- Joined
- Nov 24, 2007
What an interesting topic...
Here is what I remember from my humanities class in college on why "Oriental" is considered a derogatory term for Asians. The Asian immigrants in the late 1800's and early 1900's were initially called Orientals rather than Asians, but the term began assuming its current derogatory term around the Gold Rush era. As more Asians began to compete for jobs, resentment towards Asians grew, and people (I assume the white population) started using "Oriental" in derogatory way.
The term "Oriental" eventually came to mean third class citizen or persona non grata. I don't think people realized it at the time but calling an Asian person "Oriental" became sort of like calling an African-American person "ni****."
Sorry if I'm not explaining this too well but it was so long ago.
Here is what I remember from my humanities class in college on why "Oriental" is considered a derogatory term for Asians. The Asian immigrants in the late 1800's and early 1900's were initially called Orientals rather than Asians, but the term began assuming its current derogatory term around the Gold Rush era. As more Asians began to compete for jobs, resentment towards Asians grew, and people (I assume the white population) started using "Oriental" in derogatory way.
The term "Oriental" eventually came to mean third class citizen or persona non grata. I don't think people realized it at the time but calling an Asian person "Oriental" became sort of like calling an African-American person "ni****."
Sorry if I'm not explaining this too well but it was so long ago.
