Those hailing from East Asia are known as “Oriental”.
As of yet there is no pejorative understood by that term. The fact that Americans call Orientals “Asian” is thought of in pretty much the same way as the fact that you spell colour as “color” or call jam “jelly”.
However many culturalisms find their way over here. Who knows? Maybe in five years “Oriental” will be seen as derogatory over here too. At the moment though, certainly not.
pan
China Guy, direct translation is completely useless from a linguistic standpoint. Yellow person has cultural connotations in the Western world that the direct translation into Chinese does not.
–John
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- No, but you’re missing the point here: I used it as a general term applied to a large group of people. If I was addressing one person who didn’t like the term I would refrain from using it, but it is the nature of an internet BBS that there’s no way to tell if everybody concerned objected. And I am a bit troubled by the notion that one word isn’t acceptable, but another different word representing the exact same concept is, particularly when the concept itself is essentially neutral. Given the lack of other suggestive hints I feel it is more important to note how a potentially objectionable word is used in context rather than how it might be judged in ordinary conversation.
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As far as the “Crazy Orientals and Funny Writing” title, the post concerned the fact that I couldn’t identify any underlying relationships in simple Chinese or Japanese written and spoken language. Since most Chinese and Japanese 6-year-olds can, who I might have been insulting is rather questionable. - MC
Wha? Huh? You don’t see how one way of putting some thing is acceptable, and another isn’t?
Sorry to hear that your father died.
vs.
Hey, it’s too bad that your father’s head got blown off. I hope you can get over the fact that he’s lying in a box, rotting.
That’s how language works. That’s why there’s different ways of phrasing things, because sometimes one is more appropriate than another. Language changes over time. That’s another fact of linguistics. So let’s put them together.
Once, Oriental was considered appropriate to refer to both people and things. Now, many people (every Asian I know, for instance) are offended by being called Oriental. It is still accurate (sort of) but has moved into the inappropriate area.
Once, shit was a perfectly acceptable word for defecating, suitable for use in any context. Now, it’s not. Language changes. Deal.
You would have been insulting Chinese and Japanese people by saying that their language is ‘funny writing.’ The fact that you were kidding doesn’t make it less insulting. As I said in the thread, I realize it’s a joke. I just think it’s a joke in poor taste.
–John
It’s not like I kept secret what I was citing. The NY Times and New Republic are well known, and to go to their websites and search for the word “oriental” is trivial. But if you insist, here’s my NYT search, which included this:
Here’s TNR including this (and another) from Saul Bellow
CNN included this
and elsewhere this
(Both apparently quoting policemen).
From UPI, this
and this
thanks Izzy thought that it was standard to include the link when you state “I found such and such to be true”.
The CNN link was to a story that I’d quoted, and I’d noticed the “Oriental names on mailboxes”, but again a name is not a person.
And that exemplifies why I wanted to see the specific links.
For example, when you claim that the word has ‘not fallen into disuse’, and then mention that you found “many” matches on NYT site with the word “oriental” in the past 30 days, we aren’t able to see, for example, that “many” was 14, that of those links most of the use of the word “oriental” was in fact used as a noun. Additionally, as this shows there’s substantially more hits (146) on the word “Asian”, with for example in the same time period, the first two being
Seems to me that your cursory search didn’t go far enough. If you wish to demonstrate that the use of the word “Oriental” hasn’t fallen out of disfavor for use as a descriptive word when applied to people vs. the word “Asian”, it would have been of benefit for you to examine both words, eh?
So, you’ve managed to find a couple of instances where some one’s quoted saying “Oriental person”. You’ve also managed to overlook the majority that seem to call people “Asian” and use “oriental” as a descriptive term for objects. Seems to me that you’ve demonstrated quite nicely that the term has been largely dropped by major news sources.
by the way, I found it interesting that you selected the article you did from the list of “TNR”, instead of this one which includes this quote from Bellow the author, (which takes the former line about “Nikki” being ‘oriental’ out of the rhelm of newsreporting and into the literary rhelm)"His Asiatic face is part of his equipment as a careful noticer, the inscrutable Oriental vigilance that gives nothing back: "
**Yue Han ** So, where were you when we were arguing Polite =PC a few weeks ago? it would have been helpful, however, I fear for some, until and unless a poll is taken and a wide majority (close to 90%) assert unequivocably that “yes, we find the term “Oriental” when used to describe people, as offensive, harmful, horrible, rude, yucky, icky, painful” (and not just merely "we prefer the term ‘Asian’), then have the results of the poll cerrtified and hand delivered to each and every citizen, then read to each citizen, there will be folks who claim "gee, I didn’t mean anything offensive by it, so you should just chill ".
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Denotations generally remain the same, but connotations often change.
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A term is offensive if the group to which the term refers deems it offensive.
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Hi Opal.
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From time to time, there is a shift in the generally-accepted connotations of a racial term. In the lifetime of my parents, for example, the socially accepted term for african-americans went from Negro to Colored to Black. The two earlier terms at one point were correct, polite, and proper (note the United Negro College Fund and the NAACP).
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We are very likely going through such a shift right now with “Oriental”.
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Sometimes these shifts are aborted - when’s the last time you heard “people of color”?
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In such times of linguistic change, it is probably best to use the term that is least likely to cause offense - in this case “Asian” rather than “Oriental”.
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If you still generally use “Oriental”, you are not a bad person. If, however, you insist upon using “Oriental” when a person from that part of the world asks you not to, you are at least being rude.
Sua
<sigh> I’ve always hated the word “Oriental,” even as a child. For the record, I am of Japanese descent. Anyway, as I was growing up, I picked up connotations of weirdness or different-ness whenever the word was used. It was used by people when making generalizations about populations of people - “oriental people are hard workers”, “oriental women are easy”, “inscrutable orientals”, etc, etc, etc. These generalizations appeared in various media (I don’t remember exactly which ones, but, for example, phrases like “the mysterious Orient” frequently appeared in TV shows) and I heard them from adults and other children. I didn’t read Edward Said when I was a kid, I had not been to a university yet, but that word always made me uneasy.
My dislike for the word is based on personal experience…
I’m at work, gotta go, will post more later.
I am white. My son is Korean American. As I’ve said before in these threads (and you can search for them), since he is not old enough, I will speak for him…
Please refer to him as Asian. Korean American would be my first choice, but since you wouldn’t know that looking at him, Asian works well. Oriental is ok - I don’t find it offensive, as long as it isn’t with malice, but the only people I ever hear use the word Oriental when referring to race (as opposed to rugs or vases) are my elderly relatives (and december) - it isn’t the “current” word. Anyone using the word Oriental is filed in my mind as “a little out of touch.” Young people using Oriental are filed as either “living in a box” or “red-light potentially racist.” Since most people don’t want to be percieved as out of touch, or potential racists, it only makes sense to use the current inoffensive word, which is Asian.
Better yet a term is offensive to an individual to if he/she deems it offensive.
Unless of course the individual has no preference either way, or if he/she prefers the term Oriental. Therefore a person shouldn’t be judged when they use the word Oriental when addressing a person unless it is clearly known that the person being addressed prefers to be called Asian.
Grim
China Guy:
I don’t know that is necessary to turn this into a PC debate, you seem to be overreacting a bit. As I noted, my sense from the mid-1980s forward was that educted American-born Asians began asking for the use of Asian over Oriental based on the opinions goboy provided. Right or wrong in their analysis, I never saw much harm to it. Further, of course, post 1979 and publication of Ed Said’s Orientalism the terminology got something of a bad rap.
Since we can’t run a valid survey from SD I can only suggest that a survey of usage in print and in modern academic works suggests that usage has evolved away from oriental as the adjective or noun for East Asians.
I don’t, myself, view it as offensive per se, however I do tend to hear it coming from uninformed people who tend not to be able to tell a Korean from a Japanese person, which has tended to reinforce my avoidance of the word in favor of Asian. (Mind you Asiatic, a different adjectival form carries the same sense for me, for the same reasons)
Jaimest nicely captured the thinking on this.
Finally, in re such terms as the “oriental mind” or mystical orient and all that kind of rot, I rather dislike them all as being substitutes for analytical rigor through poorly founded stereotyping. I’ve run into the same kind of commentary, often with the same terminology, in re the Islamic world and I found it to get in the way of a real understanding.
As for Chinese language usage, that’s the business of the Chinese not mine. Native speakers determine content and meaning, not non-native speakers. I wince at or find puzzling some constructions in Arabic(*) but its not up to me to change the language or comment on it, although I have asked folks working with me not to refer to Nubians with clearly offensive adjectives like “slave”. I am interested in the etymological history of the usage, wondering if it was a post-hoc adoption after European contact or not. Given me understanding from other contexts, I suspect it might be. Not this is of much interest outside of historical terms
(*: e.g. greenies for dark people, brownies for virtually everyone else and a particularly obnoxious term for Europeans which irritates me to no end.)
What’s wrong? Well, referring to all East asians and South East asians under the blanket term “Oriental” marks each different ethnicity as similar, when many have very different histories (China has it’s own, the Philippines and Indonesia have connections through the Sri Vijaya empire, for instance). You can safely say that about Europe, which has had a much more connected history than Much of the east and south east asian countries. You cant really connect the history of say, China and the Philippines because despite trade connections, there isnt a huge cultural or religious connection, unlike say, Italy and England.
Not to mention oriental assumes there’s a similar culture, whereas asian, east asian, or south east asian just denotes geography, like European does. Also, from what i’ve noticed, oriental in most people’s mind who use it refers to the Chinese.
I remember your first post. Do you remember when I said, “You Occidentals crack me up”? How did it make you feel? Did you run to the dictionary and find out it meant someone from the West. Didn’t seem like an out of date term to use for white people. Why would you do the same to us Asian people?
What bothers me most about the whole oriental/asian thing is the glee that many PCers seem to take in correcting people. Some of these folks just seem to enjoy being “offended.” They remind me of a three year old who has caught her father not wearing his seatbelt. Cute in a youngster, but at a certain point, get a life!
The next question is, if we aren’t going to use the word “oriental,” what is a convenient word for members of that group? I suppose “East Asian” could work.
Last point: There’s a limit to how far we should go to call people what they wish. Suppose that Timothy McVeigh wants to be referred to as “Aryan.” Should we go along with this?
** So you would prefer to unknowingly insult groups of other people? I’ll make a note of it. See, I have a bigger problem with folks who proudly proclaim themselves to be ‘anti PC’ and insist on using terms that they know are considered offensive since ‘I don’t mean it that way and no PC police is gonna tell me what to say’. But, to each his/her own, I suspect.
** I’m unclear here - this thread has been mostly about the preferred “Asian” to “oriental”, isn’t it?
** Don’t know about you personally. For me it’s a pretty simple thing.
Do I want to annoy/humiliate/offend/insult this person/these people? Then call 'em by something they don’t care for.
Do I wish NOT to annoy/humiliate/offend/insult this person/these people? then call them by their preferred. So, for McVeigh, personally, I wouldn’t bother addressing him in any way. YMMV
PC Double Standard
So it’s bad for us evil Americans to use the term “oriental”, meaning “eastern” but the Chinese can use words meaning “white person” and “black person” or Arabs can use words like “slave”, “greenies”, and “brownies”?
milroyj who are you arguing with? Do you think for one second that people who think Oriental shouldn’t be used, will say that it is okay for Arabs to use terms that have a connotation of ‘slave’?
I don’t know what universe you live in but even here in the US we use the terms white person and black person. So your point is…?
I am an American of Korean descent, and I don’t think Oriental should be used. Are you speaking for me as an American? Or do you equate American with White? If so then that is the most racist thing I have heard in this thread.
The problem I have with Oriental is that it doesn’t have any meaning anymore. Oriental means a person from the East. Occidental means a person from the West. If I called a white person a Crazy Occidental people would look at me crazy, and rightly so.
A late night post but this is just too dense for words:
I believe that the full rational has been given above, you can ignore as you like.
Err, white person, black person is more or less what we use in English, no?
But a small lesson: non-native speakers should rarely attempt to judge foreign language use. The pitfalls are legion. Partially translation is tricky. Partially you just don’t know the culture.
Abid is offensive. No questions. It means slave. Native speakers find it offensive. Nuff said.
Greenie and Brownie are my humorous translations of two words which simply mean green and brown. Offensive? Not that I can see. No bad connotations that I know of, no particular meanings lurking in the word. I’m not a native speaker so its not up to me to dictate usage.
Frankly, you had to dig kinda deep into misunderstanding in order to see this as a “PC” double standard. Perhaps you should join AWC in deliberate, may I say, manufactured misunderstandings?
Pity I don’t do the smiley faces.