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Cover of Jap Magazine
Spring 1994 (Vol. 1, No. 1)
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Cover of Jap Magazine
Autumn 1994 (Vol. 1, No. 3)
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Back of Jap Magazine
Autumn 1994 (Vol. 1, No. 3)
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Cover of Jap Magazine
Spring 1995 (Vol. 2, No. 4)
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Cover of Jap Magazine
Winter 1995 (Vol. 2, No. 7)
Featuring Yohji Yamamoto interview
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The ultimate fashion statement
(Of course she smokes "Peace")
Jap Magazine, Winter 1995
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Cover of Jap Magazine
Winter 1996 (Vol. 3, No. 11)
Featuring "Japonica" fashions
(First issue to publish
definitions of "Zyappu")
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Introduction to a Japonica spread
Jap Magazine, Winter 1996
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Parasol beauty and kerchief beast
Jap Magazine, Winter 1996
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Taking a stance and lighting up
Jap Magazine, Winter 1996
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Cover of Zyappu
Spring 1997 (Vol. 4, No. 12)
(First issue calling itself "Zyappu"
and introducing "romaji" [sic] chart)
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Zyappu girl Maiko in wedding dress
Jap Magazine, Spring 1997
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Cover of Zyappu
Winter 1997 (Vol. 4, No. 15)
Featuring "Age of Mixture"
(Second issue not to use kanji)
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Ijima Kaoru's "Mix? Mikkusu"
Jap Magazine, Winter 1997
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Cover of Zyappu
Spring 1998 (Vol. 5, No. 16)
Featuring "Debu" [fat people]
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Cover of Zyappu
Spring 1999 (Vol. 6, No. 20)
Five-year anniversary issue
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The "Jap" war in America
The word "Jap" has become a word not to be used in the United States, in reference to Americans and other people of putatively Japanese ancestry, or to Japan or things putatively Japanese, for obvious sociohistorical reasons: it was the government of the United States, encouraged by racists with political pull, that interrned not only "enemy aliens" of Japanese nationality during World War II, but also American citizens who happened to be of Japanese descent. This set a precedent for other American states, including Canada and Peru, to similarly treat their citizens of Japanese ancestry.
That the United States could order the round-up and herding of its own citizens on the westcoast into remote "Relocation Centers" from California to Arkansas, was possible because the government already had a long history of "yellow peril" inspired Asian exclusion laws that severally restricted immigration from Asian countries and did not allow Asian immigrants to naturalize. Behind anti-Asian racism was an even longer history of white-supremicism that to some extent continues today in not a few pockets of American society.
It is therefore entirely understandable that a human rights organization like the Japanese American Citizens League should attempt to persuade localities to relegate street names like "Jap Road" to the dustbins of history, and monitor mass media for gratuitous use of words like "Jap" by radio and tv personalities, politicians, and other public figures. A number of JACL members, however, seem to feel that "Jap" cannot possibly be used except as a derogative. Unfortunately -- or "fortunately" as I say in one of the following letters to Pacific Citizen, JACL's official newspaper -- life is not so simple, for Americans of Japanese ancestry do own the word "Jap" or otherwise have a monopoloy on its use.
Pacific Citizen letters
Articles in the Pacific Citizen, about actions taken against public figures who have uttered the J-word on the air or elsewhere, or against municipalities that persist in keeping their Jap Roads or whatever, are perennial. Most such actions are reasonable, and most commentary in op-ed columns and letters to the editor do not move me to respond in kind.
Occassionally, though, someone writes something that, while well-intended, is simply not truthful or doesn't make sense in the real world as I know it. The following letters are two of many efforts I have made to rescue "Jap" from unreasonable censorship.
Letter 1
This letter appeared on page 2 in the 30 June - 3 July 2003 issue of Pacific Citizen. It was inspired by a number of PC articles, though I specifically mention only two.
Zyappu and Aoime
There were two articles on "Jap" in the May 2-15 issue of PC. As a writer and editor, I have always been cautious about the use of this and other words having the potential of offending some people. Yet I stop short of unconditional censorship, as no word is disparaging without an intent to disparage.
Some examples come to mind. Kenzo Takada opened his famous Jungle Jap boutique in Paris in 1970. Soon there were outlets in New York and Tokyo. People in France and Japan didn't mind. Kenzo's hippy chic Jap label offended mainly Japanese Americans.
In the 1990s, a very interesting fashion quarterly debuted in Tokyo. Its name was written in katakana that would be romanized "Jappu" in the more common Hepburn system. The English title "Jap Magazine" also appeared on the spine, cover, and contents page. There were features called "Jap Interview" and "Jabber Jap". The photography and art work were street-smart, sassy, and totally unconventional.
In its third year, the magazine was renamed "Zyappu" in Latin script. This is the Kunrei romanization of the katakana name, which gradually disappeared. Eventually, all Japanese text was printed in Kunrei as an expression of the magazine's evolving world view.
Shortly before the name change, the following definition began to appear on the contents page of every issue:
zyappu [jap] n. -- 1. a disparaging word for Japanese. 2. the name of a fashion magazine in Japan which was first published in 1994. 3. Japanese who have a free and independent spirit.
Whether "slant-eyed" is worse than "blue-eyed" may depend on who you are and where you live. I have lived in Japan most of my life. And I have been personally referred to, orally and in print, as Aoime (blue eyes) by people motivated to slap this common racialist label for "Caucasian" on me. One problem is, my eyes are not blue. Another problem is, I do not welcome being racialized by anyone anywhere (one thing nice about living in Japan is there are no race boxes).
Some people in Japan use Aoime (among several other terms) with an intent to offend. Some don't. Aoime are good in some eyes, bad in others. So could there also be good Japs and bad Japs? Perhaps its not what's in the word, but what's in the heart.
Bill Wetherall
Letter 2
Predictably my letter drew some fire. One reader thought I was promoting the use of "Jap" as a reference to Japan or people who consider themselves ancestrally related to the country. So I wrote another letter, just to set the record straight, and it was published on page 2 in the 5-18 September 2003 edition of Pacific Citizen.
Case-by-case
If Lieutenant Senaha (PC, July 4-17) would re-read my letter (PC, June 20 - July 3), he will discover that I did not advocate that "Jap" be accepted as a general reference to someone of Japanese ancestry of any race or ethnicity. All I did was suggest that "Jap" has a more complex semantic range than some word-hunters seem to understand.
I have been a PC subscriber and reader for three decades, beginning in Berkeley during the 1970s and continuing from the early 1980s as a member of the Japan Chapter of JACL. I am very familiar with the history of "Jap" in North America and elsewhere. As an academic, journalist, and activist, I have written in both English and Japanese on discriminatory terminology and political correctness in Japan and the United States.
Fortunately, the emotional tapestries of words like "Jap" and "nigger" in the United States are not as simple as Lieutenant Senaha seems to believe. Just as his fictive "we JAs" do not own the word "Jap", the final authority on the meaning of "nigger" is not NAACP but the many people -- musicians, comedians, novelists, and others -- who continue to use this word with a variety of meanings.
I say "fortunately" because I feel that teaching people to tolerate the varieties of human emotions associated with words that in some contexts may be offensive is ultimately preferable to the rigid thought control that results from censoring words for their own sake. A hard-and-fast "no Jap" policy on the part of JACL would carry the message that JACL's members are not very enlightened. A case-by-case approach would be more honest and effective.
Bill Wetherall
Ijima Kaoru's essay on "Mikkusu"
Ijima Kaoru (b1954), the creator and editor of Zyappu magazine, is moderably well-known as a fashion photographer who likes breaking conventions in a world that more often than not only pretends to be creative. From it's very first issue, Zyappu reflected the more "cosmopolitan" face of an industry in which "race" is highly commodified -- whether in Beijing, London, New York, Paris, Rome, or Tokyo.
In Japan, as in many countries, racially mixed people are more conspicuous in the worlds of fashion and entertainment than in the general population. Ijima had featured all manner of models in earlier issues of Zyappu, but saw reason to devote the Winter 1997 issue (Number 15) to the subjects of "Mix? Mikkusu! / Mikkusu no zidai" [Mix? Mikkusu! / The age of mikkusu].
Already by this issue, Ijima has steered Zyappu entirely away from the use of kanji, and so everything is written in romazi, as was his introduction to the "Mix? Mikkusu!" feature. Below are both Ijima's romazi version and my structural English translation.
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Romazi original
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Structural translation
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Mix? Mikkusu!
Ima, Nihon ni sunde iru kagiri wa heiwa o kanzite irareru mono no, sekaizyû no takusan no minzoku ya kuniguni no aida de tairitu ga okori, sensô ya sabetu wa itu made tatte mo ato o tatanai.
Aru kuni ya minzoku no bunka ya, zyunsuisei o mamoru koto wa daizi na koto ka mo shirenai. Sikasi sore o mamoru tame ni otagai ga tairitu sitari sensô sinakereba naranai to sitara, sono hisan no ketumatu wa yôi ni sôzô ga tuku to iu mono da.
Soko de sukosi siten o kaete miyô de wa nai ka. Tikyû o hitotu no kuni da to kangaeru no de aru. Sono naka ni wa ironna minzoku ga ari, ironna zinsyu ga ite, hada no iro mo hanasu kotoba mo takusan aru. Da kedo otagai naka no ii hitotu no kuni no kokumin na no da. Sosite itu sika zinsyu mo minzoku mo maziriai, konton to site hitotu no sekai ni tokeatte simau. Maru de mikkusu zyûsu no yô na sonzai to naru no de aru. Soko ni wa sabetu mo nakareba kenka mo nai. Mohaya dare ga ringo de dare ga banana datte ka sae, mô wakaranai no da kara.
Sate, ima koko ni atumatte Nihonzin o bêsu to shita konketu no hitotati o mite iru to, Nihon to iu kuni mo, sekai ga mitumete iru hôkô ni mukatte, yukkuri to de wa aru ga sukosi zutsu, ugoite iru no da to iu koto o zikkan saserareru.
Motiron sono yukusaki wa "heiwa na hitotu no kuni" de aru.
Mikkusu wa sekai o ugokasi, sekai wa mikkusu sareru koto ni yotte sara ni yoi hôkô ni mukau.
Sô omoitai no wa boku dake darô ka.
Ijima Kaoru
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Mix? Mikkusu!
Now, if you live only in Japan you can feel peace, yet confrontations are taking place between many ethnic groups and countries throughout the world, and war and discrimination, no matter how much time passes, are not ending.
Protecting their culture and purity may be important for some countries and ethnic groups. But when you consider that to protect these they must confront and wage war with one another, you can readily imagine the consequences of these horrors.
And so why not try changing our viewpoint a bit. Consider the world a single country. In it are various ethnic groups, various races, many colors of skin and spoken languages. But we are the people of a single country, who all get along. And in time the races and ethnic groups mix together, and chaotically blend into a single world. It becomes an entity just like a mixed juice. If there's no discrimination there, neither is there fighting. No one even knows who's an apple or who's a banana.
Well, when looking at the people of mixed-blood based on Japanese, now gathered here, one is made to realize that the country called Japan, too, is slowly but gradually moving toward the direction in which the world is gazing.
Of course the destination is "a single peaceful country".
Mixing is moving the world, and the world, by being mixed, is heading in a better direction.
Am I the only one who wants to feel that way?
Ijima Kaoru
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