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No-No boy
A derogatory term for a person of Japanese ancestry.
Jap Quotes in No-No Boy
The No-No Boy quotes below are all either spoken by Jap or refer to Jap. For each quote, you can also see the other terms and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 1
Quotes
The war had wrought violent changes upon the people, and the people, in turn, working hard and living hard and earning a lot of money and spending it on whatever was available, had distorted the profile of Jackson Street. The street had about it the air of a carnival without quite succeeding at becoming one. A shooting gallery stood where once had been a clothing store; fish and chips had replaced a jewelry shop; and a bunch of Negroes were horsing around raucously in front of a pool parlor…
He walked past the pool parlor, picking his way gingerly among the Negroes, of whom there had been only a few at one time and of whom there seemed to be nothing but now…
“Jap!” …
“Go back to Tokyo, boy.” Persecution in the drawl of the persecuted…
Friggin’ niggers, he uttered savagely to himself and, from the same place deep down inside where tolerance for the Negroes and the Jews and the Mexicans and the Chinese and the too short and the too fat and too ugly abided because he was Japanese and knew what it was like better than did those who were white and average and middle class and good Democrats or liberal Republicans, the hate which was unrelenting and terrifying seethed up.
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire No-No Boy LitChart as a printable PDF.
Jap Term Timeline in No-No Boy
The timeline below shows where the term Jap appears in No-No Boy. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 1
Ichiro walks towards Jackson Street, which houses Seattle’s Japantown. A group of black men harass him, calling him “Jap!” and telling him to “go...
(full context)
...goodbye. Ichiro apologizes to Mr. Kumasaka for his mother, calling her “crazy” and a “goddamed Jap!” Mr. Kumasaka urges Ichiro to “try to understand her,” as Ichiro leaves.
(full context)
Chapter 4
...two of Taro’s friends confront Ichiro, and begin to attack him. They call him a “Jap,” and accuse him of being homesick for Japan. They kick him to the ground and...
(full context)
Chapter 5
...believes he made a huge mistake and ruined his life for his mother, father, and Japan. He tries to explain this to his father, who doesn’t understand. He tells Mr. Yamada...
(full context)
Chapter 10
...thinks back to a church in Idaho that he visited with his friend Tommy, a Japanese man in the same internment camp. The two were rejected from one church by a...
(full context)
