“Wasei Eigo”, or “English words created in Japan”, can leave native English speakers baffled — but what about Korean speakers?
Dave, from The World of Dave YouTube channel, has released a new video this week giving us the lowdown on the differences between English words created in Korea, also known as “Konglish”, and English words created in Japan, also known as “Wasei Eigo”. The YouTuber has made a ton of similar language videos, including one we looked at last month, and this time he’s joined by Korean Jaein and Japanese Erina to demonstrate their pronunciation of some more English words as interpreted in their native languages.
This entertaining video takes a very simple concept and makes it highly entertaining as the trio examines the differences between the way English words are spoken in Korean and Japanese mixed in with some good personalities and a few funny Korean sound effects.
Given that two out of the three are fluent in Korean, poor Erina seems to take the brunt of most jokes – or get laughed at for her Japanese-English pronunciations. There is one point in the video, however, where Erina does get some of her own licks in when she gets slightly annoyed with Dave for mispronouncing “fried potato” (Japanese English for “french fries”).
▼ Erina getting angry at Dave
Some of the words discussed in the video include “morning call”, “air-conditioner”, “steak”, “apartment”, “bathroom/toilet”, “chapstick”, “mug”, “coffee”, “one”, “arcade”, and “juice”.
It’s interesting to see how Dave and Jaein are surprised that juice (jyuusu) in Japanese represents not only fruit and vegetable juice but also soda drinks — an oddity in the Japanese language that made our top 10 most irritating Japanese borrowed words (part 2).
If you would like to see more of Dave’s videos, be sure to subscribe to his YouTube channel, The World of Dave.
Source: YouTube/TheWorldofDave
Images: YouTube/TheWorldofDave
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