Gairaigo
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Gairaigo (外来語) is Japanese for "loan word" or "borrowed word", and indicates a transliteration (or "transvocalization") into Japanese. In particular, the word usually refers to a Japanese word of foreign origin that was not borrowed from Chinese. Japanese also has a huge number of loan words from Chinese, accounting for a sizeable fraction of the language. These words were borrowed during ancient times. Modern Chinese loanwords are generally considered gairaigo and written in katakana.
Most, but not all, modern gairaigo are derived from English. Words are taken from English for concepts which do not exist in Japanese, but also for other reasons, such as a preference for English terms or fashionability.
In the past, more gairaigo came from other languages besides English. The first non-Asian countries to have extensive contact with Japan were Holland and Portugal in the 16th and 17th centuries, and Japanese has several loanwords from Portuguese and Dutch, many of which are still used in Japan today.
In the Meiji era, Japan also had extensive contact with Germany, and gained many loanwords from German, particularly for medicine, which the Japanese learned from the Germans. They also gained several loanwords from French at this time.
In written Japanese, gairaigo are almost exclusively written in katakana, but not always. Older loanwords are also often written using ateji (kanji chosen for their phonetic value) or hiragana, for example tabako from Portuguese, meaning "tobacco" or "cigarette" can be written タバコ (katakana), たばこ (hiragana), or 煙草 (kanji), with no change in meaning.
For a list of terms, see the List of Gairaigo and Wasei-eigo terms.
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[edit] False cognates & wasei-eigo
Due to Japanese pronunciation rules and its mora-based phonology, many words when spoken in their entirety take a significant amount of time to pronounce. For example, a one-syllable word in a language such as English (break) often becomes several syllables when pronounced in Japanese (in this case, burēki, which amounts to four moras). The Japanese language therefore contains many abbreviated and contracted words, and there is a strong tendency to shorten and simplify words. This also takes place with gairaigo words. For example "remote control", when transcribed to Japanese, becomes rimooto kontororu, but this has then been simplified to rimokon. For another example, depāto = department store. Portmanteaus, such as wāpuro for "word processor", are common. Karaoke, a combination of the Japanese word kara (meaning empty) and the clipped form oke of the English loanword "orchestra" (J. ōkesutora), is a portmanteau that has entered the English language. Ordinarily, Japanese takes the first part of a foreign word, but from the English words "flannel" and "blanket" they took the second syllables, to form the gairaigo neru and ketto.
Some Japanese people are not aware of the origins of the words in their language, and may assume that all gairaigo words are legitimate English words. For example, Japanese people may use words like teema (from German Thema, meaning "topic") in English, or rimokon, not realising that the contraction of "remote control" to rimokon took place in Japan.
Similarly, gairaigo, while making Japanese easier to learn for foreign students in some cases, can also cause problems due to independent semantic progression. For example, sutōbu (ストーブ) from the English "stove" has multiple meanings in English. Americans often use the word to mean a cooking appliance, and are thus surprised when Japanese take it to mean a space heater (such as a wood-burning stove). The Japanese term for a cooking stove is another gairaigo term, renji (レンジ), from English "range"—a gas stove is a gasurenji (ガスレンジ).
Additionally, Japanese combines words in ways that are uncommon in English. As an example, left over is a baseball term for a hit that goes over the left-fielder's head, rather than uneaten food saved for a later meal. This is a term that appears to be a loan but is actually wasei-eigo, literally, "English made in Japan."
It is sometimes also difficult for learners of Japanese to distinguish between gairaigo and two categories of onomatopoeia, giseigo (true onomatopoeia) and gitaigo (words that represent the manner of an action, like "zigzag" in English — jiguzagu in Japanese), which are also written in katakana.
[edit] Gairaigo misconceptions
Coincidentally, the word arigatō (有り難う or ありがとう, Japanese for "thank you") sounds somewhat like the Portuguese word obrigado, which has the same meaning. Given the number of borrowings from Portuguese, it may seem reasonable to suppose that the Japanese imported that word—which is the explanation accepted and indeed published by many. However, arigatō is not a gairaigo; rather, it is a form of the native Japanese adjective arigatai (有難い) combined with the polite verb gozaimasu. Evidence that the word arigatai was in use several centuries before contact with the Portuguese exists, for example, in the Man'yōshū. This makes the two terms false cognates.
See the list of Japanese terms mistaken for gairaigo for more examples.
[edit] Reborrowings from Japanese
Some gairaigo words have been reborrowed into their original source languages, particularly in the jargon of fans of Japanese entertainment. For example, anime (アニメ) is gairaigo derived from the English word for "animation", but has been reborrowed by English with the meaning of "animation in the Japanese style". Similarly, puroresu (プロレス) derives from "professional wrestling", and has been adopted by English-speaking wrestling fans as a term for the style of pro wrestling performed in Japan. kosupure, or cosplay, was formed from the English words "costume play", referring to dressing in costumes such as those of anime, manga, or videogame characters, and is now used with enthusiasm in English and other languages.
