"Sean Holland" <seanholland@pants.telus.net> wrote in message
news:BD6BDBCF.113B7%seanholland@pants.telus.net...
> in article hNi1d.15972$ZC7.11443@newssvr19.news.prodigy.com, Musashi at
> Miyamoto@Hosokawa.co.jp wrote on 9/13/04 8:12 AM:
>
> >
> > I am not left-wing, however I too am　反天皇制　and I can't go 10
seconds
> > into listening to
> > 君が代 without falling asleep. But I find it hard to believe that there
are
> > Japanese people
> > (whose thinking hasn't been formed by the surrounding environment- as in
> > living in the US)
> > who actually prefers being called "Asian" rather than "Oriental".
> > Could you please ask your wife how she would differentiate the words 東
洋人
> > 　and
> > アジア人？？
>
> Ok, I'll ask her. My prediction is that she will say that they are the
same,
> although I may be wrong. And even if she says they are the same, I suspect
> that even for people like her there is a different nuance.
>
> Ok, I just went and asked her and it led to a 15 minute discussion. Her
> first reaction was that they are the same. She was adamant that, in
English,
> she considers herself an Asian.
> But then I asked her スリランカ人は東洋人ですか。
> ＊ああ、それは微妙ですね。その国は漢字使わない国だから多分アジア人だろう。
> ＊ベトナム人は東洋人だろうか。
> ＊そうかな。漢字を使う国だけど。
> ＊使わないと思うんだけど。
> ＊そうか。でも、東洋人だね。
> And so on. So, what I gather is that is that she and her ilk proudly
define
> themselves as Asians, and feel a great deal of sympathy with other Asians,
> but, to her, 東洋人 has a nuance of East Asia, the countries that use or
> have until recently used 漢字, whereas アジア人 is a more encompassing
term
> that even includes Iranians, although when I asked her if Iranians were ア
ジ
> ア人 she frowned and pursed her lips and uttered uncertain noises before
> saying that yes, Iranians are アジア人. So clearly アジア人 and 東洋人 are
> not equivalent for her. All 東洋人 are アジア人, but not necessarily the
> other way around. The thing about which she was unequivocal is that she, a
> Japanese, is Asian, and she thought it ridiculous that any Japanese would
> object to being referred to as such.
> ---
> pantsseanholland@telus.pants.net Remove pants to email me.
>

Thanks Sean.
Although the above doesn't definitively resolve all this, it does show that
the "東"
in 東洋 does have some significance.
Which I suppose one could say is　当たり前

For what it is worth I asked my wife about this as well, and our discussion
did not even
go 15 minutes.

Me: 東洋人とアジア人の違いってなんだと思う？
Wife:　東洋人なんてもう誰も言わないよ。
ME:　。。。。。。。。。。
      (I probably looked like chibi marukochan with the white eyes...)

ムサシ