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Gratuitous Japanese: Difference between revisions
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{{quote|''Hey bitch you look [[Kawaii|kawaii]].''|'''Willow''', ''[[My Immortal]]''}}
In the [[Anime]] [[Fanfic]] community, the name given to the practice of including in a story the occasional word or sentence (or paragraph!) of Japanese in place of its equivalent in the author's language of choice, [[Self
Sometimes this can be a mere leavening for flavor, using terms likely to be familiar to even a casual anime viewer such as [[Honorifics]], [[Japanese Sibling Terminology]], various pleasantries and exclamations, and the ever-popular "[[Baka]]". Another popular one is using "Kami" as synonymous with "God" leading to "Oh Thank Kami!" and the like. However, some authors go overboard, dumping into their stories entire sentences and more in Japanese of varying grammatical precision. While the more thoughtful of such authors may provide footnotes or glossaries for the convenience of their readers, the sudden transition from English to a block of Japanese is still jarring for many readers.
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This is also a source of much argument in the area of [[Fan Sub|fansubs]], over whether or not to include honorifics, localize idioms, translate certain special terms, or use translator notes at the top of the screen.
Occasionally there will be [[Too Long; Didn't Dub|untranslated Japanese in an English dub of an anime]], but that almost exclusively applies to [[Honorifics]] and [[Calling Your Attacks|attack names]], especially ones that translate into literal descriptions of the attack, that would otherwise sound boring, or just be too long to easily shorten into a name that would fit the [[Mouth Flaps]].
[[Gratuitous English]] is the anime version of this; the name is because, just like Gratuitous Japanese is Japanese for the sake of it, Gratuitous English is English dropped into the dialog for the sake of it, even if it's [[Blind Idiot Translation|horribly mangled]]. [[Gratuitous German]] is the same in German. [[Gratuitous Spanish]] is... well, you get the picture. (Of course, some translators attempt [[Woolseyism]] by [[Keep It Foreign|translating Gratuitous $LANGUAGE into Gratuitous Japanese]].)
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* ''Team8'', otherwise [[So Cool Its Awesome|one of the best]] ''[[Naruto]]'' fanfics around, often suffers from this.
** ''Naruto'' fanfic authors often suffer from this, because they [[Did Not Do the Research|fail to do any research]]. '''[[You Keep Using That Word|There is no such honorific as]] '[[You Keep Using That Word|-teme]]''''[[You Keep Using That Word|!]]''' It's a pronoun!''' '''A PRONOUN!''' To quote Naruto, 'Sasuke, TEME!' means 'Sasuke, you!!' "Teme" is considered a very, very rude, insulting version of "you", and not "bastard", not "jerk", not anything else!
** Similarly, Sasuke [[Beam Me Up, Scotty|does not call Naruto "dobe" ("dead last") ''nearly'' as much as fanfic writers love to use it]]. In an odd aversion, his [[Catch Phrase|distinctive insult]] "usuratonkachi" ("useless idiot," lit. "thin hammer") is almost completely ignored (thankfully).
*** And it's treated like an [[Affectionate Nickname]] while Naruto adding -no-Baa-chan or similar to Tsunade earn him a punch.
** Also the jutsu after everything it's taken [[Up to Eleven]] where even the [[Mundane Utility|Mundane Utilities]] have the word jutsu after it.
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** What's funny is, the actual Japanese turn for [[Schoolgirl Lesbians]] is "Girls Love," in English. It's also the literal meaning of the words 'shoujo' and 'ai.' So we use [[Gratuitous Japanese]] the same way they use [[Gratuitous English]] when referring to ''the same thing.''
** [[Gender Flip]], and you get Boys Love and shounen ai for [[Yaoi Guys]].
** Also, using hentai for porn (it actually means pervert(ed). Typically used of a person.) Ero (for erotic) is more likely to be used in Japan; for example, an H-game is an [[Eroge]], erotic game (game pronounced as gemu.) ''Also'' also, Nakama doesn't strictly mean teammates with a [[True Companions|family-like bond]]. Otaku as geek is not an affectionate term; basically, it's less 'affectionate term for enthusiastic fan' and more 'loser who will never get a girlfriend because he has no life and speaks only Klingon.' However, like many such things, it may be adopted by people it's said of and soften with time - to some. See [[N
** Basically, all this can be summed up by saying most anime fandom Japanese terms are technically accurate but are used in a very different manner than the same words are in Japan.
* Many fanfics confuses 'nee-chan' (big sister) for 'nii-chan' (big brother).
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* Even James Clavell's ''Shōgun'' (part of the [[Asian Saga]]) suffers from this. The various Japanese bits written into the story range widely, from sentences where he obviously asked an actual native Japanese speaker for a translation, to phrases constructed from words gotten out of a dictionary and inserted into English grammar. Interestingly, Clavell's overly-simplified explanation of Japanese verbs is immediately contradicted by one of those sentences from an actual Japanese person.
** Example: When Toranaga asks if a ship is seaworthy, he ends up asking if the sea is worthy of respect.
* The William Gibson novel ''[[Idoru (Literature)]]'' is taken from the Japanese word for [[Idol Singer|Idol Singers]], which itself is [[Gratuitous English]]. However, Gibson's transliteration is wrong- it would be spelled ''Aidoru''.
* [[Ender's Game|Battle School slang]] incorporates a lot of Japanese. Most notable is the use of "kuso" as an expletive and synonym for "bulls**t".
* Neal Stephenson's [[Author Vocabulary Calendar|frequent use]] of the term "Nippon" and complete avoidance of the word "Japan," extending to referring to people as "Nipponese." This makes sense when used by an American soldier in the Pacific Theater of World War II in ''[[Cryptonomicon]]'', less when used in the cyberpunk future of [[Snow Crash]].
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* ''[[Large Bagel]]'' is possibly even worse about this, however it's an obvious joke.
* ''[[TV Tome Adventures]]'' does this with the scant voiced lines for a few characters and attack names in "homage" to fighting games that commonly went without english voicework in localization. The actual dialogue, however, is completely in english except when it's played for laughs. Some examples didn't do the research, like is "Kalasu Angel", a name the creator (initially) thought meant "Angel of Death" but actually meant "Angel of the Crow".
* [[Retsupurae]]'s title is this ([[Spell My Name With an "S"|sort of]]), although it's less grating than other examples. Their logo is also the kanji for "failure."
** Though it should actually be "Retsupurei" - what they've got there sounds like "Let's Pry".
* ''[[Gaia Online]]'' both parodies this and plays it straight. The Kira Kira earrings use Gratuitous Japanese to deliberately annoy some of the users. Playing things straight, the artist Drinky Tengu has made two items which only use Japanese names for poses. (The Furugasa, which features Obakemono, and the Yama [no Kami] no Tamago, which is fittingly enough a Tengu.) And finally, Logan and Agatha (neither of whom are Japanese, though they have hung out with Ninjas in the past) named their secret love child Mirai, Japanese for "future".
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* Sakura, the [[Catgirl]] student in ''The Official Fanfiction University of [[Redwall]]'', is a stereotypical Japanophile. She intersperses her speech with Japanese words, and has also dropped into [[Japanese Ranguage]] on at least one occasion. [[My Hovercraft Is Full of Eels|Not always the right word]]; she once [[Did Not Do the Research|referred to Nagru's ermine Dirgecallers as]] ''[[Did Not Do the Research|"neko-chan"]]''. It's not clear whether she just didn't know the word for ermine or if [[You Fail Biology Forever|she actually thought they were kittens]] - she's [[The Ditz|not particularly bright]], so it could be either. She later runs into Agent Drake, who is from a Japanese-speaking continuum and represents an author that ''has'' done her research. Eventually this results in her [http://community.livejournal.com/kit_n_minty/5788.html#cutid1 offering to sell internal organs].
* Often a charge within the ''[[Protectors of the Plot Continuum]]'', who seem some pretty ugly abuses of [[Fangirl Japanese]]. One particularly bad case involved a character using "baka" in ''[[Redwall]]''. With poorly placed footnotes. Another one involved [[Gratuitous Spanish]], which, as Agent Mara explained, wasn't even spelled correctly.
* ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh!:
* Some in ''[[Greek Ninja]]''.
* In ''[[Suburban Knights]]'', [[Marz Gurl]] cosplays as San from ''[[Princess Mononoke]]'', and does her whole part in Japanese.
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** "Taisetsu na mono [[Groin Attack|protect my balls]]!"
** Another example is the Okama game platform. A bit of a hidden joke, as not many viewers would know okama means something like "homo" or "tranny".
** And in the episode Over Logging, in which we find out that Stan's dad has a fetish for [[Me Love You Long Time|Japanese girls]] [[Shock Site|puking in each other's mouths]] ([[But You Screw One Goat!|among other perversions]]), said porn features "dialogue" along the lines of "kawaii deshou" and "watashi wa * barf* daisuki..."
** And from the episode ''Mecha Streisand'', we have: "Babura Babura Ichiban Kiraina Hito! Babura Babura Hana ga Okii!"
* In ''[[American Dad (Animation)|American Dad]]'', one of teenage son Steve Smith's nerd friends is a stereotypical Japanese boy named Toshi (or possibly Toushi). He's so stereotypical, in fact, that he exclusively speaks fluent Japanese. While the viewers get to see subtitles whenever he speaks (and his dialogue is often quite humorous), it's evident that Steve and his other friends have no clue what he's saying. At one point, Toushi goes into a lengthy monologue in objection to something Steve had asked him, and Steve responds along the lines of "Wow, that's a lot of words for 'yes'."
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[[Category:Fanfic Tropes]]
[[Category:Gratuitous Japanese]]
[[Category:Trope]][[Category:Pages with comment tags]]
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