In my country, the term 中国人 "Chinese" carries a very sensitive nuance...

Oh so THAT'S why we call it China. Makes sense. China is a dirty word in every language, it seems.

[country name]+man is clearly outside the formal rules for generating racial names.

Not really. It sounds right.

The nuance that the words evoke is different depending on whether they are self referential or third party referential.

It just sounds softer, and kata is a more formal/polite way of saying “person”

Like saying “frenchman” vs. “person from france”

And Japs are big on indirectness for politeness.

frenchman is better

that's sort of true
but there's no rules. we do [country]+an, [country]-ese or weird shit like french or pakistani. and we do say frenchman

Englishman

Scotsman

Irishman

Welshman

Norman

Sure, most of those use the adjectives, but they're similar enough.

Calling someone スウェーデンの方 is done to give an extra polite nuance, and there is no problem in calling them スウェーデン人 when it comes to Sweden. However, when it comes to China it is different.

Yeah personally I’d be annoyed if someone called me a “person from America” instead of an American, but I guess that’s because my identity is under siege 24/7 in our media.

Kikeman

I heard people say 中国人 all the time though. There are way too many chinamen in Tokyo btw.

you are called united states of american, or USAian

sometimes unitedstateian

frenchman

This is [ethnic group name]+man, which I think gives a slightly more polite and accurate impression than [country name]+man.

This is the problem with Japanese indirectness. You think you’re being polite by being indirect, but in fact you’re being obnoxious because you’re assuming we have any frame of reference for your specifically Japanese cultural mores and not just explaining yourself clearly.

You can't say Chineseman or Japaneseman. It sounds very, very wrong.

What do you call someone from Taiwan?

Generally speaking, derogatory terms are made up of short syllables, and it is clearly not polite to shorten an ethnic name to just three letters.

it's more about ease of pronunciation. maybe like は becoming ば or ぱ depending on the sounds around it.
the "man" in chinaman and frenchman is said so fast it sounds more like min or m'n. it would be awkward to say chinesem'n or francem'n. the S sound doesn't transition into M well.

When speaking to that person face to face, you will want to be more polite.

There are no particularly sensitive nuances when it comes to Taiwanese people.

You dont have to feel obnoxious if you are open to the logic our language carries when you are in my country.

I am not in your country. You are on an American website. Also, you are the one being obnoxious. State your meaning plainly, I can’t see your slants and body language so as to make out your meaning. When I’ve been in Japan I have no problem but it’s because of body language and tone, which does not exist in text. Just say what you mean.

Also this is why in my area Chinese businessmen are seen as much more trustworthy. They’re forward and don’t expect you to have taken classes in their particular cultural signals. Japanese people will use their cultural practices as an excuse to screw people over in contracts, and then blame the Americans for not knowing Japanese custom.

this is why in my area Chinese businessmen are seen as much more trustworthy

literally nowhere on earth are chinese businessmen seen as trustworthy

You’d be surprised at LA buster

The ease of pronunciation may have been the reason behind the popularity of the word "chinaman." However, bending the general rules for generating common ethnic names for "some kind of convenience" may come across as impolite.

There are no rules. People say what sounds right. That is how new words are made.

it's considered casual but not exactly rude. there's no standard rule regardless. you can say scots, scotsmen, the scottish or people from scotland. none of those are insulting.

This board exists for the purpose of discussing the cultures of each country on an equal footing, and the fact that this is an "American website" does not justify imposing any restrictions beyond those explicitly stated in the board rules.

chinaman = han chinese from mainland china

This is a Japanese website.

As a general rule, casual shortened ethnic names seem to be more likely to carry derogatory connotations than fuller, longer ethnic names. If Scottish people were the target of racism for any reason, it would likely be "Scots", and not "people from Scotland". Asians, including Chinese, have historically faced discrimination in North America, and casual terms used to describe them are likely to carry derogatory connotations for the same reason.

Oh I see, this is your schizo way of ranting about being called a jap on here.

Are you the same person who posted?

the additional words or syllables are more academic or literary, while out loud you would use the shorter version. this is like "person of color" vs "colored".
that doesn't make it derogatory, though. you would hear "I love Scots" not "I love the people of Scotland".
also "chinaman" is longer than "chinese" so that logic doesn't apply consistently.

Here it is considered very rude to call people from countries whose names are written and read in Chinese characters using the phrase 'Country' + 人(인). In similar cases we use the word 분 instead of 人(인) in conversation (That noun isn't based on a Chinese character, guess it's probably similar to 様 in Japanese).

Other way around 支那 is from English "China." Western languages borrowed the word from Persian and probably the ultimate origin is the name of the Qin dynasty

At least you finally made a point for once instead of just saying something was rude without any further elaboration.

Why are Koreans and Japanese so neurotic? Can any Chinks give their Oriental wisdom on this matter?

probably to avoid beheadings

Chinese and Vietnamese have many more honorifics depending on the situation and class bruh

This exchange of messages has gotten a bit long, so to summarize my point, I am arguing that convenient, casual, shortened ethnic names have a higher potential to carry derogatory connotations than formal, long winded names, and I am not saying that shortened forms necessarily carry derogatory connotations.

"person of color" vs "colored"

It may be possible to find examples where the shortened form does not carry an insulting meaning due to historical consequence, but if there is a parallel world in which it carries an insulting nuance I guess it would be the more casual one?

I also think that this logic is not only shared by Japanese, but also by Westerners. Because while many Japanese use "gaijin" without any derogatory intent, many foreigners seem to sense the potential where it could have a derogatory nuance because it is a contraction of "gaikokujin".

Yeah, but why is it offensive for Chinese in particular? The principle makes sense.

On the other hand, you don't seem to be making any points. You are wasting your time as well as other time.

, I am arguing that convenient, casual, shortened ethnic names have a higher potential to carry derogatory connotations than formal, long winded names, and I am not saying that shortened forms necessarily carry derogatory connotations.

i agree, but mainly because the short name comes first and is replaced by a longer one. this is sometimes called a "euphemism treadmill." "slow" was an accurate term for people with impaired mental development. it was considered insulting and replaced with "retarded". that was also considered insulting and was replaced.
in university, my japanese teacher talked about hearing "gaikokujin" in a historical drama. she said "gaijin" would've been the common term when the story was set. if that's true, we can see the new, longer term replacing the old. that's the euphemism treadmill.

we don't have this problem, japan is very cucked

Seeing as your point was retarded, and clearly missed the point I was making, I figured it didn’t warrant a response.

If you've entertained business guests, that's not true

Are you talking about the case in Japan? The reason is that Chinese people, who have appeared in Japan in recent decades, have a bad reputation (specifically immigrants who don't respect the law, tourists with bad manners) and are more likely to be spoken of in a derogatory manner than other ethnicities. In Japanese, there is no casual or abbreviated form for Chinese "中国人", so this shortest form, which was originally a formal term, can now be potentially used as an insult.

you will call me ヘラスの方 if you don't want to get stabbed

Yes, that is certainly the case with Chinese in Japan. By making a formal word more euphemistic, they are removing the possibility of it taking on a derogatory meaning. This fits the general relationship between the casualness of a word and its affinity for derogatory nuance, just as contractions can take on derogatory nuances.

This is not a problem. I just thought this situation was interesting, so I made a thread. Btw, until recently, Korean were also thought of in the same way, but recently this nuance has slightly faded.

I might consider.

good talk, my friend. i have learned a good deal today.

My pleasure. A rare chance in this forum.