why Oriental is offensive

[Paul Frank]

I can't stand the word Oriental and I always try to avoid the words Orient,
Oriental and Far East in my translations, but I must say that it's my
distinct impression that many if not most native English speakers,
especially outside the United States, and within the United States
especially outside the West Coast and academia, do not see anything wrong
with these terms, though "the Orient" has an old-fashioned and exotic - that
is to say Orientalist - ring to it. In Hong Kong, China, and Taiwan English
speakers of all ethnic origins use the word Oriental with little or no
awareness that it's a charged term to some. That said, I make a point of
writing and saying Asian, East Asian, and East Asia instead of Oriental and
the Orient. For historico-institutional reasons some East Asian studies
departments in the United States still use the word Oriental in their name.
The same is true, I suspect, of the School of Oriental and African Studies
(SOAS) in London. Oriental is offensive to some, but it's not offensive to
many English speakers, especially in Asia. Do most Asian Americans find the
term offensive?

Another pet peeve of mine is the term South American. Most Chileans consider
themselves to be Chilean or Latin American, although Chile is geographically
in South America. Until fairly recently, most Latin Americans also
considered themselves to be "americanos," but the word americano is
increasingly (and sadly, in my opinion) restricted to citizens of the United
States.

Paul
_____________________________________
Paul Frank
Business, financial and legal translation
>From German, French, Chinese, Spanish,
Italian, Portuguese and Dutch into English
paulfrank at post.harvard.edu | Thollon, France