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 Language Learning Forum : Cultural Experiences in Foreign Languages |  | |
| cathrynm Senior Member United States junglevision.co Joined 5920 days ago 910 posts - 1232 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Finnish | Message 9 of 26 22 February 2012 at 7:16am | IP Logged | ||
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There are other terms 混血(konketsu) and アイの子(ainoko) and one of us raised in America raised the idea of suggesting maybe reclaiming one of these, but the guys living in Japan were just horrified by both these words as apparently they have some bad history behind them. I think ainoko might imply American soldier father and Japanese mother situation specifically, and there's some weird feelings associated with this.
As far as mixed race and Asia, uh, well, what can I say? With Japan, and maybe with all the Asian countries, a huge factor in dealing with people is what your ethnicity is. There are issues here that go beyond just the terms and the words. Racial and ethnic identity issues permeate these societies, and I don't try to fight it. I'm sure every case is different. For me the strange thing is if they ask and if I mention 'Finland', a Japanese person will immediately think of Muumin (which was a 90's TV show and a book written in Finland back a few decades.) Really I know nothing about the Muumin, but I'm thinking maybe of getting a Finnish Muumin book just to study up on this, since maybe I'm supposed to be an expert or something. If I tell them I'm half-Japanese sometimes they assume I'm a native Japanese speaker, which always results in tragic listening comprehension failure. I suppose I should see this as a challenge. For me in Asia, I'm just a tourist. So whatever situations I run into don't affect my life in any practical way. I have been on the Half-Japanese Facebook group, and I've read more of what half-Japanese people living in Japan are going through. Their situation can be more complicated as a result of being mixed blood. Some of these guys are fluent in multiple languages and working working at Goldman Sachs and other high paying international companies. Others seem to be struggling, maybe because they didn't learn to read and write Japanese properly as children or discrimination or other issues like this. I think those who look more white generally do better. There was this one interesting story of a half-Japanese guy who was a monolingual Japanese speakers, and he wrote how everyone kept trying to practice English with him. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| nway Senior Member United States youtube.com/user/Vic Joined 5210 days ago 574 posts - 1707 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Japanese, Korean | Message 10 of 26 22 February 2012 at 8:30am | IP Logged | ||
Well, as an ethnically-Han Filipino-Chinese, ethnically-Ashkenazim Russian/Ukrainian-Jewish American whose Chinese grandfather was an orphan with blue eyes, I can slightly relate. The standard Chinese word for it is "Hùnxiě'er" (simp.: 混血儿 / trad.: 混血兒), which idiomatically translates to "hybrid". A Google images search yields some pretty decent eye-candy, so in the absence of context, I think it's fairly non-pejorative. The individual characters—which are identical in Japanese kanji and Korean hanja—literally translate to: 混 = Mixed 血 = Blood 儿 = Child The standard native Korean term is "혼혈" ("honhyeol"). "혈" simply means "blood", but "혼", interestingly, means both "horn" and "spirit" or "ghost". "Horn" is probably just a coincidental homophone, but I wouldn't be surprised if the latter connotation was an etymologically meaningful component of the word's origin. A Google images search, again, has some nice eye candy, so I think its meaning is fairly innocuous in a neutral setting. The Japanese phonetic kana reading of "混血" is "こんけつ" ("konketsu"), but the kanji form is the more common usage. Needless to say, the Google images search of the kanji (which, again, are identical to the hanzi and hanja) makes for a pleasant Internet experience... "アイの子" ("ainoko") idiomatically translates to "crossbreed". Incidentally, whether coincidentally or not, its lexical structure breaks down into "eyes of the child", which makes for an insanely creepy Google images search. Seriously, WTF! Anyway, all three of the Chinese, Japanese, and Korean articles for the word on Wikipedia note that "混血" can indeed be used as a derogatory insult when intentionally used as such, and the term often translates to "half-breed" (as in describing livestock) which of course has a negative connotation when used to describe people. Personally, I've lived my whole life in the United States, where it's of course completely different, and probably for the better. Here in California, I suppose I may come across as a curiously Asian-looking Hispanic, though I don't really ever ask anyone what I look like. Edited by nway on 22 February 2012 at 8:40am 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| clumsy Octoglot Senior Member Poland lang-8.com/6715Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4973 days ago 1116 posts - 1367 votes Speaks: Polish*, English, Japanese, Korean, French, Mandarin, Italian, Vietnamese Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swedish Studies: Danish, Dari, Kirundi | Message 11 of 26 22 February 2012 at 1:25pm | IP Logged | ||
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African + Asian = Blasian
Mixing it with Caucasian (Jewish and Polish) gives "Blacasian" . but seriously I think the best is to answer with descriptive answer like: "my father is half Thai and half Igbo, and my mum is Tamil", or something similar. I had a girlfriend who had multiple ancestry from China and she called herself "mix blood child" thing,so I think it's not so offensive. but I think the term " 愛の娘" may be offensive, it just sound a little like this for me. a lot of half Japanese use the term "half" ハーフ often. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Thor1987 Groupie Canada Joined 4529 days ago 65 posts - 84 votes Studies: German | Message 12 of 26 25 February 2012 at 9:21pm | IP Logged | ||
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No offense why don't you guys just say your mexican/brazllian etc. If people are asking
question you don't wanna answer just lie. Granted when people ask my backround, I say ethnic canadian, and note that my grandmother is metis. I donno but this stuff is a tricky one. I don't like being called white/european, as all my ancestors were in the country before it formed(1867). And I don't like the concept of white as it's such a non identity. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Saim Pentaglot Senior Member AustraliaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4878 days ago 124 posts - 215 votes Speaks: Serbo-Croatian, English*, Catalan, Spanish, Polish Studies: Dutch, Portuguese, Italian, Occitan, Punjabi, Urdu, Arabic (Maghribi), French, Modern Hebrew, Ukrainian, Slovenian | Message 13 of 26 27 February 2012 at 9:16am | IP Logged | ||
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I say "I'm Australian, my father is Pakistani/Punjabi (who left for the US when he was
young) and my mother is Serbian". Bracketed part is optional. I don't think it's important to note my Russian, Slovene or German/(Jewish?) ancestry or that my Punjabi ancestors were Jats and Rajputs. Edited by Saim on 27 February 2012 at 9:18am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4502 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 14 of 26 27 February 2012 at 2:14pm | IP Logged | ||
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I am, uh, Dutch. As Dutch as it can probably get. So whenever I get this question I just go "100% Dutch". I could be Scottish with my ginger beard though.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5129 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 15 of 26 27 February 2012 at 3:37pm | IP Logged | ||
Isn't it strange that although some mixes result in some of the most beautiful people on the planet, there are still so few nice terms to describe it. 6 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| cathrynm Senior Member United States junglevision.co Joined 5920 days ago 910 posts - 1232 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Finnish | Message 16 of 26 27 February 2012 at 7:52pm | IP Logged | ||
Maybe this is an internet myth. I don't know if mixed-race people are any more attractive than anyone else or not. I've only seen these super-attractive mixed blood people on Japanese TV. In reality, it seems much more of a mixed bag with ugly and attractive people in the group, just like everyone else. Past age 30-40 being physically attractive is as much about lifestyle as it is genetics anyway, I think. 5 persons have voted this message useful |
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