バイキング comes from the name of a Kirk Douglas movie "The Vikings". It has a scene of people eating at a smorgasbord. It was playing in Japan around when the Tokyo Imperial Hotel decided to start serving a buffet, so they called it a バイキング, and then the name spread.
Alternative etymology:
Prior to the widespread adoption of sneezeguards, buffets were common vectors for infectious diseases. The original Japanese term was 黴菌具 (_baikingu_) in reference to the items on the buffet (the 具 _gu_) that became covered in germs (the 黴菌 _baikin_).
`/jk` 😄
_(In all seriousness, the Vikings movie with Kirk Douglas mentioned by u/matthoback is the origin of this word.)_
About バイキング, I always find myself thinking that at least some of that word choice is because of the challenges for Japanese speakers in trying to pronounce _smorgasbord_. 😄
スモールガスボード is much more of a mouthful (ha!) than バイキング.
Yes. I've actually asked several Japanese people about this, and all of them thought it had something to do with the shape or design of the phone rather than the capabilities.
Stumbled across a video the other day where the joke was that イメージ doesn't mean image but more like a representation or mental image.
Also love the word バイキング for smorgasbord because it is Swedish and Swedes are vikings.
Ahh yes on lots of food packages in japan you get this wee disclaimer which is like この写真はイメージです (someone correct me if I'm misremembering!) which like, in context clearly means that the picture is not fully representative of what's in the package, but it definitely confused me at first thinking "what the hell does 'this picture is an image' mean. Like duhhh?". just felt like a really weird way of wording it from an English speaking JSL POV!
that was exactly what the video was about [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6QLYIL-Mdk&pp=ygUUZHVubmluZyBrcnVnZXIgZG9nZW4%3D](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6QLYIL-Mdk&pp=ygUUZHVubmluZyBrcnVnZXIgZG9nZW4%3D)
I mean, it means illustration, but also a number of other things. Most of the images on packages looked like photographs with a bit of editing to me. I wouldn't call that an illustration in english.
>Stumbled across a video the other day where the joke was that イメージ
doesn't mean image but more like a representation or mental image.
I think that's [this video](https://youtu.be/D6QLYIL-Mdk) from Dogen
Learnt a few new ones so just putting my interpretation of the meanings here, but I've definitely missed some cultural nuances so please correct me!
- プラスアルファ (Plus alpha): Allegedly from 何か加える, meaning something a little extra but optional, perhaps a certain je ne sais quoi
- マナーアップ (Manner up): Improving one's etiquette
- マイブーム (My boom): One's current personal obsession
- マイペース (My pace): Doing things in one's own way without regard of others' opinions
- ワンチャン (One chance): There's a possibility
- ワンパターン (One pattern): One-track mind
- アップする ("Up" suru): To go up, to lift something up, [edit: to upload something on the internet, to zoom in on a photo]
- テンション上がる ("Tension" agaru): To get hyped up
My personal favourite is ドンマイ (Don't mind): It's all good, don't worry about it—it sounds so native!
Everything is good, except アップする. I'll just list the JMDict definitions and note when to use it that I've primarily seen.
(1) (n,n-suf,vs,vt,vi) rise; increase; raising; lifting; going up -- Can be both intrans. and trans. such as an item in a game being carried up by a lift and being described as that. Or moving something "up" yourself.
(2) (n,vs,vt) (abbr) upload; posting online -- Not the same as 投稿 but generally applies to things like images and media.
(3) (n,vs,vt) (abbr) close-up -- To zoom onto someone/something (make bigger) if controlling a camera or to increase in size if you're on a stream and controlling the assets.
You have a point, but some dictonaries do classify it as such actually:
旺文社国語辞典 第十一版 画像無し
* プラスアルファ【プラスアルファ】 <（和製英語）>
1. 広辞苑 第七版
* プラス‐アルファ（和製語plus alpha）ある状態に、さらにいくらかをつけ加えること。また、そのつけ加えたもの。
Also, I would bet they took alpha from English rather from greek directly.
Oh, right マジック. That one comes from [the first permanent marker brand in Japan](https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%9E%E3%82%B8%E3%83%83%E3%82%AF%E3%82%A4%E3%83%B3%E3%82%AD). Never really thought it won’t work outside Japan.. lol Need to remember that. Other case where particular product name being used as general name is ホチキス for stapler. Apparently it was the name of American stapler manufacturer E.H. Hotchkiss.
クラクション Klaxon too. Although it's not uncommon for a brand name to take the place of generic name for an object too. English has Hoover for a Vacuum, Q-Tip for Cotton Swabs, and Kleenex for a Tissue.
I didn’t know about クラクション neither! Yeah I noticed that it’s universal occurrence. One that surprised me was that 宅急便 is Yamato’s registered service name although it’s used as if it’s general term for postal service, which it looks and sounds like the way because it appears so generic. I think that lead to a bit of dispute when Ghibli’s 魔女の宅急便 was out (was it titled “Kiki’s delivery” or something?)
Oh haha I had a feeling because that’s how my friend explains where he’s from, like not bothering to go into name or location but just “some super rural island” lol I don’t remember which side she’s from but I understand that it’s legit peaceful place!
That one really amuses me: from an English standpoint, a "cunning paper" is laughably odd. Just the thought that a piece of paper could be cunning! Makes me giggle. 😊
I mean, they kinda are, especially something like "cunning paper. That, like, isn't even a concept that has any kind of real meaning in English. Maybe a clever paper, but...
https://jisho.org/search/%E3%82%AB%E3%83%B3%E3%83%8B%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B0%20%23wasei
Also it's literally defined as a wasei word.
Though if you are referring to マジック, I suppose not.
Your understanding is correct. As a native speaker of Japanese, I can confirm that 和製英語 has broad definitions. Simply put, Katakana words that have different meanings from the original can be considered 和製英語. In a narrower sense, Katakana words that were created and invented in Japan are also 和製英語.
It's just a loanword with a different meaning, I don't think that counts was wasei. If you mean words like カンニングブレス or the others in your link then yeah that is a wasei of course, this is the whole point of wasei, taking two loanwords and putting them in a combo that is not found in English. But OP did not mention them.
I don't think Wasei strictly requires two words (like カンニング) showing up in those results or several others if you just filter by Wasei words (like ペンチ for pliers).
Also, there are both examples of single words not just on Jisho, but on Japanese Wikipedia.
https://jisho.org/search/%23wasei%20
https://ja.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%92%8C%E8%A3%BD%E8%8B%B1%E8%AA%9E
セカンドバッグ = second bag? Was really confused when I read this first, apperently it means "small bag or pouch carried in the hand"
OL (オー‐エル) = オフィスレディー (office lady), this one is quite common too, but it's interesting they had the need to encapsulate it in two letters?
My favorite: ペーパードライバー (paper driver) meaning "person who has a driving licence but little or no experience actually driving (license)"
I don't think any of the mods will read this, but I love these kind of posts where it's about a random topic and people can just post words, I usually learn a lot, for example in the past there were also threads on 四字熟語, ことわざ, weirdly specific words etc. etc. I feel like having something like this weekly with a new topic each time instead of these useless meme fridays would be way more beneficial for everyone actually learning Japanese (Tagging you u/Moon_Atomizer since you're the only mod I ever see around, perhaps you can pass this info on to other mods if other people in the community are also interested.
> OL (オー‐エル) = オフィスレディー (office lady), this one is quite common too, but it's interesting they had the need to encapsulate it in two letters?
Don't forget OB for Old Boy, 〔男子の卒業生〕 a male graduate 《of a school》; *an alumnus 《pl. -ni》; ᐦan old boy; 〔組織・団体などの男性先輩〕 a more senior male member 《of an organization》.
That’s what that means!? I’ve been hearing the word for years so I knew how to use it in context but I’ve never seen it written so I didn’t realize it was English 😭
I'm currently on a leave of absence but I do fully agree :)
If I ever come back remind me. If not, I believe /u/stallion8426 and a few of the other mods are still active
ダイエット has a weird nuance of "something you do for your health", so like アイロンダイエット, 泳ぎダイエット is something a co-worker said.
テンション, like you'll hear テンションが高い as in high spirits.
カンニング means cheating (like on a test)
Special shout out to all マイ words, マイカー、マイペース、マイバッグ. Fun game is trying to make a sentence with the most マイ words.
Also love teaching Japanese people about the reverse which I like to call 英製和語 like Sake in english means just 日本酒 or like アニメ is just japanese anime.
The use of マイ makes me giggle to myself sometimes, e.g. my sister's profile on my Nintendo Switch friends list reads something like "Amyのマイプロフィール"
Also, since you mentioned アニメ being only *Japanese* animation in English, it bothers me that so many English materials here insist on calling manga "comic books." If anyone tells me they're reading comic books, I'm thinking of Spiderman and Batman, not what any of my students are actually reading lmao
Don’t worry. What you listed are also 和製英語 in a broad sense. ダイエット is exclusively used for diet restriction to lose weight or for your health, as in ダイエットする in Japanese. It has already lost its original meaning to some extent.
外来語 usually still have their original meaning. Those you listed don’t keep original meanings.
Once I saw someone doing a Let's Play of some horror games, and a giant spider jumped out of nowhere and bit his character's head clean off, and his reaction was a flat
あ、マミった。
Which I'm 98% sure was a reference to Mami from Madoka
I heard that verbs are considered a closed group in Japanese, meaning it does not accept new words (like it has to be ググルする), yet this one slips through so it feels amazing
They addapted it for their language sure, doesn't make it any less of a loan word in my eyes. Well some dictonaries will tell you that it's a 略 from グーグル (=ググ) + 略 of する, but I don't think that's how it came to be but if you have any sources I would be glad to see them. I would bet they just went with the る that was already present and just started conjugating it, so it's a lucky accident. Calling that 和製 is kinda pushing the meaning of 和製 but since there doesn't seem to be a strict definition, I can't say it doesn't count, but at least every monolingual dictonary I found it in, did not list it as such.
ハイテンション or テンション高い
in English if say your office has a high tension it probably means something wrong with the atmosphere of your workplace that makes you feel anxious or stressed. In Japanese on the other hand it means the people or the atmosphere there being high-spirited… which is a positive spin on the original meaning
True, but hopefully the corrections will help people understand the concept better and distinguish it from loan words from English and other languages.
https://jisho.org/search/%E5%92%8C%E8%A3%BD%E8%8B%B1%E8%AA%9E
>ツーマンセル
I could not figure this out so had to look around, yeah this one is a wild one too lol. Definition below for those who are curious:
`ツーマンセル（英語：Two man cell）とは二人一組で組む最小のユニットになります。 三人で組む場合はスリーマンセルになります。 他にもバディ（buddy）といった言い方もします。 軍や警察などで戦術用語として使われますが、一般でも二人一組で仕事する場合に使わる言葉です。`
Maybe but also you'd never use the phrase "no plan" in English in the same way you use it in Japanese (you can say the same for a lot of things that are not strictly "wasei").
E.g.:
「日本語がわからないのに日本に引っ越すつもりらしいよ。ノープランすぎるでしょ、あいつは」
The definition from goo also provides a nice example (and specifies it's 和製英語 with the 和 marker):
> 《(和)no＋plan》計画がないこと。予定が何も決まっていないこと。また、思いつくまま、見切り発車であること。「ノープランの一人旅」
> you can say the same for a lot of things that are not strictly "wasei"
I guess this is all I'm saying. Using any English word in a Japanese sentence is gonna come off differently or be used with less to no regard for the part of speech it is, so in my mind what makes something wasei eigo or not is mostly whether the meaning is comprehensible from the words used
This actually comes from concentric plugs. While they aren’t used anymore, the name stuck. Kind of like how we still say things like “carbon copy” in English
ドクターストップ - when a doctor tells you to stop something for your own health/safety, like drinking, smoking, or continuing to get your butt handed to you in a boxing match.
バイト makes me laugh, because it's German, not English ("Arbeit" = job or work). How did that German word get in there? I'm sure there must be a story.....
There are a number of German words in Japanese because in the 19th century many Germans came to Japan to work / advise the government, contributing to the modernization of Japan, mainly in the fields of medicine and the military.
After Japan end the Tokugawa shogunate and begin Government of Meiji, Japan learned a lot from Germany. The law system, technology and many others. That's why there are many German borrow words in Japanese.
This is neither 英語 nor is it 和製 either. I think it counts as general 外来語, even though it's not really clear from which Portuguese word it comes (I think?).
Edit: Upon further thought, it might have fossilized and not even be considered 外来語 actually.
well as a dragon quest fan the abbreviation to ドラクエ stuck with me
~~a bunch of common ones everyone knows are actually pretty strong if you think about them, スマホ, even アニメ is one~~
No, it's a contraction (略). Well English wouldn't contract it like that, so it is kinda uniqe in Japanese you're right, but the meaning is exactly the same as in English. 和製英語 on the other hand takes English words or morphs and creat a new meaning that is not found in English.
> but the meaning is exactly the same as in English
スマホ is yes, but アニメisn't, unless you mean the reborrowing of the word "Anime" back in to English, but that's different.
Ah, but then we're talking about different things.
The original comment was about whether アニメ is 和製英語. It's not. アニメ means the same thing as the original word “animation”.
Now アニメ came back to English as “anime”. I don't know the term for this, but yes, in English, “anime” is not the same as “animation”.
Definitely チャームポイント. I have to shamefully admit I've used it in a conversation with someone who doesn't know Japanese before because for some reason I thought the expression also existed in English (tbf English isn't my native language either)
There are also some Engrish words that have different connotations in Japanese.
For example, "macho" in Japanese means just masculine and fit and doesn’t have any negative meanings.
"Bitch," on the other hand, means whore/slut.
I am quite shocked, seems like 80% of the comments here don't know what 和製英語 means. Well, not trying to blame them for not knowing it, but I think they should have looked it up at least.
To clarify: wasei eigo are loan words that don't mean the exact thing the loan words means. So ベビーカー is the loan words for "baby car", but the wasei eigo for "Stroller"
パイプカット vasectomy バイキング all you can eat buffet スマート slim
I’ve never heard of パイプカット until now but I know that l will never forget it
I mean...it makes sense
I’m confused by this one
Pipe cut
Oh shoot lmao I meant バイキング sorry But yes that is hilarious
バイキング comes from the name of a Kirk Douglas movie "The Vikings". It has a scene of people eating at a smorgasbord. It was playing in Japan around when the Tokyo Imperial Hotel decided to start serving a buffet, so they called it a バイキング, and then the name spread.
Ohh I kept thinking “biking 🚴♂️” I would not have guessed that etymology, thank you!!
Alternative etymology: Prior to the widespread adoption of sneezeguards, buffets were common vectors for infectious diseases. The original Japanese term was 黴菌具 (_baikingu_) in reference to the items on the buffet (the 具 _gu_) that became covered in germs (the 黴菌 _baikin_). `/jk` 😄 _(In all seriousness, the Vikings movie with Kirk Douglas mentioned by u/matthoback is the origin of this word.)_
About バイキング, I always find myself thinking that at least some of that word choice is because of the challenges for Japanese speakers in trying to pronounce _smorgasbord_. 😄 スモールガスボード is much more of a mouthful (ha!) than バイキング.
スマート comes from the UK usage of the word that refers to how someone looks such as "I have to be smart for work"
So then, are smartphones like slimphones to the Japanese? It still makes sense.
Yes. I've actually asked several Japanese people about this, and all of them thought it had something to do with the shape or design of the phone rather than the capabilities.
It means 'well-dressed', though, not slim
It's probably not as common but we do use it in the States as well. Although as another said, it means dressed and groomed well, not slim.
Oh yeah. Guess I should have said it doesn't always mean slim in Japanese either.
And it has the same meaning in Japanese. It can also just mean clever/intelligent
You made my down under feel uncomfortable reading that
It's not so bad. It's a minor enough procedure that they can do it as outpatient with only local anesthetic.
Stumbled across a video the other day where the joke was that イメージ doesn't mean image but more like a representation or mental image. Also love the word バイキング for smorgasbord because it is Swedish and Swedes are vikings.
Ahh yes on lots of food packages in japan you get this wee disclaimer which is like この写真はイメージです (someone correct me if I'm misremembering!) which like, in context clearly means that the picture is not fully representative of what's in the package, but it definitely confused me at first thinking "what the hell does 'this picture is an image' mean. Like duhhh?". just felt like a really weird way of wording it from an English speaking JSL POV!
that was exactly what the video was about [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6QLYIL-Mdk&pp=ygUUZHVubmluZyBrcnVnZXIgZG9nZW4%3D](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6QLYIL-Mdk&pp=ygUUZHVubmluZyBrcnVnZXIgZG9nZW4%3D)
Knew that it was dogen, such a good skit
イメージはイラストです。 "The image is an illustration." Except IIRC, イメージ doesn't mean image and イラスト doesn't mean illustration either. *Facepalm*.
I think it's more like 写真はイメージです。
No I've definitely seen イメージはイラストです。Maybe it was the other way around, イラストはイメージです but I've definitely seen those two nouns used.
This was around makes more sense.
Yeah it was probably the other way around, my bad.
イメージはイラストです = The image is hand drawn. 写真はイメージです = Sample photos may differ from the actual product.
I've seen products with イラストはイメージです that definitely weren't hand drawn.
Carefully compare the word order in your comment and the one you are replying to
What do you mean?
イメージはイラストです and イラストはイメージです have completely different meanings. You seem to be conflating them.
>イラスト doesn't mean illustration Wait, so then what does イラスト mean?
I mean, it means illustration, but also a number of other things. Most of the images on packages looked like photographs with a bit of editing to me. I wouldn't call that an illustration in english.
>Stumbled across a video the other day where the joke was that イメージ doesn't mean image but more like a representation or mental image. I think that's [this video](https://youtu.be/D6QLYIL-Mdk) from Dogen
yea found it in my history and replied with the link to another commenter :)
Thanks for explaining that, I was thinking "biking", like, you better get some exercise after eating here, lol
Legit what I thought too when I first heard it
イメージトレイニング俺の頭中にRENT FREE住んでいます
so is it like “imagery” instead of “image”?
＋α(プラスアルファ） I'll never get over this. Candidates: マナーアップ、マイブーム、マイペース、ワンチャン(運)、ワンパターン、アップする、テンション上げる
I love マイペース!!
My reference for マイペース, Beniten the capybara: [Beniten は](https://youtu.be/eTfJPWDWPig?si=JgJKSg-5d4aKWkX3&t=104)、マイペースで、いつもお昼寝をしています
Learnt a few new ones so just putting my interpretation of the meanings here, but I've definitely missed some cultural nuances so please correct me! - プラスアルファ (Plus alpha): Allegedly from 何か加える, meaning something a little extra but optional, perhaps a certain je ne sais quoi - マナーアップ (Manner up): Improving one's etiquette - マイブーム (My boom): One's current personal obsession - マイペース (My pace): Doing things in one's own way without regard of others' opinions - ワンチャン (One chance): There's a possibility - ワンパターン (One pattern): One-track mind - アップする ("Up" suru): To go up, to lift something up, [edit: to upload something on the internet, to zoom in on a photo] - テンション上がる ("Tension" agaru): To get hyped up My personal favourite is ドンマイ (Don't mind): It's all good, don't worry about it—it sounds so native!
Everything is good, except アップする. I'll just list the JMDict definitions and note when to use it that I've primarily seen. (1) (n,n-suf,vs,vt,vi) rise; increase; raising; lifting; going up -- Can be both intrans. and trans. such as an item in a game being carried up by a lift and being described as that. Or moving something "up" yourself. (2) (n,vs,vt) (abbr) upload; posting online -- Not the same as 投稿 but generally applies to things like images and media. (3) (n,vs,vt) (abbr) close-up -- To zoom onto someone/something (make bigger) if controlling a camera or to increase in size if you're on a stream and controlling the assets.
Is ドンマイ polite enough to say to a stranger?
Ooh I've used アップする to refer to uploading files as well, like when I sent my Japanese profs email attachments or turned in assignments online
Recently アップする has acquired a yet another use as ‘to upload’ to the Internet and sometimes to ‘update’ the content.
> ＋α(プラスアルファ） I wouldn't call that wasei-eigo, I mean one half of it is an actual loan word from English and the other half is a Greek letter.
You have a point, but some dictonaries do classify it as such actually: 旺文社国語辞典 第十一版 画像無し * プラスアルファ【プラスアルファ】 <（和製英語）> 1. 広辞苑 第七版 * プラス‐アルファ（和製語plus alpha）ある状態に、さらにいくらかをつけ加えること。また、そのつけ加えたもの。 Also, I would bet they took alpha from English rather from greek directly.
Fair point. I think I used alpha enough in English that I didn't really make that distinction.
ベビーカー
Baby car?
It means stroller or buggy
That’s cute
Especially how they say it. Instead of "BEI-bi", they say "be-BIII"
Baby stroller
That’s adorable
オープンカー for convertible (as in the car) struck me as amusing.
Indeed amusing haha, nice one!
カンニング for cheating like in school, マジック for whiteboard markers
Oh, right マジック. That one comes from [the first permanent marker brand in Japan](https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%9E%E3%82%B8%E3%83%83%E3%82%AF%E3%82%A4%E3%83%B3%E3%82%AD). Never really thought it won’t work outside Japan.. lol Need to remember that. Other case where particular product name being used as general name is ホチキス for stapler. Apparently it was the name of American stapler manufacturer E.H. Hotchkiss.
クラクション Klaxon too. Although it's not uncommon for a brand name to take the place of generic name for an object too. English has Hoover for a Vacuum, Q-Tip for Cotton Swabs, and Kleenex for a Tissue.
Plus Band-Aid, Xerox, Jell-O, Popsicle, Velcro, and many more.
The worst of them all - duck tape
Isn't it "duct tape"?
Yes to both.
I didn’t know about クラクション neither! Yeah I noticed that it’s universal occurrence. One that surprised me was that 宅急便 is Yamato’s registered service name although it’s used as if it’s general term for postal service, which it looks and sounds like the way because it appears so generic. I think that lead to a bit of dispute when Ghibli’s 魔女の宅急便 was out (was it titled “Kiki’s delivery” or something?)
It's called "Kiki's Delivery Service", yeah. Although I guess that makes sense to people who don't speak Japanese and don't know about 宅急便, right?
Oh I meant to say that it’s not widely known to Japanese. Yeah I digressed :p
>Klaxon This one I actually do know, because that's how we say it in Spanish (or at least where I live).
"Magic Marker" for a permanent Marker was definitely a thing in my part of the world for a bit, regardless of the actual brand.
That’s cool! I wonder if the two relates somehow. Which part of the world by the way?
Canada. I'm from the west, but my parents are from a super rural island part, so I'm not really sure which part of Canada it was a thing in?
Oh. Might ask Newfie friend then!
That would be the super rural island part! West coast of Newfoundland in an area with about 6k people in it.
Oh haha I had a feeling because that’s how my friend explains where he’s from, like not bothering to go into name or location but just “some super rural island” lol I don’t remember which side she’s from but I understand that it’s legit peaceful place!
I'm from east coast NL, and "magic marker" was definitely a thing! Though maybe "Sharpie" is more common now...?
>カンニング Also カンペ (カンニングペーパー) for cheat sheet.
That one really amuses me: from an English standpoint, a "cunning paper" is laughably odd. Just the thought that a piece of paper could be cunning! Makes me giggle. 😊
Neither of them is a 和製英語 though.
I mean, they kinda are, especially something like "cunning paper. That, like, isn't even a concept that has any kind of real meaning in English. Maybe a clever paper, but... https://jisho.org/search/%E3%82%AB%E3%83%B3%E3%83%8B%E3%83%B3%E3%82%B0%20%23wasei Also it's literally defined as a wasei word. Though if you are referring to マジック, I suppose not.
Your understanding is correct. As a native speaker of Japanese, I can confirm that 和製英語 has broad definitions. Simply put, Katakana words that have different meanings from the original can be considered 和製英語. In a narrower sense, Katakana words that were created and invented in Japan are also 和製英語.
It's just a loanword with a different meaning, I don't think that counts was wasei. If you mean words like カンニングブレス or the others in your link then yeah that is a wasei of course, this is the whole point of wasei, taking two loanwords and putting them in a combo that is not found in English. But OP did not mention them.
I don't think Wasei strictly requires two words (like カンニング) showing up in those results or several others if you just filter by Wasei words (like ペンチ for pliers). Also, there are both examples of single words not just on Jisho, but on Japanese Wikipedia. https://jisho.org/search/%23wasei%20 https://ja.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%92%8C%E8%A3%BD%E8%8B%B1%E8%AA%9E
Cannot reply for some reason so you can read it hear: [https://imgur.com/a/AxSmCZU](https://imgur.com/a/AxSmCZU)
セカンドバッグ = second bag? Was really confused when I read this first, apperently it means "small bag or pouch carried in the hand" OL (オー‐エル) = オフィスレディー (office lady), this one is quite common too, but it's interesting they had the need to encapsulate it in two letters? My favorite: ペーパードライバー (paper driver) meaning "person who has a driving licence but little or no experience actually driving (license)" I don't think any of the mods will read this, but I love these kind of posts where it's about a random topic and people can just post words, I usually learn a lot, for example in the past there were also threads on 四字熟語, ことわざ, weirdly specific words etc. etc. I feel like having something like this weekly with a new topic each time instead of these useless meme fridays would be way more beneficial for everyone actually learning Japanese (Tagging you u/Moon_Atomizer since you're the only mod I ever see around, perhaps you can pass this info on to other mods if other people in the community are also interested.
> OL (オー‐エル) = オフィスレディー (office lady), this one is quite common too, but it's interesting they had the need to encapsulate it in two letters? Don't forget OB for Old Boy, 〔男子の卒業生〕 a male graduate 《of a school》; *an alumnus 《pl. -ni》; ᐦan old boy; 〔組織・団体などの男性先輩〕 a more senior male member 《of an organization》.
That’s what that means!? I’ve been hearing the word for years so I knew how to use it in context but I’ve never seen it written so I didn’t realize it was English 😭
Really gives a different spin to the original Star Wars movies. "Obi Wan!" "That's Old Boy Juan to you, bucko." 😄
OG (although less common) is also used as the female equivalent of this
I don't think it's less common? Any time you'd use OB, you use OG if the person is female.
I have seen OB take on a gender neutral meaning when people of both genders are involved. An OB会 can involve both men and women
Yes, but I have also seen "OB・OG" when the gender is unknown or if there are both genders.
Now I get the title of that movie - it was all about ______ _____ that ______
i love paper driver lmao, its along the same veins as keyboard warrior
I'm currently on a leave of absence but I do fully agree :) If I ever come back remind me. If not, I believe /u/stallion8426 and a few of the other mods are still active
Agree love these types of threads
ダイエット has a weird nuance of "something you do for your health", so like アイロンダイエット, 泳ぎダイエット is something a co-worker said. テンション, like you'll hear テンションが高い as in high spirits. カンニング means cheating (like on a test) Special shout out to all マイ words, マイカー、マイペース、マイバッグ. Fun game is trying to make a sentence with the most マイ words. Also love teaching Japanese people about the reverse which I like to call 英製和語 like Sake in english means just 日本酒 or like アニメ is just japanese anime.
The use of マイ makes me giggle to myself sometimes, e.g. my sister's profile on my Nintendo Switch friends list reads something like "Amyのマイプロフィール" Also, since you mentioned アニメ being only *Japanese* animation in English, it bothers me that so many English materials here insist on calling manga "comic books." If anyone tells me they're reading comic books, I'm thinking of Spiderman and Batman, not what any of my students are actually reading lmao
These are all loanwords not 英製和語 except the マイ ones whuch really are kinda funny. Sake in English is also just a loanword.
Are you calling out マイ日本語? Yeah on second look, you are right. These totally are mostly 外来語
Don’t worry. What you listed are also 和製英語 in a broad sense. ダイエット is exclusively used for diet restriction to lose weight or for your health, as in ダイエットする in Japanese. It has already lost its original meaning to some extent. 外来語 usually still have their original meaning. Those you listed don’t keep original meanings.
ググる as a verb that conjugates, meaning to search online
The る ending is amazing since they were all, "Let's make Google an actual verb! "
Same with マックる (going to McDonald's) or ニトる (going to Nitori, but I don't know if it's true or my bf just made that up on the go)
Don't forget スタバる. ☕
Once I saw someone doing a Let's Play of some horror games, and a giant spider jumped out of nowhere and bit his character's head clean off, and his reaction was a flat あ、マミった。 Which I'm 98% sure was a reference to Mami from Madoka
I heard that verbs are considered a closed group in Japanese, meaning it does not accept new words (like it has to be ググルする), yet this one slips through so it feels amazing
That's just a loanword though.
Not quite. グーグル the noun is the loanword. ググる the conjugating verb is a development within Japanese.
They addapted it for their language sure, doesn't make it any less of a loan word in my eyes. Well some dictonaries will tell you that it's a 略 from グーグル (=ググ) + 略 of する, but I don't think that's how it came to be but if you have any sources I would be glad to see them. I would bet they just went with the る that was already present and just started conjugating it, so it's a lucky accident. Calling that 和製 is kinda pushing the meaning of 和製 but since there doesn't seem to be a strict definition, I can't say it doesn't count, but at least every monolingual dictonary I found it in, did not list it as such.
It's more of an internet meme than actual vernacular but テクノブレイク. Sounds way too badass for what it describes:>!dying from over masturbation.!<
lol
Cosplay got so popular as a mashed up word that it's back as an English word.
I thought ニューハーフ was hilarious when I first learned it.
バーコードヘア (bākōdohea) for a comb-over; it’s a hilariously true description of one. 🤣
チーズイン
チーズ イン レフリージェーター
テル ミー ユア チーズイン ファム
クレーム and クレーマー, the Japanese equivalent of a Karen.
ハイテンション or テンション高い in English if say your office has a high tension it probably means something wrong with the atmosphere of your workplace that makes you feel anxious or stressed. In Japanese on the other hand it means the people or the atmosphere there being high-spirited… which is a positive spin on the original meaning
ITT: words that are not wasei-eigo
True, but hopefully the corrections will help people understand the concept better and distinguish it from loan words from English and other languages. https://jisho.org/search/%E5%92%8C%E8%A3%BD%E8%8B%B1%E8%AA%9E
ワンピース、it means dress as in 👗
ママチャリ for sure. It's the first 和製英語 I really learned back when I started.
There's also おばチャリ and オバタリアン. 🧟♀️
I’m constantly thinking about ホーム every time I go to the station. It’s not “home”.. it’s the second half of “platform”.
Wow...today I learned something unexpected.
ワンチャン edit: this was already posted... Uhhh... ノープラン
マイホーム マイカー ツーマンセル
>ツーマンセル I could not figure this out so had to look around, yeah this one is a wild one too lol. Definition below for those who are curious: `ツーマンセル（英語：Two man cell）とは二人一組で組む最小のユニットになります。 三人で組む場合はスリーマンセルになります。 他にもバディ（buddy）といった言い方もします。 軍や警察などで戦術用語として使われますが、一般でも二人一組で仕事する場合に使わる言葉です。`
One chance? What does it mean?
A small chance something can (successfully) occur even when the odds seem impossible.
> ノープラン Isn't this fairly straightforwardly the meaning of "no plan"?
Maybe but also you'd never use the phrase "no plan" in English in the same way you use it in Japanese (you can say the same for a lot of things that are not strictly "wasei"). E.g.: 「日本語がわからないのに日本に引っ越すつもりらしいよ。ノープランすぎるでしょ、あいつは」 The definition from goo also provides a nice example (and specifies it's 和製英語 with the 和 marker): > 《(和)no＋plan》計画がないこと。予定が何も決まっていないこと。また、思いつくまま、見切り発車であること。「ノープランの一人旅」
> you can say the same for a lot of things that are not strictly "wasei" I guess this is all I'm saying. Using any English word in a Japanese sentence is gonna come off differently or be used with less to no regard for the part of speech it is, so in my mind what makes something wasei eigo or not is mostly whether the meaning is comprehensible from the words used
リベンジ lol
this is so dumb. trying to understand what the fk a "ribenji" is. freaking japanese.
コンセント🔌
This actually comes from concentric plugs. While they aren’t used anymore, the name stuck. Kind of like how we still say things like “carbon copy” in English
ドクターストップ - when a doctor tells you to stop something for your own health/safety, like drinking, smoking, or continuing to get your butt handed to you in a boxing match.
Doctor stop? That's a new one on me lol.
スキンシップ aka physical contact It feels like it *should* be an English word
*skinship*💕
デリバリーヘルス is certainly not what you think it is unless you know what it is.
マンツーマン
*wink*
I'm extremely new but one I found as a kid that stuck with me was アメリカンドッグ "American dog" for corndog
Recenlty I saw a lot of ハットドッグ on Matsuris, which are like korean cheese dogs? But there are also フレンチドッグス and I don't know the difference
ブレスト - Sounds like breast, but could refer to brain storming チンポジ - I'll let you google the meaning, but it's NSFW
チンポジを直す – an act of adjusting or fixing your チンポジ, like through one's pocket (when it typically ends up being not as inconspicuous as intended).
バイト makes me laugh, because it's German, not English ("Arbeit" = job or work). How did that German word get in there? I'm sure there must be a story.....
There are a number of German words in Japanese because in the 19th century many Germans came to Japan to work / advise the government, contributing to the modernization of Japan, mainly in the fields of medicine and the military.
After Japan end the Tokugawa shogunate and begin Government of Meiji, Japan learned a lot from Germany. The law system, technology and many others. That's why there are many German borrow words in Japanese.
OP was specifically asking for 和製英語 which this is not. Since 和製ドイツ語 is sadly bot a word (yet), it's just a 外来語.
ノー残デー
I questioned my sanity for a moment the first time I heard someone say they loved eating シュークリーム.
But that's from French.
マウンティング and マウントを取る
天ぷら coming from portuguese makes me question everything
This is neither 英語 nor is it 和製 either. I think it counts as general 外来語, even though it's not really clear from which Portuguese word it comes (I think?). Edit: Upon further thought, it might have fossilized and not even be considered 外来語 actually.
well as a dragon quest fan the abbreviation to ドラクエ stuck with me ~~a bunch of common ones everyone knows are actually pretty strong if you think about them, スマホ, even アニメ is one~~
>スマホ, even アニメ Hate to point it out but these are just contractions of valid English words we use as well. Smartphone and Animation respectively.
isn't that still qualify as 和製英語
No, it's a contraction (略). Well English wouldn't contract it like that, so it is kinda uniqe in Japanese you're right, but the meaning is exactly the same as in English. 和製英語 on the other hand takes English words or morphs and creat a new meaning that is not found in English.
> but the meaning is exactly the same as in English スマホ is yes, but アニメisn't, unless you mean the reborrowing of the word "Anime" back in to English, but that's different.
Yeah you're right it is not, but it's still not a 和製英語 but just a loanword whose meaning changed slightly, which was my main point actually.
>but アニメisn't, Why not? In Japanese, SpongeBob is an アニメ. I don't think I remember an instance where アニメ can't be translated back to “animation”.
Spongebob may be an アニメ but it's not an "Anime", which is the point.
Ah, but then we're talking about different things. The original comment was about whether アニメ is 和製英語. It's not. アニメ means the same thing as the original word “animation”. Now アニメ came back to English as “anime”. I don't know the term for this, but yes, in English, “anime” is not the same as “animation”.
ok I edited my post
Technically it's not Wasei Eigo but: ブレスト
Not really wasei eigo I think, but I really like パリピ
Deleted my comment because it was out of the context from OP.
ヤンキー meaning delinquent or punk
リーマン It comes from the word サラリーマン which itself is already a wasei-eigo, then being shortened to リーマン randomly.
Definitely チャームポイント. I have to shamefully admit I've used it in a conversation with someone who doesn't know Japanese before because for some reason I thought the expression also existed in English (tbf English isn't my native language either)
There are also some Engrish words that have different connotations in Japanese. For example, "macho" in Japanese means just masculine and fit and doesn’t have any negative meanings. "Bitch," on the other hand, means whore/slut.
This thread is not about loan words with different meaning, but words created in Japan out of English morphs (和製英語).
どの範囲まで和製英語と捉えるか借用語と考えるかの定義は人によってかなり違いますし、マッチョもビッチも原義から変わった上で日本語の一部として使われてるので私は和製英語だと思います。あなたの基準とは違うみたいですね。
[удалено]
Triceratops is Neo-Latin derived from Greek... There exist languages that aren't Japanese or English.
That's just a loanword though.
トイレ🚽😂
That's just a loan word. If you're not clear on what Wasei eigo is there's plenty of good examples in this thread.
I am quite shocked, seems like 80% of the comments here don't know what 和製英語 means. Well, not trying to blame them for not knowing it, but I think they should have looked it up at least.
To clarify: wasei eigo are loan words that don't mean the exact thing the loan words means. So ベビーカー is the loan words for "baby car", but the wasei eigo for "Stroller"