LOANWORD
Do you know Japanese words which became into English?
みなさんは英語になっている日本語を知っていますか？
They're called "loanword", which means a word taken into one language from another (Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, Fifth EditionLDOCE5 © Pearson Education Limited 2009, 2011).
"借用語"と言われるものです。
Recently I read an interesting article about it, so I want to share what I felt in the article.
最近そのことに関した面白い記事を読んだので是非共有させてください。
This is it.
これです。http://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2017/01/02/language/japanese-affecting-english-lexicon-new-ways/#.WINP6ERKOEc
This explains things about loanwords.
e.g. how Japanese words become English.
借用語に関した説明がのっています。
例えば、どんな風に日本語が英語になるかとか。
I did not know that "emoji" is in Oxford English Dictionary, which dubbed it as the word of the year 2015!
"絵文字"もオクスフォード辞典にのってるんですね、しかも2015年のワードオブザイヤーやったとわ！
Then nowadays the quality of Japanese words which become English is changing.
そして何やら、英語になる日本語の質というものが変わっているらしいんです。
The author of this article references:
以下を引用してます。
Indra Levy, associate professor of Japanese literature at California’s Stanford University, notes that whereas precedents often named a specifically Japanese object (“geisha” or “anime”), the latest loanwords represent a new level of interplay between Japan and the world.
She says these words show, “the broadening and deepening of Japan’s international influence on ‘high popular culture,’ by which I mean the vocabulary of daily life — eating, emailing or texting, and consuming — shared by countries around the world that enjoy large middle-class populations.”
This means that people in Western countries accepted Japanese objects in the past, but they has done Japanese concepts nowadays.
つまり、西欧が、昔は日本の"モノ"を受け入れていたが今はそれが"概念"になっているらしいです。
I've never thought "dashi" or "umami" now becomes into English.
まさか"出汁"や"旨味"が英語になっているなんて…
Can you imagine what "bokeh" is?
"ボケ"って何かわかりますか？
This is used "to describe the soft-focus look provided by expensive lense".
How about "KonMari"?
では、"コンマリ"は？
This article introduces:
記事が例も出してくれてます。
By 2016, in a New York Times magazine feature, a writer was quoting a woman saying she had “KonMaried” her boyfriend.
“Having tidied everything in her home and finding she still distinctly lacked happiness,” the author writes, “she held her boyfriend in her hands, realized he no longer sparked joy and got rid of him.”
What I learned is that we, Japanese people, definitely have our unique cultural sensibility.
何を学んだかというと、我々日本人は確実に独特の文化的な感性をもっているというのことです。
Expressing them in our language means that we express our culture.
それらを言語を通して発信することは、文化を発信することになるんだなと。
High school students often asks like this:
how can I say 〜 in English??
高校生、めっちゃ聞くんです。
"先生、〜って英語でなんて言うんですか？？"
って。
e.g. I rememer when I just became a teacher, one of the students asked me what "kenage" is in English, which made me consider how I can explain "kenage" in English.
そう言えば高校の教員になりたての時、"健気"に関してめっちゃ考えさせられたなぁ〜。
Now I think that we can use the Japanese word though we also need to paraphrase it.
今は思うのは、その日本語を使えば良いといいのではないかということです。その言葉使っちゃっていいですよね、続けて説明(パラフレーズ)すれば。
Of course, this could distract the main topic of the conversation, so we need to pay attention to it not to get out of the discourse.
もともとの話の筋を逸らすのはもちろんダメですが。
Now I think I want to adapt this idea into my dairy classes: grammar practice, regular activity, or conversation practice.
これはクラスでも使えると思います。
関係代名詞の継続用法の指導はこれで決定です笑
帯活動でやっても面白い。
なりきりcoversationのshareの時にも使えるなぁ。
I am very glad to read the article!
ほんとこの記事読めて良かった！
This can be one of the ways to improve expressiveness of our culture.
文化発信力を鍛えるヒントを発見できました！
Finally, I would like to introduce one of the scenes from back to the future Ⅲ.
最後に、バックトゥザ・フューチャー3(1990)でのワンシーンを紹介します。
Colt Gun Salesman:
Hey, just tell me one thing...where'd you learn to shoot like that?
Marty:
Seven-eleven.
I was surprised and excited that he said this word.
この言葉を聞いた時、めっちゃ驚きました。
Japanese things were now widely accepted in the world even in 1990.
1990年にはセブンイレブンはもう海外で受け入れられていたんですね。
