ABSTRACT
As the conclusion of this book, this chapter explores the evolving identities and communal experiences of Japanese migrants in Australia (JMAs), focusing on the tension between identifying as Nihonjin (Japanese) and Nikkeijin (Japanese descendants). Based on over two decades of fieldwork, the study traces how early post-war JMAs resisted the Imin (migrants)/Nikkeijin label due to its connotations of poverty, ethnic inferiority and working-class status, emphasising their middle-class background and alignment with Japanese national identity. However, diversification in migrant demographics, such as working holiday makers, marriage migrants, international students, sexual minorities and nuclear evacuees, complicated this image. This chapter illustrates how JMAs experience intersecting realities as both Nihonjin and Imin through community language education, social integration and cultural practices. It argues that these dual experiences are lenticular, instead of contradictory, shifting with context. The notion of ‘heritage language’ education and community building becomes a key site for sustaining identity across generations. This chapter proposes the concept of a porous, multifaceted ‘JMA/Nikkei Australian’ community, shaped by transnational mobility, historical consciousness and hybrid cultural practices. This community should not be understood as a fixed ethnic entity but as an ongoing social process of negotiation and redefinition within Australia’s multicultural landscape.
