Home alone

Natural History, July-August, 2004 by Winifred C. Chin, Takeyuki Tsuda

In his article "No Place to Call Home" (4/04), Takeyuki Tsuda brought out the painful realities of Japanese who choose to leave "home." Return migrants are distinguished from the native born to the point that even their names must be written in a distinct phonetic system that identifies them as foreigners (gaijin). Former Peruvian president Alberto Fujimori himself could not avoid such treatment.

For that reason, I disagree with Mr. Tsuda's conclusion that the children of the returnees "will be able to bridge the ethnic gap." Yes, they are learning Japanese and adopting Japanese customs, but their names and the way they are written will always identify them as having once left the country.

Winifred C. Chin

New York University

New York, New York

TAKEYUKI TSUDA REPLIES: I appreciate Winifred C. Chin's remarks, but I would note that the Japanese Brazilians have Japanese last names, unless they happen to be of mixed descent. Many have Brazilian first names, but a number have both Japanese and Brazilian first names. The students I met who had assimilated to Japanese culture generally use their Japanese first names. They also write these first and last names with Japanese characters--not with the phonetic syllabary used for foreign names. I'm sure some of them use their Brazilian names in Japan, but that practice seems to be based on their own preference to assert their Brazilian origins.