Becoming a Japonés in a Foreign Land: The Case of Yoshihei Nakatani.

This article focuses on the life history of Yoshihei Carlos Nakatani (1910-1992), using two intimate memoirs provided by his family and heretofore unknown to the historiography. Nakatani, who immigrated to Mexico in 1932, is known as the inventor of the cacahuate japonés (Japanese peanut), a toasted peanut covered in soy-sauce-flavored flour that is now a mainstream snack in Mexico. Nakatani’s life story is distinct in that his invention of cacahuate japonés demonstrates how he actively adapted to Mexican society. This article takes Nakatani’s life as one example of a Japanese immigrant’s lived experiences in Mexico and highlights aspects of his process of integration into Mexican society. Unique sources reveal the importance of emotion and personal histories for Japanese immigrants’ negotiation of their immigrant self-identities during the historical events of World War II. It argues that Nakatani’s experiences illustrate that Japanese immigrants in Mexico had starkly divergent experiences from their countrymen in the US, despite analogous experiences with economic struggles, racism, and displacement. Nakatani’s cacahuate japonés thus offers a locus through which to re-conceptualize Japanese immigrants’ experiences and trajectories in which integration into the host country could paradoxically include reliance upon Japanese heritage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]