| Chapter 1: | Reconsiderations of Race, Ethnicity, and Identity: Transnational Migrants in Post–World War II Global Society |
(Levi-Strauss 1967). But even if the concept of binary oppositions is a natural structure of the human mind, why is skin color used? We could still categorize people by other criteria, like hairy versus non-hairy. For example, I mentioned that terms like ke-t
(Westerner, “hairy Chinese”)and kara-bito (foreigner, “Chinese person”) were used by Japanese to label outsiders. The word ke literally means “hair” and the words “t”and “kara” mean Chinese. Thus, the literal meaning of ke-t is “hairy Chinese.”The fact that this term could be extended to all outsiders is derived from the idea that Chinese (t)were outsiders or foreigners in the eyes ofJapanese throughout the country's history (and often the only outsiders they saw for long periods of time). When the Japanese first saw Westerners, they were struck by the amount of hair on their bodies. As a result, they called this new type of foreigner a “hairy foreigner” to distinguish from the other “non-hairy foreigners” like Chinese and Koreans.
Japanese saw chest hair and hairy arms in relation to an animal's fur. They saw Western people as in the process of evolving, so Westerners were closer to monkeys and apes, thus more “primitive.” On the other hand, kara-bito, the non-hairy foreigners, were at a higher stage of human evolution. Just as black and white became racial synonyms for inferior and superior, “hairy” and “non-hairy” took on the same connotations. People categorize other people with whatever characteristics they feel they have that are superior. Thus, ke-t became a derogatory word in Japanese like the “N” word in English.
The American Anthropological Association's 1998 report clearly states that skin-color-based racial categorization is not founded on any scientific evidence, but is a product of historical and contemporary social, economic, educational, and political circumstances. In contrast to ethnicity, race and racial-related words have a written past going back almost two hundred years. Wade (1997) and others (e.g., Banton 1987) argue that the significance of the term “race” has changed in many important ways over the course of history. In order to have a deeper understanding of race, then, we need to review these changes. The literature on this topic is, of course, vast to say the least. Only a few issues can be addressed here.