The words "Orient" and "Oriental"

[BeTheReds]

Originally Posted by PKoeut

"Caucasian" doesn't mean a "white" person. But society has turned it so.

"Easterner" and "oriental" have the same denotation. And as WongBa said, "oriental" originally referred to people from the middle east. So how did "oriental" turn to mean a "yellow" person?

Well, for a complete history of the word, go read wikipedia. I'd imagine that it came to mean East Asia as more and more contact was made between Europe and Asia...

Of course "far east" has a negative connotation to it. I didn't say it wasn't.

On that note, "oriental" is everything east of rome. "occidental" is west of rome. Since rome is in europe, these words still imply that europe is the center of the world.

Well, yes, they do still imply that Europe is the center of the world, "The Orient" doesn't mean everything east of Rome anymore. It specifically means China, Korea, Japan, and maybe Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand and whatever.

I've never heard someone say, "i'm european" in a practical conversation either.

I have.

I've also heard "Let's go to Europe"... "Europe is a wonderful place to visit." "European wine is better than domestic wine."

Compare:

A: Let's go to Europe.
B: Yeah! Great Idea!

A: Let's go to Asia.
B. Do you mean East Asia, South Asia, or West Asia?
A: East Asia, er, well, I was talking about Japan, China and Korea.
B: Sounds great! Let's go!

Not in the US atleast. Its always "i'm italian" or "i'm american" or "i'm part irish and french". The region is always a nation.
The only people who say "i'm asian" are asian-americans(i'm guilty of that). ...but there's an actual region labelled "asia". Theres no region labelled "orient".

1. There's an actual region labeled Europe too, so I don't see where you are going with that.
2. There is a region labeled "the orient" but the term is no longer PC.

So, how about this... if you don't like being called "asian" for one reason or another, then just say "i'm chinese" or "i'm part korean and japanese" or "i'm american". Why say you're from a unlabelled region at all?

I'm not talking about personal identification stuff. I simply want a word to refer to all of East Asia as a distinct cultural area. (Much like the designation "Europe")

Here's an example:
"like" "love"
Both can mean the same thing.
But one has a much more positive connotation than the other.

I don't see where you're going with this.

So you're offended by "far east", you're offended by "douchebag" even if it wasn't an existing insult, but you're not offended by "oriental". Ok.

Hey man... Oriental simply means East. Far puts an adjective in there. East Asia (or the Orient) is neither far, nor east of me right now. However, I am on the Eastern part of a gigantic landmass.

All the PCism has made it such that "The Orient" is somehow offensive. (I'm not denying that it is... but certainly no one word bests it in functionality.)

The opposite of westerner is easterner.
The opposite of oriental is occidental.
English-speaking euros don't call themselves occidentals, they call themselves westerners.

Well, they used to just say Europe, but a word was necessary to include North America in there, thus "Western" came into popular usage. It has become so popular, that the meaning of "Western" and "Westerner" leave little ambiguity. Furthermore, those words aren't really used much, unless they are comparing something about Europe + North America to Africa, East Asia, South Asia, the Middle East, Latin America or some other cultural deliniation. Therefore, the opposite of Westerner is Non-Western.

Easterner means nothing. And it is confusing.

They call us oriental, not easterner.

And when they do that... there's almost no ambiguity as to what they mean.

If someone asks, "what is one plus one", and I answer "deux", then then that is -not normal-. The answer is correct, but in no way shape or form is it normal.

Huh? WTF are you talking about?

Unless you start calling euros in english, "occidentals", and can get others to do it as well, then fat chance at "taking back oriental".
Kudos to the institutionalized racism in western society, though. They managed to get asians to call themselves "oriental" while at the same time calling euros "westerners".

Well, I didn't ever claim that taking it back was going to be easy. I still feel uneasy using the word. My point is that we need one simple word to use to refer to "East Asia". The only one word that has even come close to this is "Oriental".