I read them but I’m still lost. I can’t seem to escape the POLL thread and do my reviews.
Pls halp
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- Go to the Danger Zone
- Click the big red “Delete Account” button
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Hello from Russia!
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行こう！
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necronomnomnomicon
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I study art and culture (mainly focusing on musicology though). In culture theory orientalism is a negative term. I’m too tired to explain it right now, so please reply this if you want my explanation, and I’ll explain it when I’m less sleepy
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Since orient literally means east, it seems like saying “East Asia” is equivalent. It’s hard to imagine how this became offensive. I find it odd how people now say “Asian” instead of “Oriental”, but somehow exclude people from India and the middle east and other large swaths of Asia when using this nomenclature. Asian has become the new Oriental, but is used to mean the exact same thing, so we’ve only substituted one word for another. Odd.
I suspect most people who find the term “oriental” offensive are probably not even from the region, but have made a hobby on being offended on other people’s behalf. I should explain this to my wife, so she will know to be offended in the future when someone brings it up.
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I linked an article that discusses it in an academic context. From what I remember that article boiled down to ‘Oriental’ being both overly-exotic and a bit of a generalization for a very large and diverse area of the world. I’d certainly be interested to hear about it in terms of musicology and why it’s a negative term there though.
@Ish3rd It’s not quite equivalent. The Orient refers to all of continental Asia, not just East Asia. Hence why we can refer to Islamic/Indian rugs (as I’ve heard them called) as oriental rugs and Chinese food as oriental cuisine. You can start to see why that might be a bit problematic. As to other reasons why it’s problematic, here’s an interesting snippet I found in a Wikipedia article while doing some digging around from before:
In 1968, an Asian activist conference decided on favoring the name “Asian American” over the competing terms: “yellow”, “Mongoloid”, “Asiatic” and “Oriental”, since the Filipinos at the meeting thought they were “brown” rather than “yellow” and the conference thought the term “Oriental” was Eurocentric, since they originate from lands “east” only from Europe’s standpoint and, since the term “Oriental” suggested to them “passivity”.
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Interesting, in German “Orient” only refers to the Middle East, but more in an Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves kind of way; I wondered what this was about 
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I know exactly how you feel. That is the greatest motivation for learning Japanese. Wanting to pass exams is ok for motivation, but learning Japanese for future trips is the greatest motivating factor, in my opinion.
I think the term Orient started out referring to only the so-called Near East, or the modern Middle East. The term expanded over the centuries to encompass all of Asia minus Russia.
Why does this keep getting bumped up by new users?
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hey! i’m from nyc and i’m learning Japanese so I can understand anime better 
Was told to say hello to the community. So, hello! check
Welcome.
Just out of curiosity, is there a reason you chose this topic? I’m just trying to figure out why it’s popular for people to introduce themselves here.
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I think it just showed up on the first page when I visited the community page link. I didn’t want to create a new topic just to say hello, and this one was the only one on the first page that seemed appropriate
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Hello! I’m a new user looking to learn to read Japanese for hobbies, always been interested in the culture and this seemed like the logical next step 
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Hi everyone! David from mexico, I am planning to get my n5 certificaction in the future.
こんにちわ everyone, Alex here from the UK. Planning to do an internship in Japan and the JLPT N5 next year. Great to start the Japanese language journey with the WaniKani community!