"Sean Holland" <seanholland@pants.telus.net> wrote in message
news:BD6E2542.11453%seanholland@pants.telus.net...
> in article CsZ1d.2761$rX7.916@newssvr15.news.prodigy.com, Musashi at
> Miyamoto@Hosokawa.co.jp wrote on 9/15/04 8:45 AM:
> (snip)
> > Now, this whole thread started because some website claimed that the
term
> > "eskimo" was
> > offensive to the actual people because thats not what they call
themselves.
> > I merely pointed out that Japanese in Japan don;t call themselves
"Asian"
> > either.
> > Although now that I've said this, we don't call ourselves "Japanese" or
our
> > country
> > "Japan" either.
>
> It depends on the Japanese. I know plenty of Japanese both in Japan and in
> Canada who would refer to themselves as Asian or 東洋人 if the
conversation
> led to it. It seems, in part, to be a marker of one's position on the
> political spectrum.
>

Another interesting point that my wife brought up....Japanese-Americans who
speak Japanese,
or Japanese who have been in the US for a very long time fall out of sync
with the changes in
the Japanese language. Hence, a Japanese who has been out of Japan for a
long time may tend
to use 東洋人 simply because his/her parents, grandparents used it. And that
person has been
away from Japan long enough to not be aware that アジアン　or アジア人 has
replaced it.

Musashi