Tag Archives: hafu

Nationality and Citizenship in Japan

Posted on by

by Shoki Fujimoto

As we studied in EKK class, Japan forces its people who has right to possess foreign nationality to choose one nationality. In short, we can have only one nationality in Japan. This is because Japan does not allow dual citizenship. Japan has kept the system for a long time. However, I found an article that created a stir in the field of citizenship in Japan. The article says that one member of the House of Councilors who was born in Finland petitioned abolition of the system of choosing nationality. According to the article, the hard choice made the “victims” anguish and because of it, superior human resources are leaking out of Japan. The politician named Martti Turunen thinks that we are facing a time that we should consider the present states of abolition of dual citizenship.

The netizens in Japan reacted against this petition. The main reactions of them are that we are not confronting the time of reconsidering dual citizenship and Japan should keep its systems. Moreover, the fact that Martti Turunen is supporting the movement of promoting voting rights for foreign residents. Conservative netizens have argued that the policy might destroy Japanese local small community.

I think this series of debate is largely biased by their political thought, but I think this can be a chance of reviewing Japanese way of regarding citizenship and nationality. I will check the merits and demerits of the policy. First, with it, people who have dual citizenship can go to both parent’s home countries easily. Next, they do not have to apply for permanent-residence visa. Negative opinions are that the policy can cause identity crisis, and it makes procedures of disembark difficult and complex.

Japan has been said that “homogeneous country”, and Japanese people have not have to think about it because of (thanks to) it. This has some relationship between insubstantiality about mixed ancestry people, hafu. I learned that most Japanese people have only positive image about hafu by the video we watched in a class. However, the realities of hafu were different from our fantasy over them.

In conclusion, Japanese people have had a fantasy of monoracial country, and it has made reviewing the value of mixed ancestry people or hafu. Martti Turunen’s policy created a chance to reconsider such situation. It is time to reconsider such situation.

References

GCNET [http://www.gcnet.at/citizenship/merit-demerit.htm](retrieved May 9,2013)

Serchina [http://news.searchina.ne.jp/disp.cgi?y=2011&d=1127&f=politics_1127_007.shtml] (retrieved May 9, 2013)

Ministry of Justice [http://www.moj.go.jp/MINJI/minji06.html] (retrieved May 9, 2013)

Hafu in Japan

Posted on by

by Maki Yoshikawa

In Japan, there are a lot of hafu increasing the number year by year. This is because an increasing number of international marriages.

Probably we imagine people with white or black skin and big eyes. This means we unconsciously imagine non- Asian people. This is the symbol of how we are not get used to see other races in our daily life.

I have been thinking about hafus are little different from foreigners in terms of their identity. Japanese in Japan has no difficulties to define them. Foreigners are aften treated as foreigner, however, in their hometown in other countries, they are never treated as foreigner. What about hafu in Japan?

My friend‘s father is American and she looks completely American. However she speaks fluent Japanese and she uses only Japanese in daily life. She said that when she enters staff room in university, they are suddenly in a hurry and start looking for a parson who can speak English. She feels strange and always says “I can speak Japanese” in Japanese fluently. We treat people with the first appearance. My friend thinks this is little disadvantage because she feels like treated as a foreigner even if her identity is Japanese at least living in Japan since she were born. In addition, Japanese people think she can speak English fluently.

She said in the US, she is often treated very friendly at first sight as American because of the appearance. What I found interesting and strange is that once he/she knows about that she is hafu Japanese, some people do not regard her as a complete American.

I was astonished because I have thought since the US is multiracial nation, the hafu is not big problem.

What I would like to insist is that like my friend, hafu can face the unconsciousness about their identity. I regard her as Japanese but I do not know if she thinks herself as a Japanese or American. Even if she thinks herself as an American, it does not matter because nothing changes between us just because of citizenship.

I think that because of this unconsciousness of identity, hafu feel more friendly with hafu. When hafu people feel alienated, in their mind there are three kind of people which is Japanese, Foreigner and Hafu.

I was so worried how to remove their uneasiness or difficulties in Japan because I have many hafu friends and this was my first time to think about their identity and how they feel about themselves.

In my opinion, we do not have to treat them as a special. Their identity is theirs and we do not have right to decide it. What is different is just an appearance for me.

There will be more and more international marriage and more and more hafu in Japan and in the future, my child can be hafu and his/her friend can be hafu as well.

We can cope with this problem easier following times. I have no clear way to solve their difficulties but I would like to do something since this is very familiar problem for me.

Hafu in Japan

Posted on by

by Ryoma Kagawa

What do Japanese people think about hafu? In the video about hafu in class, the Japanese interviewed responded to this question that hafu are pretty and cool, have good command of some languages, and behave socially, and some of the interviewees envied hafu and even wanted to be hafu for their image. Japanese people tend to have positive image about hafu in this way, but it seems that they do not really understand hafu because, in spite of such images, there are some problems with which hafu encounter in Japanese society.

The first problem is that hafu are often treated as if they were foreigners when they look like Westerner. For example, when they are hunting for a job, they are asked if they speak English very well or they go to attend church on Sundays. This is because Japanese people have the wrong view that Westerners, or Western-looking people, are English speakers and Catholics (Haefelin, 2013). However, hafu were raised in Japanese society and are familiar with Japanese culture, and some hafu are not so good at commanding English. Furthermore, the second problem is that hafu are often discriminated against especially in rural areas, no matter that they look like Western or Asian. I found a person who has a Japanese parent and a Chinese one on the Web and he once has had negative feelings for Japan due to discrimination which he experienced; yet he was sure that he would not be accepted in China as well because he had no command of Chinese language and was hardly close to Chinese culture (Yamashita, 2013). I think that hafu share Japanese culture, customs, and language with Japanese people who have Japanese parents, so they are not foreigners but Japanese.

In order for hafu to join in Japanese society, I believe that the Japanese should change their view on them, and there are some means for the conversion of the view. One of them is to teach children other cultures at elementary schools. While adults belong for a long time to Japanese society which avoids hafu, children have flexible thoughts. Consequently, it is thought that education of multiculturalism at an early age is efficient for forming a society which better includes hafu. Such a society cannot be achieved soon, but now that one in thirty babies in Japan is hafu, I think that they will come to be accepted in society gradually.

Some Japanese people regard hafu as special, and admire them, but it is true that they have difficulty belonging to Japanese society. For a society open to them, I think that to appeal to flexible mind of the young is of great significance. In the stream of globalization, I believe that this will be realized although it requires a long time.

References

Haefelin, S. (2013, February 18). Haahu to shushokukatsudou [Hafu and job hunting]. Haahu wo kangaeyou [Let’s think about hafu]. Retrieved May 7, 2013, from http://half-sandra.com/column/2013/02/18/1423.php

Yamashita, M. (2013, April 11). 30 nin ni 1 ri ga haahu no jidai tachihadakaru bunka no kabe wo dou norikoeruno ka? [The era that 1 in 30 is hafu – how do they overcome the cultural barrier in front of them?]. WEDGE Infinity. Retrieved May 7, 2013, from http://wedge.ismedia.jp/articles/-/2702

Understanding about another: The most important thing to understand foreigner or “hafu”

Posted on by

by Tomoya Yamaguchi

Recently, in Japan there are a lot of “hafu” who is one parent is a foreigner who is white people.  Their faces are different from so-called “Japanese” and they are often thought as a foreigner in Japan, because consciousness of Japanese people is “Japanese is Japanese”.  This means that people think Japanese has a similar face as Asian ethnicity, so they are thought as a foreigner.  Another reason why people think they are foreigner is also that Japan is said to be a mono-racial country.  Hafu is rare to ordinary Japanese.  These facts result in that situation in Japan.

Hafu has a Japanese citizenship, and they have lived in Japan since they were born.  Some of the hafu has an identity as a Japanese citizen.  However Japanese people have a consciousness as mono-racial country.  This is a serious problem to hafu.  In order for them to be accustomed to Japanese society comfortably, Japanese government should create a class about multiculturalism or different culture from the elementary school.  By taking a class in the early period of children, they can understand or learn hafu or another culture and foreigner.  International school is a good example.  In our class, we watched a movie about discrimination and the identity of hafu.  In the movie, one hafu said that his company forced him to use his French name because he could be forgiven by customer when he mistook.  This is a terrible discrimination.  I think that the boss of him who forced him to use the name hasn’t touched another culture or foreigner in his childhood and he doesn’t understand the feeling of them.  If he understood the feelings, he would not say such a terrible thing.  In Japan, a lot of people don’t have an opportunity to contact with foreigners who have different culture and racial background.  This contributes to that discrimination indirectly, so it is important for children to take the class.

I think that it is difficult for us to change this situation because Japan is said to be a mono-racial country and people don’t have a consideration as to foreigner or hafu even today when globalization has progressed.  Besides, Japan doesn’t have a lot of immigrants and the policy toward foreigner is also hard or rigid.  I don’t intend to say that Japan should take an action drastically to multiculturalism because the measures about it are not prepared for.  However Japanese education should be changed to multiculturalism because globalization is progressing now and from now, more people will come to Japan from foreign countries.  In addition to it, the number of the hafu will increase more and more.  According to it, for children to take the class must be so valuable and to be a person who can understand foreign stuff is important.

Posted on by

by Robert Moorehead

I recently came across the writing of Akemi Johnson, a fellow Fulbright scholar who writes on issues of race, gender, and power in Okinawa. Johnson adeptly connects her experiences as the child of a Japanese American mother and a WASP father with the challenges the women and men of Okinawa face in dealing with the presence of US military bases in the prefecture.

Her website, akemijohnson.com, provides links to several articles that she has published, including a brilliant piece in the Kyoto Journal. She is currently working on a literary nonfiction book based on her experiences in Okinawa. Check out her work!

What Are You Anyways?

Posted on by

by Robert Moorehead

Somehow I’d missed seeing the brilliant videos of Jeff Chiba Stearns until now. These videos explore the ins and outs of being a Canadian of mixed Japanese ancestry, including the common query, “What are you anyways?” In Japan, that same question would be “Nanijin?”

Click on the picture above to see the 10-minute animated film “What are you anyways?” You should also visit One Big Hapa Family, in which the filmmaker explores these identity questions for his extended family.

From the filmmaker’s site:

Follow the adventures of the Super Nip as filmmaker Jeff Chiba Stearns explores his cultural backgrounds growing up a mix of Japanese and Caucasian in the small Canadian city of Kelowna, BC. This short classically animated film looks at particular periods in Jeff’s life where he battled with finding an identity being a half minority – from his childhood origins to the epic showdown against the monster truck drivin’ redneck crew.

“What Are You Anyways?” is a humorous yet serious story of struggle and love and finding one’s identity through the trials and tribulations of growing up.

More info at http://www.meditatingbunny.com
Please like http://www.facebook.com/chibastearns

Non-Japanese and Hafu in Japan

Posted on by

by Maho Machida

Nowadays, in Japan, many “hafu” can be seen in variety shows and fashion magazine. So, many Japanese people associate cool or cute people who are white and Japanese with “hafu”, I think. And I have never pay attention to how “hafu” form their identity in Japan before I learned it in class. I think many “hafu” who live in Japan experience some hardships which we Japanese don’t notice.

Referring to these people as “hafu” seems to be controversial. In my opinion, this term doesn’t include negative meanings. However, by calling so, we unconsciously distinguish non-Japanese from us. So, some feel uncomfortable with this labeling, if they have their identity as Japanese as they are brought up in Japan. In addition, there is a possibility that the term “hafu” imply incomplete Japanese. Therefore, these days, it becomes better to use “double” instead of it. But I think that both “hafu” and “double” could prevent them from participating in Japanese group. Both are sort another category different from “Japanese”. Therefore, it would be the best way to call them as their name, like Japanese people. The more the globalization proceeds, the more Japanese society gets diversified. So, I hope a flexible and generous society where there is no need to use “hafu” and “double”.

Japanese idea of citizenship is ethnic and exclusive, I think. There are some limits on jobs and the right to vote for non-Japanese. Historically, we have shaped our own identity and made a system in relatively homogeneous country. Japan seems to be not able to keep up with dramatically changing members of Japan. More and more people have got married to non-Japanese. Moreover, more and more people have come to Japan as immigrants and worker. Nevertheless, the number of signboards and menu cards written in both Japanese and English in Japan seems to be small, I think. And, some Japanese still have a prejudice against “gaijin”. For example, they think Japan becomes unsafe as the number of “gaijin” increases. However, in fact, the number of crimes committed by foreigners in Japan is not very large. Because of its rarity, it is focused on too much.

Thanks to the development of the Internet, we get connect more easily with the world. By using SNS, we communicate more easily with people from all over the word. In that point, our generation is more open to non-Japanese people than the past. So, I hope that Japan become comfortable to live in for non-Japanese people.

Hafu

Posted on by

by Tomoka Otani

The word Hafu stands for mixed-Japanese and I have a lot of friends who are half Japanese and half American since there is an American base near my house in my hometown. Because they look more like Americans, they were teased by their looks and names. When I was in elementary school, most of my Hafu friends had experienced bullying at least one time in their school lives. It was shocking to see my friends bullied just because by their looks or their names. Japan is said to be a racially homogeneous nation and it is extremely difficult for people who look different from other people to live in the society and to interact with other people. For example, the American people who are working at the American base are having hard time interacting with other people out side of the base, therefore, they tend to be inside the base most of the time and they hardly have a chance to know Japanese people even though they are living in Japan.

Another example is my friend, whose father is an American and whose mother is a Japanese, born and raised in Japan and could not speak English. She had trouble interacting with other Japanese children in the class because she looked different. In addition, because she looks American, she was often spoken to by Americans in English, however she could not understand since she only speaks Japanese. It is very hard for her because she looks American but she is Japanese inside. As a result, she couldn’t interact with neither Japanese nor American.

As we talked about the citizenship of Japanese, I began to think what does it mean to be Japanese. It is extremely difficult to define what does it mean to be Japanese, however, I think the most important thing of all is what people believe. For example, I have two Hafu friends, whose father is an American and whose mother is a Japanese, whose father is a Japanese and whose mother is a Chinese. They both speak English and Japanese, Japanese and Chinese. However the girl with an American father looks different from us and the other girl with a Chinese mother looks the same like us. The American Japanese are more likely to be asked by other people if she is hafu or a foreigner compare to Japanese Chinese. But both of them grew up in Japan and they both believe that they are Japanese. Therefore, I came to think that the most important thing when we define what is it mean to be Japanese is what the person believe. It is hard for others not to judge people by their looks but in terms of citizenship, I think what the person believes is the most important thing of all.

Are “hafus” special?: Considering them as an individual

Posted on by

by Yui Matsushita

According to Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (2010), the number of birth in Japan which one of parents comes from a foreign country was 21,966, while the total number of birth was 1,071,304. That means about two percent of babies (one of 49 babies) in Japan have one Japanese parent and one foreign parent. They are commonly called a “hafu.” It can be said that Japan is no longer a racially homogeneous nation.

Japan is diversifying today; on the other hand, Japanese society does not recognize this situation well. It tends to consider “hafus” as different from Japanese. They are still constrained by its stereotyped images that “hafus” are “foreigners.” Typical questions that Japanese people ask them, such as “what is your parent’s nationality?” and “which language do you speak at home?” are clarifying the difference and do not accept them as Japanese. There are a lot of “hafus” who were born in Japan, brought up in Japan, can speak only Japanese and recognize themselves as Japanese, however, they are often apt to be misunderstood that speaking Japanese fluently is surprising and speaking English is natural even it is the result of their efforts. Japanese society tends to cast people with ‘different’ appearances and ‘different’ backgrounds out (as regards appearances, it is conspicuous in people who have a white parent).

Also, there has been a lot of debate over how to call mixed-race people. In Japan, these people are usually called “hafu,” which is derived from the English word “half.” However, some people object this word because it seems to mean incompleteness of “hafus,” and those people claim the word “daburu” (the English word “double”). Both words typically focus on a “blood” characteristic of “hafus” and tend to ignore cultural and racial backgrounds (Lise, 2011). It can be applied to other Japanese words which represent mixed-race people. Every time a new word comes out, its appropriateness is argued and its fault is pointed out, however, “hafus” themselves tend not to feel its negative meaning, and some of them even think the word “hafu” is convenient to introduce themselves. Due to this, the way to call them is not a big problem because most people are not aware of the original meaning of the word “hafu” or “daburu.”

The most important issue today is that “hafus” are considered as special people and society does not treat them as individuals. They are classified into a framework of “hafu” and their action is seen as characteristic to foreigners. What Japanese society has to do is to treat them as individuals and respect their identity as Japanese. They should be considered as not foreigners or specials but one of Japanese.

References

Lise, M. Y. (2011). The hafu project: Photography and research. The booklet of The Hafu Project.

Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare. (2010). Demographic statistics: Annual transition of the number of birth classified by parents’ nationality. Retrieved 16th October, 2012, from http://www.mhlw.go.jp/toukei/saikin/hw/jinkou/suii10/index.html

What are you?

Posted on by

by Koichi Sugimoto

In this class, the professor said ‘’what are you’’ again and again, so this phrase has been repeated in my heart again and again, too. What does it mean? If I am hafu, I’ll answer ‘’I am Koichi. I have parents who have different nationalities’’. In this case, I am supposed to be hafu. Why they have to be called like that? I don’t think whether nationalities have to belong to countries which exist in this world or not. Nationalities or citizenship is certainly important to identify who he/she is, but they are not necessarily needed. I mean we all are human-being. We have each name, sense of values, thought, brief and identity. That is my thought.

By the way, in Japan, ‘’hafu’’ is a widespread word when we call someone who has one Japanese parent and non-Japanese parent because this word was coming in Japan first, used widely and which is derived from English word ‘’half’’. I learned that there is some areas in which people who call hafu ‘’double’’ live. It is because ‘’double’’ has a kind of positive meaning than hafu. How to call is occasionally formed under the influence of situation, so it’s hard to identify which words are better, but we can rethink how important it is for hafu/double. Why do they ask only hafu? We don’t have to be limited by nationalities. I am I, and hafu is hafu. That’s fine.

From readings, I pick up one example about hafu which is seems to give us something positive meaning to be hafu. Her name is Tanya Akiko Cornish, born and raised in UK. She stated when she is in London, she can identify with people living there, and also she doesn’t feel like she is something different, but in Japan, it is not comfortable for her to live in there because she is hafu. However, she stated in the last part, ‘’I’m fully happy with my racial and my class background and I feel like I’ve got an insight into all different areas and that it’s made me a better person’’. This made me more understanding, that is, there are not only necessarily bad things but also good things for them. They are in surroundings where they can learn, study and feel two different cultures and background. This is very precious things because that is a thing which almost all people cannot experience.

Finally, I could get deeper understanding of hafu through this class so far. People have each opinion, so some people are asking, ‘’what are you?’’, but that’s reasons why they don’t know hafu well, and they regard hafu as something rare or uncommon. However, hafu is coming to be close to us now. Hafu may be a main nationality in the future.