Why is it ‘cool’ to use English loanwords?

A case study from Japan

PhD. Martin Mielick
Kanda University of International Studies, Chiba, Japan.

Abstract
In this study, 47 Media English students at a Japanese international studies university
described their perceptions of the various influences of English loanwords on the Japanese
language and culture. One predominant theme that was identified in short essay responses
was that using English loanwords, also known as wasei eigo in Japanese, was seemingly
‘cool’. But what does that actually mean? The data analysis shows that there may be both
theoretical and practical reasons as to why English loanwords are seen positively. Clarity of
expression and convenience are some of the reasons for their usage in this university context.
The study also suggests ways in which new English loanwords in host languages may be
beneficial for practitioners when teaching vocabulary due to a possible lowering of the
affective filter and increased motivation level.

Keywords: English as a global language; Language change; Identity; Culture; Globalisation;

Japan; Language policies; Teaching vocabulary.

Introduction

Many students in different contexts often consider their access to English and their

knowledge and use of it as something positive. Furthermore, one of the main practical

reasons for students to learn English is to allow them to travel and study abroad. But when a

student claims a language is ‘cool’ or fashionable, what does that actually mean? Some may

argue that it is because of the status it grants users who may be able to elevate themselves at a

particular critical cultural incident (Flanagan 1954), perhaps having been educated to a higher

standard of English proficiency. For others, it is much more simplistic; it allows ease of

communication in different settings and access to better jobs. In many of our pedagogical

contexts though, learners have not had an experience of ‘real world’ usage of English. It is

often a shared academic language used in a closed cultural environment and it may be valued
more as an investment for the future. Supporting this view, Cope and Kalantzis (2000) state,

“meaning-making…is prospective; it is interest-laden and future-oriented” (p. 203).

In the context of this study in Japan, transformations are occurring in an intercultural

academic context. Second year students taking English majors in an international

communication department at an international studies university gave their differing opinions

about the rapid influence of English and its subsequent loanword use in Japanese. Initial

research showed there was a broad scope of both positive and negative opinion. For example,

some students wanted to protect the Japanese language from English language influence and

feared language loss was detrimental to their self-identities. For the purposes of this specific

paper though, I take a narrower approach in order to analyse just one of the many aspects that

the research uncovered. Feedback from a recent conference also allowed me to share a

similar experience with a university lecturer based in Thailand. And in turn, this instigated

me to find out what seems cool and fashionable about using English in its mixed, pure or

modified forms alongside a native language. The term is known as wasei eigo in Japan or

could also be termed as ‘Japanese-made English’ or ‘English words coined in Japan’ and has

been developing since around a hundred and fifty years ago when the opening up of Japan to

foreign countries occurred after a long period of seclusion.

It is easy to see the influence of English in everyday life in modern Japan, particularly in

Tokyo where I live. You can see English on transport, in media, in advertising and hear it in

forms of code-switching around the campus I work at. Furthermore, the influence of English

loanwords and their use may also be increasing in other languages around the world, but for

what reasons? Consideration should be given as to why this may be important within our

cultural and pedagogical contexts. If our students continue to embrace the ever-increasing

global influence of English because learning it is cool, then ‘cool’ is a term which should be
better understood. If we also presuppose that there is little resistance of the external

influences of English, it may decrease the use of traditional word forms and in turn those

meanings in use in the host language. The later analysis and further discussion sheds light

upon what the term cool means in practicality and this may allow practitioners to modify

their teaching approaches in order to better understand students’ needs. Insofar as, if cool

actually means: ‘beneficial to increasing my knowledge and usage of English’, then we can

adapt our curricula and approaches to teaching vocabulary to include words with more direct

cognates and/or those words which benefit students in their current and future ‘real’ worlds.

Their real worlds may be in the future international business contexts they could work in with

other international business people in their home country or abroad. English could also be

their passport to many countries and to new cultures in which they can use global English

with other speakers of English. In the following section, I further explore how the use of

English is changing in my current context in Japan.

Japanese Context

Much of Japanese society is still often stereotyped as traditional by outside observers. There

are still fans of sumo in Tokyo, geisha in Kyoto and noodle shops all around Japan but how

these traditions blend with modern society is more complicated. Japan is not as traditional,

conservative and closed as it used to be. Modern globalisation has affected this country the

same way it has in others around the world. For example, there are McDonald’s near every

train station and pop music resembles many of the western-style idol groups. For Japanese

students, there are increased opportunities for study abroad programmes and increased

exposure to international/intercultural communication with foreign professors and

international students. With this in mind, do international studies’ students come to be

‘internationalised’ in a cultural sense though? Is it cool to be an internationalised person or

“global citizen” (Appiah 2008) for university students in Japan? I doubt it would be equally

cool if the language students knew or learnt was Ancient Greek or Latin. On top of this, the

Japanese government is certain that there is a need for English language learning in Japan.

The Commission of Japan’s Goals in the Twenty-First Century (CJGTC 2000 in Kawai

2007:44) states, “knowledge of English as the international lingua franca equips one with

mottomo kihonteki na no¯ryoku [the most basic skill] for knowing and accessing the world”.

But, how do students truly believe they can use their English at the current time? According

to Stuart Hall (1996 in Wodak et al. 2009:17), the influence of business and marketing (i.e. a

capitalist society) acts as a major platform for cultural influence to occur as it “creates

favourable circumstances for cultural hybridization”. Perhaps, in Japan these circumstances

and connections students make are linked to cool, modern, fashionable goods and

commodities which are foreign and/or of the perceived Western world often advertised or

packaged with Japanese and English symbolism (including written English text as well as

showing Western type people in western type settings). In the next section, I describe the

main methodological approaches to better understanding the perspectives of my students and

the evidence they wrote.

Methodology

Firstly, students read McCurry’s (2013) article, ‘Japan's public broadcaster sued over use of

English words’ which was based on the frustrations of an elderly Japanese gentleman about

the overuse of English loanwords on NHK, the Japanese-based national broadcaster. At the

end of the unit, 47 Media English students were then asked to write reflective opinion

responses to two questions about the influence of English loanwords and the influence of the
article. They were as follows:

1) What kind of influence does the English language have on the Japanese language (or your

first language, if it’s not Japanese)?

2) Has your opinion about the use of wasei eigo words and phrases changed since you read

this article? Why/Why not? For example, “Now I can see that wasei eigo words and

phrases are difficult for some people to understand so…”.

Question Two relates to the article we read and discussed in class, as mentioned, but we also

did several activities related to the article such as vocabulary tests and presentations on

English loanwords. Essentially, the news story acted as a full unit of content in which

students engaged in several skills-based activities based on the initial article as a starting

point for topical debate. This is common in the course as the curriculum aims to increase

students’ awareness of both domestic and foreign current news events and to develop

informed opinions of different forms of Media and their effects. How their opinions were

formed in this unit is analysed below.

Data Analysis

In this section, I shall discuss the differing links to coolness or why using English derivations

may seem fashionable amongst certain students. All responses are unedited and in the case of

any grammatical errors, they are unchanged in order to show the authenticity of the data.

Data was chosen based on recurring themes of opinion which may have been both positive

and/or negative in their representation of the role of English. I start by discussing the
relationship between technology and wasei eigo as it is one of the most common cases of the

usage of wasei eigo in everyday Japanese. Almost all computers, tablets and mobile devices

are known in this form. In reference to this topic, the first theme discusses links to technology

and the ease of use of English loanwords:

Student 1: S1 (1) Q1 response: “English extends our expressions Japanese can’t. English

sounds cuter, cooler and easy to use than Japanese. ‘Smartphone’ is a good example. If we

translate it into Japanese, we could call kashikoi keitai or koukinho keitai denwa tanmatsu”.

See Figure 1 below for the extended kanji (adopted Chinese characters that are used in

modern Japanese orthography) forms:

Figure 1. Student excerpt with kanji forms for essay Question 1.

As you can see above, the fact that “it takes a lot of time to write down and to call” may mean

that English loanwords are simply more convenient to use because of the speed in which the

message may be conveyed. However, the student uses smartphone as a prime example. Many

teachers could argue that a university student’s phone is probably the most important thing

they have in class considering how often we have to tell students to refrain from using it at
inappropriate times. However, there are benefits to smartphones as they can be useful when

checking dictionary forms in order to write an accurate spelling or searching for an image to

solidify meaning, amongst other benefits. If we surmise that the most important item that a

student may possess in Japan is known by an English loanword, such positive connotations

could surely only elevate the word’s status in use. Furthermore, the kanji form doesn’t seem

cool because it is simply too laborious to write out the whole form, which as you can see

above is lengthy and complicated. Perhaps then the cool use of the English language is linked

to an item’s commodity value. One other student links such a view to this cool aspect with

regards to advertising:

S2 (2) Q1 response: “Some times (sic.) it is useful for economic reason because if we use

English word on product name, it can attract Japane (sic.) people because Japanese feel cool

for English words”.

Seemingly, the student thinks that if the product name has an English sounding name then it

is more attractive to a potential buyer. This type of thinking could elevate new foreign

commodities to an increased status by their categorisation in English loanword form. If a

commodity is desirable, is the prestige of the word linked to it, in itself, therefore not

elevated? Furthermore, if a foreign commodity is “otherised” (Said, 1978) and exotified it

may be seen as cool due to its difference from the host culture. Within Japanese culture the

notion of cuteness is one important factor in evaluating the beauty or positivity of something.

One of the most common words used by younger people in the Japanese language is kawaii

meaning cute. It can be heard on TV, on the train and certainly amongst student female

dialogue around the university campus. According to Davies and Ikeno (2002) however, this

is a complex example as “anything can ultimately be appreciated as beautiful in Japan, and

what is beautiful depends on people’s subjective point of view” (p.37).

If something is different from the cultural norm, its uniqueness may elevate its prestige.

Wasei eigo is different to traditional Japanese so it may be appreciated for its coolness and

beauty through its use as another student makes reference to:

S3 (3) Q1 response: “We use it because English language is cooler than Japanese language.

For example, when we speak something, if we use Japanese, we don’t think anything. But if

we use English, we feel flesh (sic.) and something different”.

One interpretation of this excerpt is that this student feels traditional Japanese may limit their

expression and it is surprisingly quite direct. Feeling a different sense of identity is also

something which seems positive or cool again in this sense. Further investigation could be

done as to find out what “speak something” actually means. With what topics would the

speaker feel cooler? It is interesting that the student admits his/her native language seemingly

restricts self-expression. Again, further investigation could be done to understand why feeling

different is indeed cool. It may be that this student enjoys the lexical flexibility they may

employ depending on the context. Furthermore, in this digital age where access to knowledge

of different languages and cultures is almost instant via the internet, young people, and

particularly our students are able to relate to different identities more accessibly. As a result,

our students may be able to choose their identities more flexibly through this exposure and

increased awareness. Supporting this argument Wodak et al. (2009) state “a member of a

wide variety of social groups and networks has at her or his disposal a wide spectrum of

sources of identification, from which he or she selects more or less voluntarily, depending on
the context and situation, and thus ‘composes’ her or his multiple identity” (p16-17).

In the following excerpt, this student alludes to the choices of the speaker at hand. It is

claimed that even though there are ways to express a word in Japanese, a speaker’s notion of

intentionality in language choice is open. See below:

S4 (4) Q1 response: “English influence a lot to Japanese. There are many wasei eigo in

Japan. Some of people use wasei eigo even there are Japanese words. I think Japanese

people think English is cool”.

In this case there is little explanation as to why English may be cool; nevertheless, speakers

use it because they think it is cool. Showing that you have had access to further education and

have knowledge of a foreign language is surely a status symbol. Is it not a sign of wealth and

intelligence that one has been educated well in a foreign language? However, our students

may just be adapting the meanings of these loanwords, making them more malleable to their

host language and culture.

In some of the responses to Question Two, there are some conflicting views. The same

student reflects that even though the Japanese language is changing, it is not necessarily a

good thing. Please refer to Figure 1 in order to compare the same student’s previous response

to Question 1 which was initially positive.

S1 (5) Q2 response: “Of course, the inundation of English is not good. but as I said before,

loan words is easy, cute and cool to use. It’s natural that world is changing, it’s bad idea to
cling on an old custom”.

On the one hand, we see that the student welcomes English in Question 1, if it is indeed more

convenient, but why then on the other hand does the student not elaborate why “the

inundation of English is not good”? The message now loses its clarity as there seems to be a

cause for confusion when compared with the Question 1 response. If it is cool to use English

for convenience, then it may not always be cool to use an English borrowed form. A

smartphone is an electronic device of course, and so, it may be that loanwords fit well

culturally in a Japanese context for technological devices. Research could be done to discuss

what types of English loanwords in Japanese tend to be absorbed and then widely used. As

technology is ever changing, perhaps this student does not mind that this specific area of their

language is changing. If it were something more traditional like the words to describe

traditional Japanese food, it may be seen more as an intrusion or an impractical fit. Certain

words may be embedded more deeply in the traditional roots of a language and when change

occurs in a language, these words may be more or less successfully used and/or created

dependent on their lexical field. Furthermore, in what other languages is this happening? I

would argue that certain languages and cultures handle different types of English loanwords

in different ways. Moreover, there may also be certain word categories which are more or

less cool to use and/or loan.

In the following excerpt, we see that the student admits to having been influenced by the

content of the article. They have noticed the influence and change on Japanese and in turn

feel some sympathy towards the old gentlemen in the article who could not understand many

of the loanword forms being broadcast. The reason for the increased usage seems to be once

more because people think it is cool:

S6 (6) Q2 response “It has changed. There are many wasei eigo words compare to before.

Many young people use Englich (sic.) in their conversation. because they think using English

is cool. Wasei eigo sounds strange but sometimes it is helpful for Japanese people to study

English”.

In the above example you may find a different focus in the student’s opinion, in terms of

using English loanwords. Previous examples showed that English loanwords were used for

ease of communication. However, in this case, the student claims wasei eigo is helpful for

study and not necessarily for everyday use. As mentioned in my introduction, the power of

teaching newly formed cognates/recent loanwords may often be overlooked. Furthermore,

wasei eigo forms are pronounced very differently in Japanese to the point where they actually

don’t even sound like their original English forms. They are often intelligible to proficient

English speakers and almost like a creole form or dialect in many senses, yet most members

of society know many examples and use them as well as students. They may have never even

learnt English yet know the words/phrases meaning in use within Japanese.

Please consider the following example below as evidence for potential misunderstanding in

meaning, form and especially pronunciation:

ドクター ストップ = similar to /dɒku:ta:su:tɒpu:/

Means ‘doctor stop’, which actually means ‘when the doctor tells a patient to stop doing

something’.
Therefore, the clarification of pronunciation in global Standard English forms is necessary.

Even the meanings of the words may be convoluted or mistaken like the above. Once again,

if cool means that using loanwords reinforces learning, it will have positive connotations

when in use. In essence, it gives the speaker a platform to try out loanword forms both in

English and with their Japanese counterparts. Such a shared borrowed/mixed/specialist

vocabulary range may also provide a sense of shared academic, sociocultural and linguistic

community belonging. In turn, this may create a shared sense of learning and particular

language use in a distinct academic context, such as Japanese universities. I also invite other

researchers to provide examples of such developments in academic and linguistic variation

within their contexts involving the use of English loanwords, particularly in the classroom.

Conclusion

I start my conclusion by summarising the main arguments of the findings. Secondly, I

summarise the main findings of the research which may have practical pedagogical

implications both for students and teachers inside and outside the classroom.

There is sometimes difficulty in identifying one’s own identity in any culture when traditions

change and new signs of culture emerge. Furthermore, the importance of language is but one

factor which shapes who we are or indeed who we think we are. It is safe to say that in most

pedagogical contexts, the spread of global English may be having at least some effect on our

teaching. Access to the internet in a digital age, and the subsequent exposure to language

forms, has changed much of our student’s interests and we should also consider how

censorship laws in different countries limit online access to different cultures (and their

discourses). Nevertheless, there are other ways that English loanwords are being introduced

into new languages. The power of capitalism and advertising is one way, much of which is
linked to vocabulary found in fast food outlets, fashion and on technological devices. I argued

in some ways that because these capitalist facets are seemingly beneficial to the lifestyle of

our students and/or grant elevated status, then the positive connotations that this brings shall

probably not be rejected or protested against by those who are consumers of capitalism on a

daily basis.

In my context, the host language is viewed by some students as more old-fashioned and less

cool than English but perhaps this is a new form of Japanese in its own right. Such change

often causes conflict as not all members of a society have equal access to the English

language and this is evident if we consider the article used as a basis for discussing this topic

with reference to the elderly man who could not understand the wasei eigo forms. Many of

my students however, really are using these forms in many ways. English may well be seen

as a foreign intrusion to many cultures at the moment but if it is seen not as foreign but rather

as everybody’s then it could be a positive tool to allow flexibility of expression in different

cultural contexts.

Now I shall discuss some of the main conclusions that may have more practical pedagogical

implications. The findings showed that technological words are often loaned and/or have

already been embedded as cognates in everyday Japanese use. Such an array of technological

words may allow students and teachers to learn new words or practice their clear English

pronunciation. For example, in applications and software, simply using these forms of

technology in English also provides language learning access that Japanese speakers may not

usually have access to. Therefore I encourage the use of apps in the classroom in English

which increase exposure to such language. A kind of specialist technological lexical field

may be learnt on top of any cognates for the words representing technological devices.

Research found that the use of English in Japanese is sometimes just more convenient,
especially in the case of writing for one student. The use of kanji (originally borrowed from

Chinese in Japanese) is at times unable to manifest itself functionally and conveniently in

modern Japanese. This may be evidence that English can be shaped to be used in whatever

convenient form it may assist the user’s discourse at that time, particularly when it is a shared

discourse understood by certain groups. In a fast food age of convenience does this type of

linguistic expression not suit modern times better? If you had the choice to write a

complicated message or a direct, uncomplicated, quicker message, depending on context of

course, which would you choose if the meaning is still the same in the end? If we think of this

in terms of learning for students, certainly considering excerpt 1, it is simply more effective

for them to write an English loanword form in some cases.

One student also mentioned that Japanese may be restrictive in the modern age. Utilising a

linguistic toolbox with like-minded people is surely a logical way of expression.

Experimental communication with new words is a creative way of expression in dynamically

changing intercultural academic contexts. With this in mind, we can teach or clarify those

words which are loaned from English providing accuracy of meaning in use and affirming

clarity of expression. In essence, loanwords that are beginning to be more widespread in the

host language need further clarification by teachers in the target language. i.e. English that we

teach. If students think these words are cool, teachers are already lowering their affective

learning filters because at least the students have some prior knowledge of the words meaning

in use. However, as mentioned, these words need clarification in form, meaning and

pronunciation in the target language. Please consider the previous example of doctor stop (ド

クター ストップ) once more (see above) and in further discussion of this example we may

even be able to teach imperative grammar alongside the form, meaning and pronunciation. Of

course, ‘doctor stop’ is also not a real English collocation, so that also needs clarification.
Explaining other collocations such as ‘bus stop’ and ‘please stop’ may also further highlight

the noun and verb forms usage. In other words, there are many, many ways to use such words

effectively to explain how they are really used in English.

The research aimed to illuminate the fact that the increasing amount of English loanwords in

host languages can be a valuable resource for both students and teachers. It should be

welcomed when used wisely to clarify examples like the above. And, if our students think

these words are cool then there may be an immediate motivation to learn them and a decrease

in anxiety about remembering the word. As mentioned, why these words are cool is quite

varied and in actuality may be due to more practical reasons than we think, such as

convenience and shared lexicology within specific cultural contexts.

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