Most recent Japanese word you've learned?

  • 判別・はんべつdiscernment, distinction, discrimination

  • 細工・さいく1) craftsmanship, handiwork; 2) trick, artifice, tampering

  • 粉微塵・こなみじんin very small pieces
    Similar to the 木端微塵 from my previous post.

  • 執念・しゅねんtenacity, persistence, implacability, obsession, vindictiveness, spite

  • 執念深い・しゅうねんぶかいvindictive, spiteful, vengeful, persistent, tenacious
    Interestingly, this is the third 執 word I’ve come across in the past few days … all of them from JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure.
    Most of the example sentences I’ve seen use 執念 in quite a negative sense; it seems to refer to an unhealthy obsession, rather than just being passionate.

  • 躱す・かわすto dodge
    Commonly spelled using kana.

  • 襤褸・ボロ (noun) rag, scrap, tattered clothes; (adjective) run-down, shabby, junky
    Commonly spelled using kana.

  • ズタボロ・in tatters, wiped out

  • 死相・しそうthe shadow of death, the appearance of a person approaching death

  • 抜け作・ぬけさくfool, blockhead

  • 圧迫・あっぱくpressure, oppression, suppression

  • 屈服・くっぷくyielding, succumbing, submission
    Collocations:
    圧迫に屈服する = to give in to pressure
    道理に屈服する = to listen to reason
    権威の前に屈服する = to grovel before authority

  • 奥底・おくそこdepths, deep place
    Collocation: 心の奥底 = bottom of one’s heart

  • 動揺・どうよう1) trembling, shaking; 2) agitation, losing one’s composure, feeling shaken

I went to Jins for a new pair of glasses, and they gave me an eye exam. Afterward, the employee said 「乱視です」but I genuinely thought he was saying 「ランチ」He saw my puzzled look and said “astigmatism” in English. About an hour later (still mulling it over in my head), I remembered 遠視 and 近視 from WK, and realized “ranshi” must mean astigmatism. When I saw 乱, it all made perfect sense…

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大きさ・おおきさ・size

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Picked up 業火 (ごうか) last night while playing an RPG called Hajimari no Kiseki (創の軌跡).

Hellfire; the flames of hell; raging fire; Buddhist term for a fire that consumes an evildoer. :open_mouth: Fair to say that you probably won’t hear that one in 日常会話…

Also was quite tickled to learn that 強 and 弱 can be added as a suffix to an amount (of time, for instance) to mean “a little more than” or “a little less than,” respectively.

一時間弱: “just under an hour”

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明々後日・しあさって・in three days’ time; two days after tomorrow

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I will not count WK grammar :smiley:
So the last word, or better- kanji for an action, not really a full word, is a kanji for something “silent”…
黙 (だま)
Found it while searching random words that might be connected to name of anime 聲の形 (Koe no Katachi).
(So since I hear “だまって” or “だまれ” in anime a lot, then I thought it might be nice to learn kanji for this one.)

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土砂降り (どしゃぶり) - downpour, and
梅雨 (つゆ) - rainy season/monsoon Very interesting kanji that I wish was taught on WaniKani.

From Nihongo Switch podcast which I’ve been enjoying at work since learning about it here. :slightly_smiling_face:

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  • 跡取り・あととりsuccessor, heir

  • 遅かれ早かれ・おそかれはやかれsooner or later

  • 差・difference, contrast, variation

  • 強調・きょうちょうemphasis
    Example sentence (from a 日本語の森 video):
    「わりに」は差が大きいことを強調します。 「わりに」 emphasizes that the difference is big.

  • 皺・しわ1) wrinkle, crease; 2) ripple
    Commonly spelled using kana.
    Example sentence (from JoJo): よく見ろ。皺がねぇだろう。 Look closely. No wrinkles.

  • 射程・しゃていrange (of a rifle, missile, magic spell, etc.)

  • 距離・きょりdistance

  • 隔てる・へだてる1) to separate (by distance, time, etc.), to isolate, to divide; 2) to have in between, to be separated by; 3) to alienate, to estrange
    Transitive analogue of 隔たる.
    Example phrases (from Weblio):
    Gloss 1) 区域を隔てるしきり a partition that divides an area into parts
    Gloss 2) 世代を隔てること the condition of being separated by generations
    Gloss 3) 心を隔ておくこと the condition of keeping one’s heart closed

  • 分け隔て・わけへだて1) distinction; 2) discrimination, favoritism

  • 反省・はんせい1) reflection, reconsideration, contemplation; 2) regret, remorse

Both of the kanji are taught. It’s just the vocab that’s missing. And the completely irregular reading.

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Today I’ve learned 皮肉。

The reason why “skin meat” equals “irony” and “sarcasm” wasn’t given in the explanation so I looked it up:

(quoted from here: )

it comes from 皮肉骨髄 “skin meat bones marrow” attributed to the Bodhidharma of Chinese Chan / Zen Buddhism. Bones and marrow came to take on the meaning of essential, skin and meat became synonymous with superficial. From there, 皮肉 was also used as a word for criticizing faults/defects (which stems from not recognizing the true nature of something.), which seems to be its primary current usage, e.g. the JDIC dictionary entry for the derived 皮肉ひにくる says:

皮肉る
to speak cynically or with sarcasm

Although 皮肉 is sometimes best translated to irony, as in the fixed expression 皮肉なことに, e.g.

バイトを辞めたんだけど、皮肉なことに、年中他の仕事でずっと忙しかった。

I quit my part-time job, but ironically was busy with other work all year.

I think 皮肉 works best for cynicism/sarcasm or dark/pessimistic irony, rather than the lighthearted variety of irony.

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  • 非難・ひなんblame, criticism, reproach
    Homophone with 避難. I wonder if authorities run 非難訓練 so that they can quickly deflect criticism when a disaster happens.

  • 仕留める・しとめるto bring down (an animal), to shoot dead

  • 痰・タンphlegm, sputum
    Commonly spelled using katakana.

  • 猛禽・もうきんbird of prey

  • 金融・きんゆうfinances, circulation of money, credit transactioning, loaning of money

  • 金融危機・きんゆうききfinancial crisis
    Example: 2008年の世界的な金融危機

  • 貧困・ひんこんpoverty

  • 陥る・おちいるto fall into
    Etymology: 落ち入る
    Examples:
    穴に陥る (fall into a hole)
    罠に陥る (fall into a trap)
    経営難に陥る (run into financial troubles)
    貧困に陥る (be reduced to poverty)
    混乱に陥る (fall into disorder)
    鬱に陥る (fall into depression)

  • 資料・しりょうmaterial, data, documents, resources

  • 一次資料・いちじしりょうprimary source

  • 紛れる・まぎれるto disappear into, to be lost in, to be mixed in with

  • 紛れ・まぐれfluke
    Commonly spelled using kana. Note that the reading is not quite the same as in 紛れる.
    Etymology: From an alternative reading of 紛れる (まぐれる). One source suggests that this comes from 目 (め) + 暗れる (くれる) - “eyes get dark” ~ “cannot see” → “to become lost”.
    まぐれる isn’t found on Jisho .org. I presume that it’s an older form of まぎれる, but I’m not 100% certain.

  • 紛らわしい・まぎらわしいeasy to mix up, confusingly similar, ambiguous

  • 感涙・かんるいtears (from being deeply moved); tears of gratitude

  • 噎せる・むせるto choke (i.e. on food, drink, smoke)
    Commonly spelled using kana.

  • 咽ぶ・むせぶ1) to be choked; 2) to be choked up (i.e. from tears)
    Commonly spelled using kana.
    Example: 感涙にむせぶ ~ to be moved to tears

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犯罪のタイポロジー はんざいのたいぽろじ-
犯罪の類型学 はんざいのるいけいがく
Both can be translated as Typology of Crime. The title with the 外来語 がいらいご loan word is printed in larger letters, the one with 類型学 るいけいがく in very small letters. This shows how loan words from the English are getting more dominant recently.

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Some recent ones that I found interesting.
(As I checked the meanings in Japanese, I haven’t used a Japanese-English dictionary.)

つに癖で、… : By force of habit,…
あるべき姿 : (a) perfect world/ as it should be
クセになりそう : (I) could get used to this.
先を越される : To be beaten to the punch.

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  • 呼吸・こきゅうrespiration

  • 飛ぶ・とぶto be lost, to disappear
    I knew the meaning of “to fly”, but this was new to me. I learned it from this example sentence on WaniKani:
    ビエトとダリンが、水害で飛んだデータを復元しています。

Viet and Darin are recovering the data that was lost from the water damage.

  • 復元・ふくげんreconstruction, restoration, reversion

  • 整形・せいけいplastic surgery, cosmetic surgery
    For when you’d like to have your shape arranged.

  • 寛ぐ・くつろぐto relax, to feel at home
    Commonly spelled using kana.

  • 遺言・ゆいごんwill, testament, last request

  • 遠隔操作・えんかくそうさremoted control(led)

  • 意符・いふsemantic component (of a kanji)

  • 音符・おんぷ1) musical note; 2) phonetic component (of a kanji)

  • 疑問符・ぎもんふquestion mark

  • 騒音・そうおんnoise, din
    Kanji etymology for 騒: 騒 is the shinjitai version of 騷, which in Chinese means “harass” or “bother”. Yellow Bridge and the Shuowen Jiezi both list this as a phono-semantic compound, and indeed 騷 (sāo) is a near-homophone of 蚤 (zǎo), even in modern-day Mandarin. However, seeing as the components are 馬 (horse) + 蚤 (flea), one can’t help but wonder if the person who coined it didn’t intend for it to also function as an ideogrammic compound (“fleas bother horses”).
    As an aside, 蚤 originally depicted a bug (虫) and a claw (㕚), which I think is pretty neat.
    Kanji mnemonic: A horse (馬) sits on a stool (又) that has a bug under it. It does this to harass the bug, and it makes a lot of noise.

  • 安眠・あんみんsound sleep, sleeping peacefully

  • 妨害・ぼうがいdisturbance, obstruction, hindrance, interference
    Keyword mnemonic: It’s the Bow Guy. Ugh, I hate the Bow Guy; he always shows up gets in the way. Like when I was trying to vote in the last election, and he showed up and shot the ballot out of my hand. There was also that one time when I was sharing a plate of spaghetti with a girl, and we were just on the verge of having a Lady and the Tramp-style kiss, but then Bow Guy shot an arrow through our spaghetti and ruined it.

  • 望外・ぼうがいunexpected (joy, success, etc.); beyond what one hoped; beyond expectation
    This word is apparently less common than 妨害. That’s because Bow Guy’s influence is usually a bad thing; when it does happen, it’s above and beyond one’s expectations.

Not only can you “sell a fight”, you can “sell your name” too!

喧嘩(けんか)()る・to pick a fight
()を売る・ to gain a reputation; to make oneself famous

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In this vein I recently learned 一昨昨日/一昨々日・さきおととい/いっさくさくじつ: three days ago.

Edit: misinformation

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モブ

  1. mob; crowd of people​
  2. background character (in a manga, anime, etc.); mob (in a video game); non-playable character

tenor

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行方不明ゆくえふめい missing, lost

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Three days ago :wink:

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Yeah, sorry, I misremembered :wink: Time flies, eh?

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