All Questions
5 questions
11
votes
5
answers
4k
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Why did Japanese borrow words for simple numbers from Chinese?
I just realised that all (standalone) Japanese numbers from 1-10 are borrowed from Chinese (maybe except 4 and 7 if they're read as よん and なな instead of し and しち). Now, I understand why a language ...
- 113
0
votes
1
answer
195
views
Pronunciation and spelling of English loanwords in Japanese
The word for allergy in Japanese is アレルギ (pronounced "a/re/ru/gi")
The first three characters are typical for words borrowed from English, but why is the last sound "gi" instead of "ji"? Is this word ...
- 363
1
vote
2
answers
344
views
Why are some words to express country names different between Chinese and Japanese?
In some countries, their principal chinese characters are represented differently between Chinese and Japanese. For example,
意 vs 伊 (Italy)
法 vs 仏 (France)
德 vs 独 (Germany)
That being said, there ...
- 553
2
votes
3
answers
4k
views
Which of 可爱/可愛い was exported to the other between Chinese and Japanese?
In Chinese (Mandarin), there exists a word 可爱 that means "pretty" or "cute" in English. In Japanese, there is also a word 可愛い (adjective) that means the same thing in English.
Given that both words ...
- 553
5
votes
2
answers
672
views
Pronunciation in languages from East Asia of words that are Japanese loanwords in English
In English, most loanwords from Japanese are pronounced similarly to the Japanese word. It isn't an exact match, for example with "karaoke" the pronunciation of the second "a" differs between English ...
- 1,256