6

Wasei-eigo and most Gairaigo (especially in a text or sentence as opposed to being by itself) is usually written in Katakana (イメージ, ジュース, スマート,パンツ,アベック). However, there are times that have seen some in their original Romaji form (image, juice, smart, pants, avec) even in a Japanese sentence, ex. 彼女のpantsです; juiceが好き; ジョーンはsmartですよ; 数々のavecを見た; etc.

Is this common or incorrect? What does it mean if you do this as opposed to using Katakana?

Improve this question
4
  • 2
    Would those be called "romaji"? "Jyuusu" is but "juice" is not.
    – user4032
    Apr 15, 2014 at 1:44
  • I'd think so, considering that romaji is just Japanese for the latin alphabet used in the European languages that most Gairaigo comes from.
    – crayondraw
    Apr 15, 2014 at 2:47
  • I really doubt native Japanese usually mix such easy English words into Japanese sentences. When did you see that? Maybe copywriters may create such text as an ad.
    – naruto
    Apr 17, 2014 at 3:36
  • 1
    ...Now that I think about it... Most of the situations I've seen were in some form of commercialism like an ad or music video
    – crayondraw
    Apr 17, 2014 at 15:58

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
2

I haven't seen a lot of those cases in daily life. I feel like people use English in sentences when they want to add some "fanciness" (for some reason people seem to think it's cool to use English). Like you said in the comments, the only places I can think of where English words are used in Japanese sentences are titles in magazines and TV ads.

Although it's definitely not formal, I wouldn't say it's incorrect. It doesn't have any special meaning to it as far as I know, other than that intention of making the sentence a bit more "fancier."

Improve this answer

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .