Gene Expression: Nigerians in Tokyo?

Quick question: Does anyone know much about Nigerians in Japan? There are a few near where I live, and I remember reading somewhere that Japanese is similar to a certain Nigerian language. Interestingly, I've seen them hang with several trendy young Japanese, i.e. the men and women who get deep tans and dye their hair strawberry blond. Perhaps these would be "jiggers", analogous to the white hip-hop imitating whiggers.

BTW, for an interesting Japanese/Nigerian exchange, scroll down this review of Fumiko Enchi's novel "The Waiting Years". Maybe Nigeria and Japan aren't such odd bedfellows after all.

Godless comments:

Impolitic comments without statistical substantiation have been removed. Concerning the Japanese-Nigerian language connection

The function of tone is different in tonal languages. By using a different tone for one word, the meaning of that word can be dramatically changed. For example, in Igala, a Nigerian tonal language, the three letter word "awo" can have many meanings depending upon the tones used in its production. ... Tone may also be used grammatically; used mainly or exclusively for the signaling of grammatical distinctions. This is often the way it is used in African tonal languages. It is often used to distinguish between main clauses and subordinate relative clauses. (Katamba 188). In Japanese, tone often has this grammatical function. It is used to distinguish words, but is also used to mark sentences.

I was kind of surprised at this, but now I see that the similarity is just coincidental. Given the geographic separation, the difference in characters, etc., Japanese & Igala are certainly not part of any "Indo-European"
-like language superfamily.

What would you call these kids, Jiggers?

Kokujo.

Posted by: Jason M. at August 13, 2003 11:33 PM

Okinawa is VERY DIFFERENT from Tokyo. For one thing, many Okinawans consider themselves to be ethnically different from Japanese, and many also do not look Japanese (IMO I've seen several that look part Japanese and part Filipino). While we're on the subject, anyone know the average IQ of Okinawa?

Posted by: duende at August 13, 2003 11:50 PM

Duende, I think this post is pretty interesting and all, but I sense a missing context. You haven't really fleshed out why you're even in Japan. Don't we deserve a fuller treatment of what you're doing? Give us a full-blown Vinod approach to your travels already. :)

Posted by: Jason M. at August 14, 2003 12:06 AM

It wouldn't surprise me if the Okinawans were related to the ancient Taiwanese and other ancient asian hunter-gatherer populations. They're probably related to those austronesians that one finds all the way to indonesia .
You may have noticed that the Japanese can get much darker than the Koreans (close relatives)and nothern Chinese.

Posted by: ogunsiron at August 14, 2003 12:34 AM

Jason M.,
For those that like to waste their all-too-brief vacation time at the computer, more power to them. Me, I just carry my journal in my purse and jot things down while on the train. But I'll post more when I get home.

Posted by: duende at August 14, 2003 01:16 AM

"The Waiting Years" is freakin' great.

Posted by: Justin Slotman at August 14, 2003 06:46 AM

Just thought I`d let everyone know that this below blog is linking this post as well as the plastic　surgery one and some other black themed posts.

http://tradermike.net/movethecrowd/

づえんで

Posted by: duende at August 14, 2003 07:35 AM

Duende is constantly worried about the corruption of Caucasian and "High IQ" "North Asian" peoples by the blacks...

I remember a post from her lamenting about how "due to multiculturalism" a lot of people think of her as Mid-Eastern... tch, tch. Poor thing probably doesn't have blue eyes...

There was another post which I can't seem to recall right now... where she expressed mmmmm... "academic curiousity"... that members of a light skinned race were voluntarily conviving with members of a dark skinned race... I'll comment about it when it comes to my mind...

Keep up the fight Aryan (cough) sister...

Posted by: turkey time gobble gobble at August 14, 2003 04:59 PM

Oh yes, I remember now.. Duende once wondered about why white men are increasingly going out with asian women... and she came to the following conclusions:

1) Only ugly, short, pimply white nerds were going out with Asian women... and they were doing so because White women wanted nothing from them..
2) The reasons why they found Asian women attractive were that they had a fondness for black hair and black eyes... that's it... it apparently has nothing to do with the personality of Asian women or their physical attractiveness or intellectual depth... or any of that stuff that apparently only white women have... it's just because of the black hair and the black eyes...

Posted by: turkey time gobble gobble at August 14, 2003 05:40 PM

Turkey:
Below is a link to the offending post. Please use quotes to determine where I say that WM/AF relationships are based ONLY on physical attraction. Did you not see the large paragraph on "intellectual tolerance"? Also, you said pimply, not me. Where is the "lamentation" for being mistaken for mid-Eastern, rather than a straight-forward, value neutral statement?

http://www.gnxp.com/MT2/archives/000417.html

Posted by: duende at August 14, 2003 05:56 PM

Are the Nigerians in Tokyo Igbo or Yoruba?

Posted by: Fredrik at August 17, 2003 09:22 AM

Did you know that the average Japanese skull is larger than the average European skull?
Did you also know that the average Nigerian skull is larger than the average European skull? (oral presentation from the American Anthropological Association Meeting 1997)

Did you know that only about 70% of Nigerians literate, but of those literate, 21 years of age and older, 15-20% have a masters or higher graduate degree? (this is the highest percentage in the world!)

Did you know that the most highly educated ethnic/foreign-national group in the United States are Nigerians? (according to the US Census Bureau)

Did you know that the Negro "race" (race is a political term not a biological one) has the greatest diversity in genetic endowments than any "race". In fact the genetic endowments of all the other "races" are contained within the Negro "race"? (Dr. Eric Lander, Whitehead Institute/MIT)

"In the beginning there was only Black and in the end there will only be Black."

Posted by: Alpha&Omega at September 29, 2003 07:30 PM