New Japanese word!
It's hardly news when a new word is created, as that happens in every living language all the time, but sometimes I get really excited when I discover a new word and can pretend to be, for a brief glistening moment, a gumshoe linguist.
Last night, Anna was reading a Japanese fashion magazine called "GISELe." She came across a katakana word she didn't know, chirarizumu (チラリズム), and asked me what it meant. The -izumu suffix is common in Japanese foreign-derived words, which are called gairaigo. Can you non-Japanese speakers guess what it means? It sounds somewhat like, and means the same thing as a common English suffix.
...
Any ideas?
No? Well I'll give you a hint. I'll throw out a few other romanized Japanese terms sharing the same suffix.
Okay, take a look for a moment and don't read further until you've either figured it out or want to read the spoiler.
...
Okay. The spelling is a little strange, but perhaps you figured out that it corresponds to "-ism" in English. The words in the list were: "post-modernism," "terrorism," "minimalism," "dadaism," "anarchism," "socialism," and "communism."
So back to the story: what the heck is "chirarizumu?" I struggled for a few minutes to map it to an English word before giving up. I then tried looking it up in several dictionaries and it wasn't there...so I figured it must be a fusion of Japanese "chirari"(a fleeting [glimpse]) and the English suffix -ism. So I said to Anna that I guessed it must mean "the quality of being fleeting." She then smiled and said that given the context, that was probably correct. The article was a list of sexy secrets for women, and the author was suggesting that her readers try showing some skin on purpose, yet making it seem accidental.
What an interesting word, huh? I'm still stuck on a translation though..."fleetingism" doesn't seem to work very well. Maybe I'm English-challenged as a result of being in Japan for a few years. You true natives out there, if you have a good idea, let me know with a comment!
Last night, Anna was reading a Japanese fashion magazine called "GISELe." She came across a katakana word she didn't know, chirarizumu (チラリズム), and asked me what it meant. The -izumu suffix is common in Japanese foreign-derived words, which are called gairaigo. Can you non-Japanese speakers guess what it means? It sounds somewhat like, and means the same thing as a common English suffix.
...
Any ideas?
No? Well I'll give you a hint. I'll throw out a few other romanized Japanese terms sharing the same suffix.
- posuto-modanizumu (ポストモダニズム)
- terorizumu (テロリズム)
- minimarizumu (ミニマリズム)
- dadaizumu (ダダイズム)
- anakizumu (アナキズム)
- sōsharizumu (ソーシャリズム)
- komyunizumu (コミュニズム)
Okay, take a look for a moment and don't read further until you've either figured it out or want to read the spoiler.
...
Okay. The spelling is a little strange, but perhaps you figured out that it corresponds to "-ism" in English. The words in the list were: "post-modernism," "terrorism," "minimalism," "dadaism," "anarchism," "socialism," and "communism."
So back to the story: what the heck is "chirarizumu?" I struggled for a few minutes to map it to an English word before giving up. I then tried looking it up in several dictionaries and it wasn't there...so I figured it must be a fusion of Japanese "chirari"(a fleeting [glimpse]) and the English suffix -ism. So I said to Anna that I guessed it must mean "the quality of being fleeting." She then smiled and said that given the context, that was probably correct. The article was a list of sexy secrets for women, and the author was suggesting that her readers try showing some skin on purpose, yet making it seem accidental.
What an interesting word, huh? I'm still stuck on a translation though..."fleetingism" doesn't seem to work very well. Maybe I'm English-challenged as a result of being in Japan for a few years. You true natives out there, if you have a good idea, let me know with a comment!
posted by jeremy at 9:52 AM
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