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How do Japanese loanwords evolve in meaning over time visualisation

How do Japanese loanwords evolve in meaning over time

False friends when learning Japanese: How do Japanese loanwords evolve in meaning over time
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Japanese loanwords often undergo semantic changes after being borrowed into the language, evolving meanings that range from nuanced shifts to significantly different or narrowed meanings compared to their original forms. This evolution is influenced by cultural adaptation and linguistic integration within Japanese society.

Semantic Changes in Meaning

Loanwords tend to acquire meanings that are narrower than those in the donor language, focusing on specific ideas or objects linked to Japanese culture or usage. Some loanwords may lose original meanings entirely or take on new cultural nuances that differ distinctly from their source. For example, “salaryman” (サラリーマン) in Japanese specifically refers to a male office worker, a cultural concept that has even been reborrowed into English with this meaning. 1

Integration and Adaptation

Loanwords are generally borrowed as nouns in Japanese regardless of their original grammatical class and can be transformed into verbs or adjectives through native suffixes and auxiliary verbs (e.g., to “get” becomes “getto suru” for “to get” or “do a get”). This grammatical flexibility facilitates the integration and sometimes semantic shift of loanwords. 1

Causes of Semantic Shift

Changes in meaning can be attributed to:

  • The cultural context in which the word is used in Japan.
  • The absence of historical or broader contextual usage from the donor language.
  • A modernizing or positive connotation attached to loanwords compared to native terms.
  • The emergence of loanwords replacing or existing alongside native terms with overlapping or distinct meanings. 2, 1

Research and Analysis

Studies using computational linguistic methods like word embeddings confirm that many English loanwords in Japanese have meanings that deviate semantically from their English originals, reflecting unique cultural interpretations and usage patterns in Japanese. 3, 4

In summary, Japanese loanwords evolve in meaning primarily through cultural adaptation, narrowing or shifting semantic scope, and linguistic integration, often resulting in significant differences from their original meanings in the source language. 4, 2, 3, 1

References

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