华盛顿州新法律：“东方人”一词被禁

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　The northwestern US state of Washington made headlines earlier this year when it passed a law prohibiting the use of the word "Oriental" in official contexts. Instead, the word "Asian" must be employed. The new law only bans the use of the word "Oriental" when the reference is to human beings. Therefore, one law which defines "minority group" to include "Orientals" will be changed to refer to "Asians", but another law which refers to "Oriental medicine" will be left unchanged. According to the law's sponsor, Korean-American state senator Paull Shin , the law was passed because the term "Oriental" is "pejorative terminology" and "offensive".

　　"Oriental" derives from the Latin word oriens, meaning "the rising sun" or "east". Because Asia is east of Europe, "Oriental" took on the meaning of "Asian". "The Orient", the "Far East" and "East Asia" are all noun phrases referring to the eastern section of the Asian continent. Ironically, the eastern part of Russia is usually excluded from the definitions of the Orient and East Asia, even though Russia extends farther to the east than any other country on the Eurasian landmass.

　　According to Mr Shin and other critics of the word Oriental, the word is offensive to Asians because it implies a Europe-centered view of the world. From the Pacific coast of the United States,swheresthe state of Washington is located, the so-called "Orient" is to the west, not the east.

　　The problem with this argument is that many commonly accepted geographic terms derive from outdated worldviews of this sort. My home state of Wisconsin is part of a region known as the "Middle West" or the "Midwest", yet I live in the eastern half of the United States. The term was invented because the United States was settled from east to west. For the settlers starting out from the Atlantic coast in the late 18th and early 19th century, everything west of the Appalachian Mountains was considered "the west".

　　Not long ago the "Near East" was the accepted name for the area stretching from Egypt to Iran among Europeans and Americans; in recent decades it has been ousted by the "Middle East". Like "Far East" or "Orient", either term makes sense only if one takes Europe as the point of reference.

　　And other languages are no better than English in this regard. The Arab world divides itselfsintosthe Maghrib (the West) and the Mashriq (the East) with the Sinai Peninsula as the border. Ironically, the division of the ancient worldsintosAsia and Europe was probably borrowed by the Greeks from the Phoenicians, the ancestors of today's Lebanese; indeed, Europe and the Arabic Maghrib may well be derived from the same Semitic root, referring to the setting of the sun. And what can we say about a civilization like China, which unabashedly proclaims itself the "central country"?

　　Perhaps it is too much to expect precision in such language issues. Whether or not there are good grounds for considering "Oriental" offensive, over the past few decades the term has gradually fallen out of favor as a word to describe the people of Asia or Americans of Asian ancestry. In today's English, the word "Oriental", when used to refer to a person, sounds old-fashioned at best and derogatory at worst.

　　Nevertheless, while it may no longer be a good idea to refer to a person as an Oriental, it is still the standard usage in many phrases referring to things. For example, the term "Oriental carpet" refers to a type of carpet typically imported from Turkey or Central Asia. These carpets are extremely expensive (often costing thousands of dollars) and are highly prized.

　　The English language is full of other apparently contradictory tendencies for words relating to ethnicity. "Chinatown", meaning a neighborhoodswheresChinese immigrants live, is proper English. But "Chinaman", meaning a Chinese person, became offensive in America during the first half of the 20th century, even though it is a direct translation of Zhongguoren. And "Frenchman", meaning a French person, is perfectly neutral English.

　　The care Yankees must take in referring to Asians is as nothing compared with the delicacy required to get through the minefield of terms for Americans of sub-Saharan African ancestry. "Colored person" is now offensive, even though it was regarded as a polite term for much of the century after the US Civil War (1861-65). On the other hand, "person of color", meaning someone of any non-European race, is acceptable and, in some ideological circles, a favored phrase. "Negro" (the Spanish word for "black") gave way to "black" or "Black" in the 1960s, only to yield in turn to "Afro-American" in the 1980s and "African-American" or "African American" in the 1990s.

　　And while one can speak of "black people" and "white people" or "blacks" and "whites", one would be ill advised to speak of "red people" (American Indians - the "First Nations" of Canada, by the way) or "yellow people" (Asians). "Reds" is reserved for politics. The term "browns" is used occasionally to refer to Latin Americans of Indian or mixed Indian/European ancestry.

　　What to make of this jumble of conflicting language taboos? One can draw two lessons: First, non-native speakers should use caution when speaking about ethnicity or race in English, as the English language is rife with linguistic traps in this area. Second, the number of offensive terms relating to other ethnic groups is a signal that the US has never been fully comfortable with its status as a multiracial society. Culture is reflected in language, and the large number of pejorative ethnic terms in American English shows that the United States still suffers from ethnic and racial tensions.

华盛顿州新法律 “东方人”一词被禁

　　Timothy Kiefer(康思德)(美)

　　(本文作者为美国律师，毕业于哈佛法学院，去年曾在北京大学任教)

　　今年早些时候，美国西北部的华盛顿州做了一件轰动媒体的事，该州通过了一条法律，禁止在正式场合使用“东方人”(Oriental)一词。在说到东方人时，必须用亚洲人一词来代替。由于Oriental一词既可以做名词，即东方人，也可以做形容词，即东方的，新法律则只禁止Oriental一词用于指人的时候。因此，那类涉及到将东方人归类到“少数人群体”的法律就必须改称东方人为亚洲人，而另一类涉及物例如东方药品的法律就不必改。根据提出这条法律的韩国裔参议员保罗-申所说，该项法律得以通过，是因为“东方人”是个带贬损味道的专用词，是得罪人的。

　　“东方人”一词来源于拉丁字oriens，意思是升起的太阳或是东方。因为亚洲位于欧洲的东方，“东方人”便有了亚洲人的含义。东方、远东、东亚都是表示亚洲大陆东部的名词短语。可奇怪的是，俄罗斯的东部往往不算是东方和东亚，尽管俄罗斯比欧亚大陆块的任何一个国家向东延伸得都更远。

　　根据申先生以及其他对“东方人”一词持批评态度的人士所说，这个词得罪了亚洲人，是因为该词隐含着欧洲是世界中心的观点。此外，从美国的西海岸(太平洋海岸)也就是华盛顿州所在地，所谓的“东方”实际上是在西方而并非东方。

　　引起争论的这一问题在于很多已被广泛接受的地理术语来源于已过时的对世界的认识。我的家乡威斯康星州是被称做美国中西部的一个州，其实我是住在美国的东半部，中西部一词的发明是因为美国这个国家是从东向西拓展的。由于18世纪晚期和19世纪早期移民的定居地是从东海岸(大西洋海岸)开始，凡是在阿巴拉契亚山脉以西的地方都被认为是西部。

　　在不太久远之前，“近东”一词被欧美人用来指从埃及到伊朗的那部分地区；在最近几十年，它被“中东”一词所代替。就像“远东”或“东方”一样，这些词只是在以欧洲作为参照物时才有意义。

　　在这方面其他语言也不比英语强。阿拉伯世界将自己分为西部(Maghrib)与东部(Mashriq)，中间以西奈半岛为界。奇怪的是，将古代世界分成亚洲与欧洲的分法很可能是希腊人从腓尼基人也就是今天黎巴嫩人的祖先那里借用过来的。说真的，欧洲一词与阿拉伯语的西方一词(Maghrib)很可能来源于闪米特语系的意思是“太阳落下”的同一个词根。对于像中国那样的文化就不必多说了，她称自己是“位于中心的国家”。

　　或许在语言问题上要求精确有些过分。无论“东方人”一词得罪人是否真有道理，在过去的几十年中该词已经渐渐不被人们用来指亚洲人或是亚裔美国人了。在今天的英语中，用“东方人”一词来指某人时，往好了说，听起来没有时代感，往坏了说，则有贬义。

　　然而，当说一个人是东方人恐怕不再是个好主意时，该词在指物的很多短语中仍然是标准用法，比如，东方地毯通常是指从土耳其或中亚进口的地毯，它们的价格极贵(通常是数千美元)，受到极高的赞誉。

　　英语中还充满了其他一些显然具有矛盾倾向的与种族相关的词。“中国城”(Chinatown)意思是中国移民居住的地区，它是个很适当的英语单词，但是若说Chinaman，意思是中国人，那在美国二十世纪上半叶可就得罪中国人了，尽管该词是“中国人”一词的直接译法。而“Frenchman”，意思是法国人，则完全是个中性词，不褒不贬。

　　美国佬在说到亚洲人时必须采取的小心态度，与说到撒哈拉沙漠以南非洲人后裔的美国人时所需要的精心考虑相比，那简直算不了什么，因为说到后者时就像走过地雷阵。Colored person(有色人)一词现在是得罪人的，然而在美国国内战争(1861-1865)之后一百年中的大部分时间内却被认为是个有礼貌的词。而另一方面，“Person of color”(意思也是有色人)，指任何非欧洲种族的人，是可以被接受的，而且在某些意识形态的领域内是一个备受喜欢的词，用来指美国黑人的“Negro”(西班牙语“黑”的意思)，在上个世纪六十年代让位于“black”(黑人)或者“Black”，只是到了80年代才又让位给Afro-American”(非洲裔美国人)，到了90年代又让位于African-American”或者African American(还是非洲裔美国人的意思)。

　　当人们可以说“黑人”和“白人”时，若有人建议说“红人”(指美洲印第安人--顺便说一句，他们被称为加拿大的“第一民族”)或者“黄人”(亚洲人)，可是个坏主意。Reds(红人)只是在政治范畴中被保留下来，但“棕人”有时却是可以用于指祖上是印第安人或是印第安人与欧洲人混血的拉美裔美国人。

　　从这个有争执的语言禁忌的乱摊子当中，我们能悟出什么呢？

　　人们可从中获取两点：首先，母语不是英语的人在用英语说到民族和种族时必须谨慎，因为在这一领域英语充满着陷阱。第二，一定数量的与其他种族相关的冒犯性词汇是个信号，标志着多种族社会的状况从来就没有让美国彻底舒服过。语言反映了文化，在美国英语中大量的具有贬义的与种族有关的词汇表明美国仍然存在着民族、种族间的紧张关系。

北京青年报