{"id":21641,"date":"2021-11-16T17:15:07","date_gmt":"2021-11-16T17:15:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=21641"},"modified":"2021-11-16T17:16:10","modified_gmt":"2021-11-16T17:16:10","slug":"otaku","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=21641","title":{"rendered":"Otaku (\u30aa\u30bf\u30af)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>One of the Japanese words I learnt recently is  <strong>\u30aa\u30bf\u30af<\/strong> (otaku), which can be translated as geek, nerd or enthusiast, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/jisho.org\/search\/otaku\">jisho<\/a>, and which has been borrowed into English to mean someone who is keen on manga (\u6f2b\u753b), anime (\u30a2\u30cb\u30e1), etc.<\/p>\n<p><a data-flickr-embed=\"true\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/sushicam\/4367115781\/in\/photolist-7DUBnF-7PPgiA-iYSQS-6PMyA8-hsN9L-6PMynT-iYT7s-6PRLA9-6PMDmM-6PRMnS-6PRLLA-6PMx1M-hsN6b-Q52kN3-5DwxsQ-6PMwSF-4NeHiQ-4NeHpb-4NavmM-4Navga-4NavvK-4NeHwC-dE5pGA-dE3CFC-4NavHZ-4NeHzQ-4NeHBb-4Navd8-4NeHym-4NavFB-2RX4EM-ZoEamC-iYUcs-DutKoG-iYTwU-iYTmS-t5EHsh-rUHpnb-KCxzkW-iYTST-up5bvu-KUswDQ-QvEYkt-PDh8J-k87W9-iYT3F-iYSMV-nprWoh-nppE48-sYV758\" title=\"otakufest - Akihabara\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/2693\/4367115781_25f71f4568_z.jpg\" alt=\"otakufest - Akihabara\" width=\"640\" height=\"425\"><\/a><script async=\"\" src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>It comes from an honorific form of you, <strong>\u304a\u5b85<\/strong> (otaku), and became popular in the 1970s and 1980s as a way for fans of manga and anime to address to each other. A 1983 article by Akio Nakamori (\u4e2d\u68ee\u660e\u592b) in <em>Manga Burikko<\/em> (\u6f2b\u753b\u30d6\u30ea\u30c3\u30b3) called <em>Otaku no Kenky\u016b<\/em> (\u304a\u305f\u304f\u306e\u7814\u7a76), or Otaku Research, popularized it, and gave it a derisive and insulting meaning as the article was very critical of otaku subculture. Thanks to a serial killer in the late 80s nicknamed the Otaku Murderer, who had a large collection of anime and manga, it gained further negative connotations.<\/p>\n<p>Today <strong>otaku<\/strong> is considered an insult in Japanese and is used to refer to people with an unhealthy obbession with anime and manga. However, it doesn\u2019t appear to be used in this way in my Duolingo Japanese lessons, so perhaps some people are proud to call themselves otaku, like some people (including me) proudly call themselves geeks or nerds.<\/p>\n<p>There are different kinds of <strong>otaku<\/strong> with interests in various things such as manga, travel, computers, video games, cars, anime, phones, cameras, fashion or trains. You\u2019re most likely to spot them in the wild in Akihabara (\u79cb\u8449\u539f) and Ikebukuro (\u6c60\u888b) in Tokyo.<\/p>\n<p>In the West <strong>otaku<\/strong> apparently has few if any negative connotations and is used to used by fans of Japanese, Korean and other East Asian popular culture. Some might define <strong>otaku<\/strong> as meaning \u201creclusive and potentially dangerous\u201d while to others it means \u201cmostly harmless and quirky\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>The word <strong>\u304a\u5b85<\/strong> (otaku) is a honorific \/ respectful form of you, and also can refer to your house, home, family, husband or organization. <strong>\u5b85<\/strong> (taku) on its own means (one\u2019s) house, (one\u2019s) home or one\u2019s husband. Unusually <strong>\u5b85<\/strong> only has one pronunciation &#8211; most Japanese kanji have two or more. The <strong>\u304a<\/strong> (o) is an honorific suffix.<\/p>\n<p>If you use <strong>otaku<\/strong>, what does it mean to you?<\/p>\n<p><em>Sources and more information: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dictionary.com\/e\/slang\/otaku\/\">https:\/\/www.dictionary.com\/e\/slang\/otaku\/<\/a>,<br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.merriam-webster.com\/words-at-play\/what-does-otaku-mean-in-japanese\">https:\/\/www.merriam-webster.com\/words-at-play\/what-does-otaku-mean-in-japanese<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/japanyugen.com\/otaku-japanese-obsessive-subculture-explained\/\">https:\/\/japanyugen.com\/otaku-japanese-obsessive-subculture-explained\/<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/wikimili.com\/en\/Otaku\">https:\/\/wikimili.com\/en\/Otaku<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/digitalworks.union.edu\/cgi\/viewcontent.cgi?article=1364&amp;context=theses\">https:\/\/digitalworks.union.edu\/cgi\/viewcontent.cgi?article=1364&amp;context=theses<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One of the Japanese words I learnt recently is \u30aa\u30bf\u30af (otaku), which can be translated as geek, nerd or enthusiast, according to jisho, and which has been borrowed into English to mean someone who is keen on manga (\u6f2b\u753b), anime (\u30a2\u30cb\u30e1), etc. It comes from an honorific form of you, \u304a\u5b85 (otaku), and became popular [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104,129,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21641","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english","category-japanese","category-language"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21641"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21641\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21644,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21641\/revisions\/21644"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}