The earliest organized group of Japanese emigrants settled in
Mexico in 1897. Today, the four largest populations of Japanese and descendants of Japanese immigrants live in the
United States,
Canada,
Brazil and
Peru.
Gosei is a term used in these geographic areas outside Japan.
Gosei characterizes the child of at least one
Yonsei (fourth generation) parent. Differences among these national
Gosei developed because of the varying historical processes through which their Japanese emigrant forebears became Nikkei.
Gosei in the US The lives of Japanese-Americans of earlier generations contrast with the
Gosei generation and beyond, who often lack a single surviving grandparent with firsthand memory of the culture. According to a 2011 columnist in
The Rafu Shimpo of Los Angeles, "Younger Japanese Americans are more culturally American than Japanese" and "other than some vestigial cultural affiliations, a
Yonsei or
Gosei is simply another American." American descendants of
Wakamatsu colonist Masumizu Kuninosuke are in the generation through his marriage to a mixed African-Native American woman in 1877, some who only discovered the ancestry of their 1/64th ancestor through a DNA test.
Gosei in Canada Japanese-Canadian
Gosei are entirely acculturated, as is typical for any ethnic group.
Gosei in Peru Japanese-Peruvian (
Nipo-peruano)
Gosei made up less than 1.0% of the Nikkei population in 2000. They are represented by the
Asociación Peruano Japonesa.
Gosei in Brazil Japanese-Brazilians (
Nipo-brasileiro) make up the largest Japanese population in South America, numbering an estimated less than 242,543 (including those of mixed-race or mixed-ethnicity), more in the 1.8 million in the
United States. The
Gosei are a small part of the ethnic minority in that
South American nation in the last decades of the 20th century. In 1990, 0.8% of the
Nipo-Brasileiros community were
Gosei. == Cultural profile ==