This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Addbot (talk | contribs) at 14:55, 7 March 2013 (Bot: Migrating 3 interwiki links, now provided by Wikidata on d:q840740). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.
Revision as of 14:55, 7 March 2013 by Addbot (talk | contribs) (Bot: Migrating 3 interwiki links, now provided by Wikidata on d:q840740)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)Kotobagari (言葉狩り, "word hunting") refers to the reluctance to use words that are considered politically incorrect in the Japanese language. For instance words such as rai (癩, "leper"), mekura (盲, "blind"), tsunbo (聾 "deaf"), oshi (唖 "deaf-mute"), kichigai (気違い or 気狂い "crazy"), tosatsujō (屠殺場 "slaughter house"), and hakuchi (白痴 "moron/retard") are currently not used by the majority of Japanese publishing houses; the publishers often refuse to publish writing which includes these words.
Another example is a school janitor in Japan was used to be called a kozukai-san (小使いさん "chore person"). Some felt that the word had a derogatory meaning, so it was changed to yōmuin (用務員 "task person"). Now yōmuin is considered demeaning, so there is shift to use kōmuin (校務員 "school task member") or kanrisagyōin (管理作業員 "maintenance member") instead. Linguist Stephen Pinker calls this shift the euphemism treadmill.
Other examples of words which have become unacceptable include the replacement of the word hyakushō (百姓) for farmer with nōka (農家), or the replacement of the word shina (支那) for China written in kanji with the version written in katakana (シナ) or with the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese name for China, Chūgoku (中国).
Kotobagari and Ideology
Kotobagari has led to some confusing terminology.
NHK, the Japanese Broadcasting Company runs a Korean language study program, but the language is called "Hangul" to avoid being politically incorrect. This is a result of both the North and South Korean governments demanding that the program be called by the name of one country. North Korea wanted the show to be called "Chōsen language" (朝鮮語) taken from its full name, 朝鮮民主主義人民共和国 or Democratic People's Republic of Korea. South Korea wanted "Kankoku language" (韓国語) from 大韓民国 or Republic of Korea. As a compromise, "Hangul" was selected and Korean is referred to as "the language on this program" or "this language", but this has led to the use of the neologism "Hangul language" (ハングル語) to refer to the Korean language; although it's technically incorrect since hangul itself is a writing system, not a language.
References
Gottlieb, Nanett (2006). Linguistic stereotyping and minority groups in Japan. Oxon: Routledge. ISBN: 0415338034.
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