 The Wa-sei Eigo Game
English made in Japan. |
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Kid: Do you like AV?
Foreign English teacher: (Thinking: AV... audio-visual equipment...) Uh, yes?
Kid: Yadda! (Laughing, runs away.)
Japanese, like almost all languages, has loan words, or words that have been borrowed from other languages. Japanese is peculiar however in the high incidence of loan words that have been changed in meaning in the process. This English is called "wa-sei eigo," or English made in Japan.
A cool idea for Eikaiwa or other high-level classes is to play a game that makes students more aware of this type of "English". Before I explain, let me present some wa-sei eigo:
English Japanese
(in romaji) |
What a native speaker would
think upon hearing the word |
Actual English meaning |
| terebi ge-mu |
TV game show |
video game |
| hotchikisu |
hot kiss |
stapler |
| supo-tsu man |
person who likes hunting and fishing |
athlete, "jock" |
| ha-fu |
half |
person of mixed race |
| nai-bu |
naive |
overly sensitive |
| biru |
bill |
building |
| (car's) handoru |
car door handle |
steering wheel |
| nyu- ha-fu |
new half |
transvestite |
| ai vi (AV) |
audio-visual |
adult video |
|
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Wasei Eigo handout (includes all words listed above and more) |
So, here's the how-to:
- Before class, attach cards with wa-sei eigo (in katakana) on the wall. There need be no particular order, but be sure there's some room below each card to hang a few more.
- Introduce the game with some loan words English has borrowed from Japanese. Try saying them in a natural English accent and see if your students can understand. For example, (American) speakers of English usually say, "Tow-key-oh" (Tokyo), while Japanese would intone, "Tow-kyo.". Or more perversely, ask your students if they like "carry-oh-key" (karaoke).
- Split the class into two teams.
- Each team receives two types of cards. One stack should have the actual definitions of the wa-sei eigo words on the wall. The other stack should have what a naïve English-speaker would think upon hearing the wa-sei eigo word (e.g., at first you might think terebi ge-mu might mean "TV game show").
- The teams then take turns matching their cards to the wa-sei eigo on the wall and challenging the opposing team to find the correct match. Using the same example, if the wa-sei eigo on the wall were terebi ge-mu, one team might identify "video game" as the proper term, challenging the other team to locate the third card ("TV game show") if they can. The other team can always disagree if they want.
- Winner gets an all-expense paid trip to Hawaii and a new set of dishtowels.
* It's helpful to color-code the cards according to what type they are. For instance, wa-sei eigo cards might be green, card with the actual meaning white, and what a naïve English speaker would think pink because it's wrong and I hate pink. |
