Talk:Japanese Americans

Has the question of the use or non-use of the hyphen in the phrase Japanese-American, Italian-American, etc., been discussed on Wikipedia, and a consensus reached rejecting the hyphen? (Once upon a time, persons belonging to such groups were called "hyphenates".) Michael Hardy 01:35, 19 Nov 2003 (UTC)

From User talk:Jiang archive 1:

Hi,

I'm puzzled about what you are doing to pages about x-Americans. While in terms of strict grammar a dash should not be there, they always are written with a dash because many such communities do not actually see themselves as Americans but as Anglo-Americans, Irish-Americans, Spanish-Americans, Italian-Americans, etc. Indeed Irish-Americans take offence at being written as Irish Americans, as any Italian-Americans I know don't just take offence; they are liable to punch you if you leave the dash out, so important do they view it. They and other communities regard the dash as crucial to highlighting their dual cultural identity. So I think your changes are in all the communities I know about not merely wrong but actually can (however accidentially) cause offence. FearÉIREANN 07:29 5 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Without the dash, the "Asian" or "Chinese" is used as an adjetive to modify the term "American," and therefore the Chinese American, Asian American, etc. would be considered American. Without the dash, it seems like a Chinese-American is half-Chinese, half-American, which is not the case. (I find that offensive!) Actually, the dash is less frequently used (probably because of these reasons: [1], [2], [3] Try to snoop around on the web and you'll find the dash absent on most semi-official sites. Well, it all comes to which culture you come from. I left the European cultures alone. African American and Japanese American were already that way when I found them. There's a difference between cultural and national identity--the dash emphasizes dual national identity, not cultural. Sorry for not allowing this issue to be discussed before I acted...I brought it up at the Chinese American talk page and got no response after 24 hrs. --Jiang 07:39 5 Jul 2003 (UTC)

--Jiang 02:41, 19 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Here are the first five hits from a google search: [4][5][6][7][8]. The links are overwhelming for leaving out the hyphen. --Jiang 02:45, 19 Nov 2003 (UTC)

New article: Hyphenated American. --Jiang

Contradiction of another article

"Japanese Americans are typically members of Protestant Christianity. Only a small minority are also followers of Mahayana Buddhism, Zen Buddhism and sectarian Shinto."

This claim directly contradicts this from the Religions of Japan article

"Some churches in America take an active missionary role in converting Japanese in Japan, and America, but even in America, 97% of Japanese Americans adhere to Shinto and Buddhism."

These can't BOTH be right. I'm going to place a similar message on that article's talk page. I don't know which view is correct; maybe someone who knows better than me can fix this.

Rhesusmanrhesusman 17:22 UTC 17 April 2005

Maybe because the both claims are true? In Japan, it is not that simply you profess to some religion or not. For example, some may not follow the teaching of Shinto, but celebrate New Yeark in the manner of Shinto. (This is very common case in Japan) The best thing we can do is just not to mention these issues at all. -- Taku 16:35, Apr 17, 2005 (UTC)

I don't know. This article's claim looks pretty exclusive. It says only a small minority ALSO follow Buddhism and Shinto. There is a clear implication that most Japanese Americans are NOT following Buddhism or Shinto in addition to Christianity. I know about the phenomenon of Japanese syncretism you mention, but this article's claim does not seem to accommodate that at all. If these claims really can be viewed as simultaneously acceptable, shouldn't they be re-worded at least so they don't look so mutually exclusive?

Rhesusmanrhesusman 17:52 UTC 17 April 2005

As a Japanese-American (Sansei), I was also surprised by the statement in Wikipedia that "Japanese Americans are typically Christians. Only a small minority are also followers of Mahayana Buddhism, Zen Buddhism and sectarian Shinto." Based on my interactions with Japanese-Americans, most are not Christians. Many would say that they are "not very religious" or are mildly "Buddhist/Shinto," although I do not know the exact percentages. My observations indicate that the statement that "Japanese Americans are typically Christians" is not accurate.

In addition, I question the veracity of the claim that "After Filipino Americans, Japanese Americans are the second largest Asian Christian community." I would think that Korean-Americans would rank higher than Japanese-Americans.

Are these statements based on reputable surveys? If so, what are the sources?

--Nisei-han, 13-July-2005

I would tend to agree with you. Have you read Religions of Japan? It tends to agree more with what you're saying. Rhesusmanrhesusman 16:37 UTC 24 July 2005

War Service

I find this sentence odd: Despite the treatment, many Japanese Americans served in World War II, mostly as sentries and intelligence agents in the Pacific war. I was under the impression that all the JA's that were in the Army were sent to Europe? IIRC, the reason they were all sent there was that they were afraid they would be confused with the Japanese Empire troops. And why would they be put into intelligence, when the whole reason for their internment was that they weren't trusted? I have read up on Allied codebreaking in WWII, and they do not mention use of JA's in intelligence work. Mostly, they seem to have used asian people of other races (Korean, Chinese, etc.) or white officers, who had learned the Japanese language.