世論 What Japan Thinks

goo Ranking had a fun little ranking survey recently, looking at what unusual loan words that have come from Japanese to English. I believe the survey was conducted based on a Japanese Wikipedia list of loan words.

Demographics

Over the 22nd and 23rd of July 2011 over 1,000 members of the goo Research online monitor group completed a private internet-based questionnaire. However, the link to the sample demographics does not work. Note that the score in the results refers to the relative number of votes for each option, not a percentage of the total sample.

About the only words you’ll find in a dictionary are hikikomori, which made it into the Oxford dictionary a couple of years ago, and the food ones. I’d like to know how Wikipedia decided on which words to list, as outside of the cooking ones most seem related to anime and manga, in particular the more seedy side of it.

Ranking result

Q: What do you think are unusual loan words that have come from Japanese to English? (Sample size=just over 1,000)

Rank	Word	Meaning	Score
1	Bakayaro	You idiot!	100
2	Jibaku	Suicide bomber	72.4
3	Binta	To hit someone, usually as corporal punishment	69.0
4	Bishojo	Beautiful young girl	68.5
5	Bishonen	Handsome young boy	64.8
6	Hikikomori	Person who shuts themselves away from the world in their room	64.0
7	Gashapon	Capsule toy vending machine	56.7
8	Gyaru	Japanese corruption of “gal”, an over-madeup, over-dressed young woman	52.2
9	Oyaji	Middle-aged man, old git	51.2
10	Konjo	Will power	48.6
11	Cosplay	From costume play, dressing up as characters from anime, etc	43.0
12	Dango	Small, sweet rice starch ball	42.3
13	Kawaii	Cute	39.1
14	Dashi	Stock, broth for Japanese cooking	33.9
15	Mottainai	What a waste!	33.1
16	Teriyaki	Meat of fish grilled in a sweet soy sauce	26.5
17=	Shabu-shabu	A dish featuring thin strips of beef you boil yourself	25.5
17=	Wabi-sabi	The quintessential Japanese aesthetic	25.5
19	Yakitori	Skewered grilled chicken	24.7