Wasei-eigo
''Wasei-eigo'' ( ''wasei eigo'', lit. "Made-in-Japan English") are Japanese language|Japanese pseudo-Anglicisms : English language|English constructions not in use in Anglophone countries nor by English native speakers, but only by speakers of Japanese. A more general term for made-in-Japan foreign words is ''gairaigo|wasei-gairaigo'', which usually applies to words made from European languages.One example is the word ''desk'' (: ''desuku''). It seems like perfectly good English, but in Japan, it is a title for a person. ''Tanaka-desk'' would be a reporter or editor in charge of a department at a newspaper (for example, the city desk). Similarly, ''mansion'' (:ja:: ''manshon'') refers not to a mansion, but an apartment or its building. Wasei-eigo words can form compounds with Japanese words, for example, ''okushon'' () combines ''oku'', meaning hun!
dred million, with "mansion" to form a new word meaning "luxury apartment". This is actually a pun, since the word "man" means "ten thousand" in Japanese: "oku-shon" is ten thousand times more than "man-shon". Sometimes, two English words with their normal meanings will be combined to form a new compound word. One famous instance is ''famicom'' (: ''famikon'' or :ja:: ''family computer''), a portmanteau of "family" and "computer", meaning a video game system (especially, but not necessarily, ''the'' Famicom, known to the rest of the world as the Nintendo Entertainment System). Sometimes the resulting words make as much, or more, sense than their standard English equivalents. (see: ''fried potato'' or ''recycle shop'' in the List of Gairaigo and Wasei-eigo terms|examples.)Some wasei-eigo have in turn been borrowed as pseudo-Anglicisms in other coun!
tries. For example, ''apatu'' in Kore!
an langu
age|Korean is clearly borrowed from the Japanese word ''apāto'', not the English word ''apartment''.For an extensive list of terms, see the List of Gairaigo and Wasei-eigo terms.
|
