Nikkei

Japanese emigrants and their descendants living outside (and sometimes inside) Japan. A broader term (since it includes Japanese Brazilians, Japanese Canadians, etc.), "Nikkei" it has come to be used as an alternative to "Japanese American" by some. As a newer term, how exactly one is to use it—and who is or is not Nikkei—is still being worked out.

A handful of Japanese American organizations use the term "Nikkei" instead of "Japanese American"; see for instance the Oregon Nikkei Legacy Center ( http://www.oregonnikkei.org/ ) or the San Jose Nikkei Matsuri ( http://www.nikkeimatsuri.org/ ).

"Nikkei" is also the name of a popular index for the Tokyo Stock Exchange, akin to the Dow Jones Industrial Average for the New York Stock Exchange.

For More Information

Discover Nikkei. http://www.discovernikkei.org/en/ . [A project of the Japanese American National Museum, brings together resources from Nikkei communities around the world.]

Hirabayashi, Lane Ryo, Akemi Kikumura-Yano, and James A. Hirabayashi, eds. New Worlds, New Lives: Globalization and People of Japanese Descent in the Americas and from Latin American in Japan . Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002.

Kikumura-Yano, Akemi, ed. Encyclopedia of Japanese Descendants in the Americas: An Illustrated History of the Nikkei . Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press, 2002.

Last updated March 19, 2013, 8:41 p.m..