1
Revised #Japanese vs “I’m sorry” Venn diagram. “I’m sorry it had to end like this.” (Naomi Osaka) was translated as [gomennasai] by Japanese media but is that correct?
2
INCORRECT: *みんなさん [minnasan]
CORRECT: みなさん [minasan] ‘everyone (polite)’
Very common error among learners of #Japanese
3
#Japanese has 5 words for what you can just call “rice” in English. Just try ordering [ine] at a restaurant!
4
Video of Freddie Mercury speaking/singing in #Japanese (via @laquefre25). Ever heard Queen's Japan-only single Teo Torriatte (Let Us Cling Together)? #BohemianRhapsody
5
Highest-grossing media franchises:
#1 Pokémon 🇯🇵 $92B
#2 Hello Kitty 🇯🇵 $80B
#3 Winnie the Pooh 🇬🇧 $75B
#4 Mickey Mouse 🇺🇸 $70B
#5 Star Wars 🇺🇸 $65B
#6 Anpanman 🇯🇵 $60B
#7 Disney Princess 🇺🇸 $45B
#8 Mario 🇯🇵 $36B
#9 Shōnen Jump 🇯🇵 $34B
titlemax.com/discovery-cent…
6
Messing with Google Translate. Face the fact that there is no 1-to-1 correspondence between Japanese and English words/concepts!
7
GENIUS: “Useless machine” inventor @togenkyoo creates Christmas light that flashes every time someone tweets ‘we broke up’ to overcome her loneliness during Japan’s favorite romantic holiday 🎄ch.togetter.com/2019/12/16/767…
8
Acronyms commonly used in Japan but not so much elsewhere:
EC (e-commerce)
SE (systems engineer)
SIer (system integrator)
SNS (social networking service)
BtoB (business-to-business) [not “B2B”]
MTG (meeting)
PJT (project)
PET (polyethylene terephthalate)
TPO (time, place, object)
9
Why different kanji? Because the Chinese distinguished what the Japanese didn’t, except for “cold.”
10
Align left for #Japanese katakana シ [shi], align top for ツ [tsu]. And their hiragana equivalents し and つ are in fact cursive forms of シ and ツ.
11
New useful #Japanese phrase:
コロナが落ち着いたら [korona ga ochitsuitara] ‘After the Corona(virus pandemic) settles down’ > Use this phrase to politely decline someone’s invitation/suggestion.
12
Same origin:
English: donor
┗Old French: doneur
┗Latin: dōnum 'gift'
┗Italic *dōnom
┣Indo-European: *déh₃nom
┏Indo-Iranian: *dáHnam
┏Sanskrit: दान [dā́na] 'donation'
┏Middle Chinese: 旦那 [tanᴴ na] 'patron'
Japanese: 旦那 [daᴺna] 'husband'
13
ENOUGH with people who go "I love tonKATSU ramen!" unless they tell me where I can get #ramen noodles with deep-fried pork on top
14
See how swapping が [ga] for は [wa] changes who is about to cry in the 80s hit song:
なぜあなた*が*時計をちらっと見るたび泣きそうな気分になるの？ ‘Why do *I* feel like crying every time you glance at the clock?’
なぜあなた*は*時計を... ‘Why do *you* feel like crying...’ twitter.com/SKinsui/status…
15
やばい [yabai] does NOT mean everything. If whatever quality you intend to describe is yabai enough, it’s [yabai].
16
After reading the replies I’m starting to think this chart better represents the meaning of ヤバい [yabai]. [yabai] replaces any adjective only when its degree reaches the yabai zone.
17
For the kanji-obsessed: Over 50,000 kanji printed on a single poster from the publisher of Japan's biggest kanji dictionary. Out of these, only 2,136 are "official" regular-use characters (jōyō kanji) in Japanese.
kanjicafe.jp/detail/9283.ht… [J]
18
If you pursue pure, faithful translation with zero "localization," your anime subtitles will look like a linguistics paper
19
Takeshi-san falls victim to Genki textbook learners screwing up the subject particle が [ga] and object particle を [o]
20
Takeshi-san vomits shoes because learners of Japanese keep messing up the pitch accents of 👟履いて [haite (low-high-high)] ‘putting on feet’ vs 🤮吐いて[haite (high-low-low)] ‘vomiting’
21
Japanese words that were butchered by English speakers (←Look who's talking) and not known by many:
soy < 醤油 [shōyu]
tycoon < 大君 [taikuN]
(head) honcho < 班長 [haᴺchō]
skosh < すこし [sukoshi]
rickshaw < 人力車 [jiNrikisha]
ginkgo < 銀杏 [giᴺkyō] twitter.com/JapanIntercult…
22
Again, sing it! You'll understand these #Japanese words don't sound anything like each other. "×" = often devoiced (whispered). Standard Tokyo Japanese.
23
Some #Japanese teachers and proud learners tend to overemphasize the complexity of kanji, keigo and counters but they are not the essential elements of verbal communication.
24
Real-life Japanese phone convo w/ word2word translation
👩🏽[moshimoshi? ima doko?] 'hello? now where'
🧑🏻[ima uchi] 'now house'
👩🏽[nani shiteru?] 'what doing?'
🧑🏻[terebi miteru] 'TV watching'
👩🏽[uchi kuru?] 'house come?'
🧑🏻[iiyo nanji?] 'OK what.time?'
👩🏽[ichiji] '1.o'clock'
25
"Learning Japanese" in your Twitter profile:
1⃣日本語学生/日本語の学生 > Common but incorrect! 学生 = full-time student, not "studying." You wouldn't say "Japanese language full-time student."
2⃣日本語を勉強しています。> OK but a full sentence
3⃣日本語勉強中 > Most natural IMO.
"Language boffin”. MA in linguistics, native 🇯🇵. Lived in 🇫🇷 🇬🇧 SC TX 🇯🇵. PR/Comms @ DeNA→Nissan→@PreferredNet. 広報人. 薄いエンタメ言語学