SLS 660: Sociolinguistics & Second Languages
Professor Higgins
Interactions between Japanese Tourists and Local Retailers in Hawai’i
Yuka Sano
December 9, 2009
1
1. Introduction
Japanese tourists comprise 17.1% of all visitors to Hawai’i each year (State of
Hawai’i, Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism). According to
Japan’s National Tourist Organization (2008), out of 3,531,489 Japanese who left Japan for
the United States in 2007, 37.2% left for Hawai’i. For Japanese people who do not get
much chance to use foreign languages in their home country (Nakahara, 2002, 2008),
visiting foreign countries provides one of the small number of chances that they encounter
different languages and cultures from their own. Even though there are several studies that
analyzed Japanese tourists’ behavior from outsiders’ perspective for the business purposes
(e.g., Reisinger and Waryszak, 1994; Reisinger and Turner, 1999), there seems to be no
research done on Japanese tourists’ encounters with non-Japanese. However, considering
the number of Japanese tourists who visit Hawai’i, understanding the nature of the
interactions between Japanese tourists and people in Hawai’i would lead to the deeper
understanding of the multicultural society of Hawai’i. In addition, considering popularity of
Hawai’i as a vacation destination among Japanese, their interactions with non-Japanese in
Hawai’i would be a great source to understand Japanese’s’ perception towards foreign
language, multicultural communication. Therefore in this paper, I examine how Japanese
tourists in Hawai’i interact with local people, especially with the shopkeepers at retail
stores. When Japanese people travel overseas, shopping forms a very important part of their
travel activities (Reisinger and Waryszak, 1994). Having omiyage (souvenir) culture to take
gifts back to families, relatives, friends and colleagues, Japanese tourists seem to engage in
relatively more shopping than tourists from other countries (Pizan and Susmann, 1995), and
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therefore, service encounters can be considered as the most common foreign encounters
that Japanese tourists face during their trip.
In this study, I took an interactional sociolinguistics approach which assures that the
meaning and use of language are socially and culturally relative. Interactional
sociolinguistics approach considers whether or not a particular instance of language use
was appropriate in relation to specific context, and it also examines what is being
accomplished by a particular use of language (McKay and Bokhorst-Heng, 2008).
Followed are my initial research questions:
a) How do Japanese tourists interact with English speakers in Hawai’i?
b) How do they use English/Japanese to communicate with English speakers?
c) How do these interactions affect Japanese tourists’ perceptions about intercultural
communications?
These initial research questions however, changed as I analyzed the data that I obtained.
2. Literature Review
In this study, I took an interactional sociolinguistics approach to examine how
linguistically and culturally different two groups interact with each other. This is an
approach that allows a researcher to take cultural background and differences in
consideration when analyzing conversations among different cultural groups. Gumperz
(1982) claims that there are fundamentally different ways of showing speakers’ intentions
in different cultures, and because of these different conventions for the display of meanings,
misunderstandings occur in intercultural communications. He explains these conventions as
contextualization cues which can be “any feature of linguistic form that contributes to the
3
signaling of contextual presuppositions” such as ‘the code, dialect and style switching
processes, …choice among lexical and syntactic options, formulaic expressions,
conversational openings, closings and sequencing strategies’’(1982: 131). Since
interactions between Japanese tourists and local retailers are encounters involving different
cultures, Japanese participants and local participants are considered to have different
interpretations towards these cues.
Using this approach, several researchers have studied service encounters between
two different ethnic groups. Bailey (1997) claims that different perceptions and ways of
showing respect in service encounters among Korean immigrant shopkeepers and African
American customers in Los Angeles caused misunderstandings, and therefore led to
conflicts between two groups in a macro level. In his analysis of “socially minimal” and
“socially expanded interactions”, Bailey claims that since each culture associates different
types of interaction to be respectful, misunderstandings towards each other occur.
On the other hand, Ryoo (2007), who also studied the interactions between Korean
immigrant shopkeepers and African American customers, claims that interculturality was
not always a weakening factor that hinders the communication between the participants.
Instead, it plays a positive role in helping participants to achieve multiple interactional
goals. She also asserts that the majority of service encounters revolves around the various
types of situated identities of participants (e.g., shopkeepers and customers) rather than
their cultural or ethnic identities as African American or Korean.
These studies show how interculturality serves differently in the interactions between
two different ethnic groups. In Bailey’s study, cultural difference in communication was the
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cause of the misunderstanding while in Ryoo’s study, the interculturality was not always
salient, and it served as a positive factor to construct the communication. The case of
Japanese tourists and local retailers is also an encounter of different cultures, but there are
some differences from the case of Korean immigrant shopkeepers and African American
customers. While in case of Koreans and African Americans, they are supposed to be able
to use the same language to some extent even thought English they use are not completely
the same. However many Japanese tourists do not use English, so the shopkeepers may use
L2 Japanese to communicate with them. Secondly, Japanese tourists in Hawai’i may be
seen as ‘temporary visitors’, and that would affect how they construct their social identities
or situated identities through their interactions. Considering these points, This paper
attempts to reveal how different contextualization cues are shown and interpreted by
Japanese tourists and shopkeepers in Hawai’i, how interculturality is treated by the both
groups, and what kind of identities of the participants are seen in the conversations (e.g.,
shopkeepers/customers, visitors/locals, tourists/entertainers, non-native speakers of
English/native speakers of English, non-native speakers of Japanese/native speakers of
Japanese, etc.)
As I referred to the literatures on interactional sociolinguistic studies in analysis, I
also referred to my own member’s knowledge to understand the Japanese tourists’ cues.
Born and raised in Japan myself, I assume that I have a basic knowledge how most
Japanese interpret people’s expressions and contextualization cues. I also referred to the
opinions (how they interpret each cues) of my Japanese and American peers that I could
gain in class and during my presentation.
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3. Methods
Fieldwork for this study was conducted between November 19 to 23 in 2009, at 21
retail stores in Waikiki and Ala Moana Shopping Center. Most of the stores are clothing
store that are popular among Japanese tourists. Data collection methods were ethnographic
observations, note-taking, and interviews with the shopkeepers. For ethnographic
observations, I observed the interactions between Japanese customers and shopkeepers, and
right after or during the observation, I took field notes. Field notes consist of transcripts of
the conversations and descriptions of the participants such as gender, approximate age,
perceived relationship and ethnicity. Even though tape-recording is considered to be one of
the most important methods of collecting sociolinguistic data, I followed Abe (2004), who
claims that careful field notes ‘can provide important insights into the social use and
significance of lexical, grammatical and rhetorical forms’ (p.208). Also while observing, I
paid attentions to the following elements: a) the point when the local shopkeepers greet and
talk to Japanese customers; b) how bilingual workers’ L2 Japanese is treated by Japanese
tourists; and c) any point where communication breaks down. Since Japanese is my first
language, Japanese conversations were transcribed in Japanese and translated into English
at the time of analysis. In some cases after the observation, I talked to the shopkeepers and
interviewed them in English. Most shopkeepers that I approached took time and answered
to my research questions very friendlily. When I approached them, I told them that I am
doing a school project, researching “how Japanese tourists communicate with shopkeepers
here”. None of them seemed to be surprised by this question, and when I opened my
interview by asking them “do you have many Japanese customers here?” most of them
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laughed as if saying “of course!” Again, the researcher’s ethnicity as Japanese would have
affected the answers of the shopkeepers.
4. Data Analysis
Among 21 retail stores that I observed, in many cases, interactions between Japanese
customers and local shopkeepers were minimal, and at some store, even no interaction was
observed. When I interviewed a shopkeeper at a clothing store where no interaction
occurred, Clair (pseudonym), a local Filipina girl who was born and raised in Hawai’i
answered as follows:
I get nervous when I talk to Japanese customers cuz they go like ‘huh?’ and I
don’t speak Japanese. They don’t understand me. So I sometimes use gestures.
I do this ((thumbs up1)) and I always do this ((making a cross with index
fingers2)).
Her answer shows that having verbal conversations with Japanese customers is sometimes
difficult for local shopkeepers, and as she explains, use of gestures seemed to be a common
strategy for them to communicate with each other.
Compared to the retail stores that Japanese customers come in by themselves,
interactions seemed to be more active at kiosks where shopkeepers lure customers by
calling out to people who pass by in order to sell products. More efforts seemed to be made
to have a conversation and make understanding with Japanese customers at these shops.
The following two excerpts are from the interactions observed at these kiosks.
1
Which she means “yes”
2
Which she means “no”
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4.1. Except A
Two women (originally from Israel, probably in their 20’s) are working at a kiosk try
to stop people who pass by and sell dresses. When a male and female pair of Japanese
tourists walks by, they often say “Aloha, onneisan (lady)” as they show several ways that
the dress can be worn. In many cases when they use Japanese, Japanese tourists recognize
that they are being addressed, and smile and stop or walk away. In the data below, one of
them (SK) talks to a Japanese couple (probably in their 30’s) and when they decided to buy
one and pay for it, SK tries to sell one more dress to them. Japanese woman (C) mainly
talks with SK.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
SK:
Let me show you this one. You buy this one, so this
one becomes ((shows the price on the calculator))
C: ((looks at the calculator, smiles, tilts her head, looks at
the SK, and talks to her partner))
SK: ((smiles and looks at C)) Do you want this one?
C: ((looks at her partner, smiles back to SK and tilts her
head))
SK: Okay ((takes the dress off from the hanger and puts
it in the bag))
C: No, no ((shakes her head stops the SK))
SK: No? Are you sure? This is a nice one?
C: ((talks to her partner in Japanese, looks back at the SK,
smiles, and shakes her head))
8
In this excerpt, the only phrase that the Japanese customer utters is ‘No, no’ (line 10),
and besides that, she communicates with the shopkeeper by using gestures and
facial-expressions as contextualization cues. When the customers was shown the price of
another dress and asked whether she wants it, she looks at the calculator. This action of
looking at the calculator is a contextualization cue that can be interpreted as a display of
interest. However, since she smiles and tilts her head right after looking into the calculator
on lines 3-4, it displays her hesitation towards buying it, and she confirms her opinion with
her partner who stands besides her. This confirmation with her partner seems to be a
culturally appropriate action for a Japanese woman to confirm something with her partner
(probably a husband). However on line five, the shopkeeper looks only at the female
customer and asks if she wants the dress. This indicates that the shopkeeper is treating only
the female customer as her ‘customer’.
When the female tourist is asked if she wants the dress, she smiles back to the
shopkeeper and tilts her head (lines 6-7). This head-tilting action can be considered as a
contextualization cue that shows an indirect declination, because consequently she does not
buy the dress, and this action leads to that outcome (line 10). In Japanese culture,
sometimes politeness is expressed through ambiguity or indirectness, and making
everything too clear can be considered as rude. Spees’s (1994) cross-cultural study of
indirectness shows that native Japanese speakers use more indirect expressions when there
is a greater status difference among the speakers and therefore they have to be polite. In
addition, Tannen (1986) argues that to avoid face-threatening act, people employ polite
strategies, and indirectness is one of the factors of the politeness. In this case, declining the
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shopkeeper’s offer (to make the second dress cheaper) would be a face threatening act for
the shopkeeper, therefore the female customer would have employed the politeness strategy
by obeying indirectly.
On line 8, the shopkeeper seems to be interpreting the customer’s cues as ‘yes’, and
puts the dress in the bag. However, the interview with the shopkeeper indicates that she
might have understood the declination of the customer. 3 To the researcher’s question of
“Do you use Japanese when you are explaining too? Like how you dress, and… as you do
in English?” she answers as follows: “No… I just use English. They go just like ((nods
twice)). I don’t know if they understand or not but they buy. I don’t care if they understand
but I just do what I have to do.”4 Her answer reveals that on line 8, the action of putting the
dress into the bag can be considered as a contextualization cue indicating that she is
pushing the customer to purchase the dress even though she may have noticed the
customer’s message of declination. In this case, the shopkeeper’s goal of this conversation
is “to sell additional dress to the customer”. Considering the nature of the service encounter
as “a goal-oriented speech event” (Goffman, 1963: 89), these interactions from line 6 to 10
might not be a breakdown of communication, but a legitimate procedure of the
conversations, because the shopkeeper pursues the action oriented towards her goal and
negotiates with the customer who has her own goal “to buy only one dress”.
4.2 Excerpt B
3
At the time of the interview, the shopkeeper did not know that the researcher was
Japanese and speak Japanese.
4
For the rest of the interview, see the appendix.
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In the next excerpt, a Caucasian-looking man and woman (probably in their 20’s) are
working at a stand and attempting to stop people who pass by to sell T-shirts. These T-shirts
are made with small wires and engineered to flash corresponding to the sounds that a
microphone catches. This is a family business, and they are brother and sister. There is
another kiosk in Waikiki as well. When a Japanese-looking couple (probably in their early
20’s) (Cs) passes by, walking one to two meters away, the male shopkeeper (SK) talks to
them in Japanese.
1
2
SK: ((waves big, walks slightly towards Cs))
Konnichiwa! (‘Hello’)
3
Cs: ((stop, look at the SK and smile/laugh)) hhh.
4
SK: ((remains some distance towards Cs)) Nihonjin?
5
(‘Japanese?’)
6
Cs: ((smile and watch the SK))
7
SK: Osaka? Tokyo? (Names of big cities in Japan)
8
Cs: ((laughter))
9
10
11
12
13
C(male): Kobe!
SK: Kobe! Small..chiisai ne! (‘It's small’)
C(male): Chiisai..hhh
SK: ((points at the T-shirt that he is wearing)) Kore mita koto aru?
(‘Have you ever seen this?’)
14
Cs: ((smile, shake heads, wave hands and start to walk away))
15
SK: No? Chotto dake? (‘Only for a while?’)
11
16
Cs: ((smile, shake heads and walk away))
17
SK: Sayonara! (‘Good-bye’) ((waves))
18
Cs: ((look back, smile and bow))
In contrast with the first excerpt, the shopkeeper in this excerpt keeps using Japanese
to Japanese customers until the end of the conversation. Even to Japanese questions that he
asks, Japanese customers use gestures and body languages as the main means of
communication (lines 12 and 16). On line 2, the shopkeeper uses Japanese greeting to
attract Japanese tourists’ attention. Because of his language choice, his utterance draws the
attention of the Japanese couple who walk quite far from the shop. Receiving the
shopkeeper’s greeting, the Japanese couple stops, look at him and smile which seems to
indicate their interest. However even they stop, they do not greet the shopkeeper back. This
shows that the shopkeeper’s ‘konnnichiwa’ is not taken as a pure greeting, and Japanese
tourists seem to take this use of L2 Japanese as a cue of “attracting the attention of
customers”.
On line 4, the shopkeeper takes the customer’s smile and stopping as an indication of
interest, and carries the conversation further by asking them if they are Japanese. This
question seems to serve as an opener for the further conversation to build a friendly
relationship with the customer. Here again, the shopkeeper’s goal of this conversation is to
sell products. Receiving this, the customers do not answer to the question, but their smiles
confirm the utterance of the shopkeeper. His action of asking customers’ nationality in this
way (not even making it a sentence) sounds too direct and rude (even by American point of
view, as discussed in class). However, Japanese customers seem not to care about this
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language use. This may be attributable to the fact that the shopkeeper is apparently an L2
speaker of Japanese (from his Caucasian-looking appearance and his intonation). Therefore,
the Japanese customers do not expect the proper form of politeness from him
(pragmatically andlinguistically). In contrast, a Japanese shopkeeper who works at a
lingerie store and has lived in America for five years expressed her anxiety in politeness
towards Japanese customers.5
On line 7, instead of asking ‘where are you from?’, the shopkeeper gives names of
big cities in Japan. By giving kinds of answers that he expects from the customers, he
makes it easier for them to take part in the interaction which may lead them to a purchase.
This utterance also indicates that the shopkeeper has some kind of knowledge about Japan,
albeit shallow. Being provided with wrong choices, the customer gives the right answer and
participates in the interaction (line 9). On line 10, the shopkeeper seems to try to build
solidarity by commenting on the city that the customers are from. However, since Kobe is
not a small city6, and the meaning of ‘small’ is not very clear (if he suggested the area or
the population), he fails to build solidarity with the customers, and the conversation does
not develop from that.
On line 12, the shopkeeper changes the subject and asks the customers if they have
seen the product that he is trying to sell. When he brings the conversation into business, or
the real purpose, the customers notice that and decline by using gestures and body
languages (line 14). Receiving these cues indicating ‘no thank you’, the shopkeeper
5
For the transcripts of the interview, see appendix B
6
Kobe has 1,537,642 populations at the time of December 1, 2009.
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negotiates further, asking if the customers can take a little time to look at the product, and
on line 16, the customers decline again by using the same body language. Here, the
conversation is developed around the goal of ‘selling product’ by the shopkeeper and
‘rejecting it’ by the customers. Using L2 Japanese and gestures as means, they seem to
reflect the participants’ identity as a shopkeeper and customers. On line 17, the shopkeeper
gives up negotiating and greets the customers, and at this time, the customers seem to take
it as a ‘proper’ or ‘pure’ farewell and return the act of bidding farewell by using gestures
(bowing).
In this excerpt, in contrast to Excerpt A, the shopkeeper used a lot of Japanese words
and sentences to pursue his goal of selling product. Here again, the conversations seemed to
have indicated the nature of the service encounter as “a goal-oriented speech event”. The
interview with him shows how he understands Japanese tourists and uses Japanese to attract
them. In the following are the excerpts from the interview (R stands for Researcher):
1
2
R: Have you been to Japan?
SK: Oh, no. I learned Japanese here. You know, we
3
have many Japanese people here and I have
4
some Japanese friends.
5
6
R: Does it make a difference when you use Japanese to
Japanese customers?
7
SK: Yea, Japanese people here are very shy. They aren't
8
open. So I joke a lot like.. 'Konnichiwawa', 'Gomen,
9
gomenne'. ((laughs)) {Konnichihuahua}, {Sorry. Sorry}
14
10
R: ((laughter))
On line two, the shopkeeper uses the word ‘learn’ towards Japanese language, and he also
explains that he has some Japanese friends. These utterances seem to show that he sees
himself as a ‘L2 Japanese speaker’. It is also evident in the way that he answers to my
question of ‘have you been to Japan?’ I asked this question because he displayed some
knowledge about Japanese cities in the interaction with the customers above, but he took
the question as about the language competence and answered that he learned it in Hawaii.
Therefore, it is also the evidence that he understands himself as ‘L2 Japanese speaker/a
Japanese learner’. Lines 7-9 show that he understands Japanese customers to be ‘shy’, and
that he believes that entertaining them would allow him to have a friendly relationship with
them. The use of jokes and pans indicates how he uses Japanese to conduct his
goal-oriented action which is to draw customers’ attention to the kiosk. The pan of
“konnichiwawa” is originally used by a popular female Japanese singer, and young
Japanese tourists would understand that it is a harmless pan. However, it is not evident if
the shopkeeper learned it from his Japanese friends or invented it himself. Even though the
final goal of selling products is same as the first shopkeeper, his strategy seems to be
different, and he sees understanding Japanese customers and having interaction with them
would lead to the accomplishment of his goal. Considering this, he seems to have interests
in intercultural understandings and communications that is based on his interest in selling
products. Since this is a cross-sectional observation, it is not observable how much of his
Japanese use leads to the success in selling products, but during the observation, he was the
only one who communicated with Japanese customers while his sister did not utter any
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word in Japanese and consequently, did not communicate with them.
5. Discussions and Limitations
In this study, I attempted to investigate how intercultural interactions occur among
Japanese tourists and English speaking shopkeepers in Hawaii. The first finding is that
Japanese tourists seem to make a lot of use of gestures, body languages and face
expressions rather than verbal aspect of the language, and shopkeepers take these cues as
means of communication as well, and actively attempt to understand them, and in some
cases, the shopkeepers themselves used body languages to talk to Japanese customers (such
as the case of Clair in Excerpt on page seven).
The second finding is that most of the conversation between Japanese tourists and
local retailers shows the nature of service encounters as goal-oriented speech event. Both
the shopkeepers and the customers tried to pursue their own goal, negotiating in English,
Japanese and body languages. As can be seen in Excerpt A, even though a shopkeeper’s
reaction to Japanese customer’s contextualization cues seems to be an evidence of not
understanding, it can be considered that the shopkeeper is pushing and negotiating as one of
the strategy to sell products rather than a breakdown of communication. Shopkeepers in
Hawai’i seem to use cultural differences in understanding cues as a tool for businesses.
The third finding is that in some cases, shopkeepers tried to engage in intercultural
communication with Japanese customers actively in order to accomplish the goal of selling
products. For these shopkeepers, using L2 Japanese and having intercultural interactions
are one of the procedures of the service encounter interactions. Not only having
negotiations of business exchanges, being in Hawai’i, shopkeepers make Japanese jokes,
16
mention about Japanese cities and use Japanese greetings to get customers’ attentions.
These activities seem to be similar to socially expanded service encounter interaction that is
explained in Bailey’s (1997) study. He explains its features as including activities that
highlight the interpersonal relationship between customers and shopkeepers, in addition to
the three features of socially minimal service interactions that are: a) greetings and
openings, b) negotiation of the business exchange, and c) closing of the encounter. The
shopkeepers in Hawai’i seem to develop the socially expanded conversations around
cultural aspects (e.g., name of the cities that the customers are form, or Japanese jokes).
They also seem to employ cultural features within these three procedures (such as greetings
and openings in Japanese). Since it is apparent that the shopkeepers are the L2 users if
Japanese, Japanese tourists seem not to take some expressions as rude, which can be
considered to be rude in their first language (e.g., asking ‘nihonjin?’ directly).
This study however, also has a limitation. Since I did not have chance to interview
Japanese customers, I cannot know how actually they perceived the interaction, what made
them act as the way they did, and how they thought of the local shopkeepers. Being
Japanese myself, I could refer to my membership knowledge to interpret Japanese
customers’ actions, therefore it was more necessary for me to interview the shopkeepers.
However, in order to fully understand the picture, Japanese tourists’ perceptions should be
included in the future research.
6. References
Bailey, B. (1997). Communication of respect in interethnic service encounters. Language in
Society. 26. 327-356.
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Cook, H. (2001) Why can’t learners of JFL distinguish polite from impolite speech styles?
In K. Rose & G. Kasper (eds.) Pragmatics in language teaching (pp. 80-102).
Cambridge.
Goffman, E. (1963). Behavior in public places. New York: The Free Press.
Gumperz, J. (1982). Discourse strategies. Cambridge University Press.
Japan National Tourist Organization. (2008). Visitor arrivals and Japanese overseas
travelers. Retrieved from http://www.jnto.go.jp/jpn/downloads/080728monthly.pdf.
Okamoto, S. & Smith, J. (2004). Japanese language, gender, and ideology: cultural models
and real people. Oxford University Press.
Pizam, A. & Sussmann, S. (1995). Does nationality affect tourist behavior? Annals of
Tourism Research. 22 (4). 901-917.
McKay, S. & Bokhorst-Heng, W. (2008). Interactional sociolinguistics. Ch.6 in
International English in its sociolinguistic contexts. New York: Routledge.
Mori, J. (2003). Construction of intercultuality: A study of initial encounters between
Japanese and American students. Research on Language and Social Interaction. 36.
143-184.
Reisinger, Y. & Turner, L. (1999). A cultural analysis of Japanese tourists: challenges for
tourism markets. European Journal of Marketing. 33 (11/12). 1203-1227.
Reisinger, Y. & Waryszak, R. (1994). Tourists’ perceptions of service in shops: Japanese
tourists in Australia. International Journal of Retail and Distribution
Management. 22(5). 20-28.
Ryoo, H. (2007). Interculturality serving multiple interactional goals in African American
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and Korean service encounters. Pragmatics. 17(1). 23-47.
Spees, H. (1994). A cross-cultural study of indirectness. Issues in Applied Linguistics. 5(2).
231-253.
State of Hawaii, Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism. (2008).
Annual
Visitor
Research
Report.
Retrieved
from
http://hawaii.gov/dbedt/info/visitor-stats/visitor-research/2008-annual-visitor.pdf.
Tannen, D. (1986). That’s not what I meant!. New York: Ballantine Books.
Tsuda, S. (1993). Indirectness in discourse: What does it do in conversation?. Intercultural
Communication Studies. 3(1). 63-74.
7. Appendix A
Interview with the SK from Excerpt B
1
2
R: Have you been to Japan?
SK: Oh, no. I learned Japanese here. You know, we
3
have many Japanese people here and I have
4
some Japanese friends.
5
6
R: Does it make a difference when you useJapanese to
Japanese customers?
7
SK: Yea, Japanese people here are very shy. They aren't
8
open. So I joke a lot like.. 'Konnichiwawa', 'Gomen,
9
gomenne'. ((laughs)) {Konnichihuahua}, {Sorry. Sorry}
10
11
R: ((laughs))
SK: ((finds Asian woman passes by)) Konnichiwa!
19
12
13
C: ((does not look at him and keeps walking))
SK(sister): I think she's Korean.
14
15
R: Is it hard to recognize?
SK: Yah, it is.
Appendix B
An interview with Sawako (pseudonym) who works at a lingerie shop in Ala Moana
Shopping Center. She is in her late 20’s, and even though she is originally from Japan, she
had lived in the mainland of America for five years and has come to Hawai’i about two
months before the interview. She has a Caucasian husband. She is tanned, has some
highlights on her hair, and looks like a local Asian woman.
1
S: I talk to them in Japanese because you know
2
they don't understand English. Even though they start
3
learning English from junior high or even in elementary.
4
They are not used to speak. When I talk to them,
5
they usually say "okay" or "yes" when they don't
6
need a help. And.. You know, they are just
7
visitors, they don't stay here forever, so…
8
Oh, excuse me… ((being called by other shopkeepers))
9
((coming back)) so yah, they don't use English…
10
R: Do you get trained to use Japanese from the company?
11
S: Oh, no no. I use Japanese because I'm Japanese,
12
but they don't teach Japanese.
20
13
14
R: Do you feel more comfortable with Japanese customers?
Or with American customers?
15
S: Oh, I feel more comfortable with Japanese customers…
16
Because I know the culture… but I have to be really
17
careful with the politeness. You know, the level of
18
Japanese customer service is uuuup high
19
((pointing at the ceiling)) I have to be really careful
20
when I am talking to older people. You know,
21
we have different languages to be polite, but English
22
is more simple, so yah, English is easier…
21