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Nikkei community concentrated in São Paulo (Portuguese)

(Portuguese) The Nikkei community in Brazil is something quite special. Brazil has the largest Nikkei community in the world, and it’s a community with many unique aspects to it. So, for example, in terms of unique aspects, it’s a community that’s centered in São Paulo. Immigrants began arriving in 1908, and from the very beginning, they went to plantations in the state of São Paulo. And a great many of them stayed in São Paulo.

After some time, in the thirties, they started going to Parana, but São Paulo is still the country, rather the state where there’s a real presence of Japanese immigrants. Roughly eighty percent of Japanese-Brazilians live in São Paulo. So you have a rather concentrated community, which up until more or less the forties was essentially an agrarian one. Then there was a process of urbanization. And today, for example, we can talk about, if we compared ourselves with Peru, for example, or with the United States, we could say that it was always a much more closed community, and now, on the verge of a hundred years of history, it’s beginning to open up a bit more to the rest of Brazilian society.


Brazil identity Nikkei São Paulo United States

Date: October 7, 2005

Location: California, US

Interviewer: Ann Kaneko

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

Interviewee Bio

Célia Abe Oi was born in Itapetininga in 1950. Her grandparents had arrived in Brazil in 1929. Originally from a family of fishermen on the island of Atatajima, near the city of Hiroshima, upon their arrival they began working in the Brazilian countryside, initially in the cotton fields and later growing potatoes. Her parents and siblings also worked in agriculture. In 1968, she began studying History in college, and in 1979 completed her course in Journalism at the Cásper Líbero College. In the mid-1970s, she began working in the editorial room of the Portuguese section of the Diário Nippak newspaper. Célia contributed to various journals and publications tied to the Japanese-Brazilian community, until she became the director of the Museum of the History of Japanese Immigration in 1998. (July 26, 2006)

Jero (Jerome Charles White Jr.)
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Jero (Jerome Charles White Jr.)

Nikkei Sansei

(b. 1981) Enka Singer

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Enson Inoue
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Enson Inoue

Sudden acceptance in Japanese society

(b. 1967) Hawai`i-born professional fighter in Japan

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Enson Inoue
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Enson Inoue

Ring name: "Yamato Damashi"

(b. 1967) Hawai`i-born professional fighter in Japan

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Jero (Jerome Charles White Jr.)
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Jero (Jerome Charles White Jr.)

Getting on Kohaku (Japanese)

(b. 1981) Enka Singer

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Enson Inoue
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Enson Inoue

Citizenship and identity

(b. 1967) Hawai`i-born professional fighter in Japan

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Kip Fulbeck
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Kip Fulbeck

Early consciousness of identity

(b. 1965) filmmaker and artist

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William Hohri
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William Hohri

Importance of self-representation in legislation

(1927-2010) Political Activist

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Kip Fulbeck
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Kip Fulbeck

Finding parallels through art

(b. 1965) filmmaker and artist

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Kip Fulbeck
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Kip Fulbeck

The Hapa Project

(b. 1965) filmmaker and artist

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Francis Y. Sogi
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Francis Y. Sogi

Defining the term Nikkei

(1923-2011) Lawyer, MIS veteran, founder of Francis and Sarah Sogi Foundation

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Kip Fulbeck
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Kip Fulbeck

Perceptions of uniqueness

(b. 1965) filmmaker and artist

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Kip Fulbeck
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Kip Fulbeck

Identity as a conscious ongoing process

(b. 1965) filmmaker and artist

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Kip Fulbeck
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Kip Fulbeck

Lessons learned from The Hapa Project

(b. 1965) filmmaker and artist

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Kip Fulbeck
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Kip Fulbeck

Japanese Americans are more aware of their Hapa identity

(b. 1965) filmmaker and artist

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Kip Fulbeck
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Kip Fulbeck

Discomfort at being labeled by others

(b. 1965) filmmaker and artist

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