Wasei-eigo

Wasei-eigo (和製英語, Japanese-made English, English words coined in Japan) are Japanese pseudo-Anglicisms: English constructions not used in the English-speaking world or by native English speakers, but that appear in Japanese. This should not be confused with gairaigo, which generally refers to modern borrowings-proper into Japanese, especially from English. Wasei-eigo is also distinct from Engrish, as these are actual Japanese words used in Japanese conversation—not an attempt at speaking English.^[1] These include acronyms and initialisms particular to Japan (see list of Japanese Latin alphabetic abbreviations). Wasei-eigo can be compared to wasei kango (和製漢語, Japanese-created kango (Chinese compounds)), which are Japanese pseudo-Sinicisms (Japanese words created on Chinese roots), and are also extremely common.

Some common examples are sararīman = "salaryman" meaning 'white-collar worker'; ōeru = OL standing for "office lady" meaning 'female office worker'; "raito noberu" or light novel, etc.

Some wasei-eigo have in turn been borrowed as pseudo-Anglicisms in other countries.

See also

• List of gairaigo and wasei-eigo terms
• List of Japanese Latin alphabetic abbreviations

References

Further reading

• Laura Miller. 1997 "Wasei eigo: English ‘loanwords' coined in Japan." In The Life of Language: Papers in Linguistics in Honor of William Bright, edited by Jane Hill, P.J. Mistry and Lyle Campbell, Mouton/De Gruyter: The Hague, pp. 123–139. Google Books
• Kenkyusha's New Japanese-English Dictionary, Kenkyusha Limited, Tokyo 1991, ISBN 4-7674-2015-6
• Katakana Shingo-jiten, Gakken 2003, ISBN 4-05-301351-8

External links

• Wasei-eigo examples