Interviews

1. Father’s Reason For Moving to Argentina (Japanese)

2. Nikkei Businesses in Buenos Aires (Japanese)

3. Escobar’s Immigrant Population (Japanese)

4. Popular Sports in the Nikkei Community (Japanese)

5. Great Japanese Language School in Escobar (Japanese)

6. Serving in Malvinas War and its Impact (Japanese)

7. Nikkei Signalman (Japanese)

8. Supporting Nikkei in Japan (Japanese)

9. Changes in the Nikkei Community in Japan (Japanese)

10. The Next Generation of the Nikkei Community (Japanese)

11. Nikkei Identity (Japanese)

12. Roles You Can Fulfill Being in Japan (Japanese)

13. About Escobar (Spanish)

(b. 1962) Nisei Japanese Argentinian, currently residing in Japan

Nikkei Identity (Japanese)

(Japanese) I sometimes gave a talk about [Nikkei] identity to Nikkei students, particularly from the perspective of being Nikkei. But I believe the environments that they grew up and the values that they inherited from their parents or their father or grandfather taught are different for each person. so I have never defined “this is what Nikkei identity is,” nor do I think someone should. In particular, Nikkei living in Japan have both Japanese and foreigner at the same time. They have Japanese roots, but they suddenly come to Japan and form their new identities in Japan. Or I could probably say that they’re in the process of forming their own identity. I don’t think it’s good to push one single definition onto somebody like them. so they have to take the time to find their own place and really need to think about how we should approach these matters.

identity Nikkei in Japan

Date: September 22, 2019

Location: California, US

Interviewer: Yoko Nishimura

Contributed by: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum

Interviewee Bio

Juan Alberto Matsumoto was born in 1962 in the city of Escobar, Buenos Aires, Argentina. He received an informal bilingual education attending the Japanese school in Escobar. While he was in college, he enlisted in the Malvinas War (Falklands War) and served as a signalman. Afterwards, he graduated from the University of Salvador in Buenos Aires with a degree in international relations. In 1990, he went to Japan as a government-sponsored student. He majored in Labor law at Yokohama National University where he received a master’s degree.

Currently he serves as a public relations legal translator, a court interpreter, and broadcast interpreter, as well as a lecturer at JICA trainee orientations. He also teaches Spanish language and Latin American politics and law at the University of Shizuoka and occasionally he gives talks on multicultural coexistence. He also provides various supports for Latin American Nikkei living in Japan. (February 2020)

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