The two expressions I would like to choose are found are on an advertisement for Subway sandwiches and a Lemon & Vinegar flavored KitKat Bar.
This is a Nestle KitKat Bar from Japan. The most interesting part of this picture is the "flavor" of chocolate it is because we don't really have flavors of KitKat here in the United States. The flavor itself is pretty unusual for candy: Lemon Vinegar. In and of itself, this sounds really really unappetizing.
The Katakana on this wrapper is used as a "loanword", in that it translates two western words into Katakana. Though there is a japanese word for "lemon" and "vinegar", the fact that it is a flavor on a Western chocolate bar results in the use of Katakana. This may make the bar seem more foreign and interesting. It's possible that "Western things" are more popular in Japan, and therefore making a product seem more Western
This is an advertisement for a new sandwich at subway. I found this ad very interesting for several reasons. First of all, it is almost offensive in its portrayal of Indian men and women. I also found it interesting that the man in the ad uses kanji to speak, while the woman uses only katakana. The name of the new sandwich is "Sando-Indo", a condensed version of "Sandwich Indian".
The reason the sandwich advertisement is in Katakana is possibly because it is referring to a loan word, or in this case an Indian-style influenced sandwich. Also interesting is the romanized English lettering at the top. It would be interesting to know whether English is successfully used often in Japanese advertising.
When we studied the uses of Katakana in class, I did not find any large discrepancies between the textbooks. Though Katakana has some set uses (onomatopoeias, loan words, foreign names, emphasis), I believe now it is being used for a wide variety of contexts and scenarios. It will be interesting to watch how the use of Katakana develops in Japan over the next few decades.
ファーグソン
It was interesting that you pointed out the romanized words in the subway ad. I wonder where this ad was placed - perhaps the demographics of the audience played a role, if it was in an area with people who are able to understood English.
ReplyDeleteI like your conclusion/realization about the use of katakana in various contexts. You explored the advertising context and perhaps you can research further how katakana advertising affects consumers' psyche so that you can state your reason with confidence/back it up with support. I don't think there was any purposeful meaning behind the Indian male/female different speech. It just happened that the female talked about a foreign product Chai. How about the other word she mentions "Set," why is it written in katakana? Do you know if there is a Japanese equivalent word? just wondering myself...
ReplyDeleteInteresting analysis! If you visit a Japanese store, you will find it absolutely true that more than 90% of snacks use Katakana instead of kanji or hiragana or English on its packages. My friend once made an interesting point that Katakana shortens the distance between customers and the product and makes the product look cool and fashion, while kanji would probably enlarge the distance on the packages.
ReplyDeleteSusan- I was going to mention something along the lines of why Kanji is not used as often as one would think. As I mentioned on Bordner's blog about how the Latin script came to being. It may be that as societies become more commerce driven, such as the Phoenicians and Greeks were in antiquity, the use of meaning symbols (such as Kanji and Egyptian hieroglyphics)becomes cumbersome as commerce demands that one communicates quickly and concisely reaching the largest market possible. As for why the Indian man and woman are using Katakana, the use of Katakana is to give the impression of an accent. So I would assume that when a Japanese reads this they would hear an Indian accent in their head giving the product further novelty, which is a major selling point in Japan.
ReplyDeleteいい記事を書きました！ Indeed, the primary purpose of Katakana is to denote loanwords, but just as you are keen to notice, its usage has expanded beyond simply that, most notably in the area of advertising and packaging. I think you are spot-on when suggesting that "katakanization" of words makes them seem more Western. In Japan, Western goods have an image of being high-quality, reliable, and cool, so it makes sense that packaging would take any opportunity to employ the use of katakana. In general, it seems that the Japanese are more likely to be attracted by something that appears foreign and exciting rather than something mundane at produced at home.
ReplyDeleteKatakana is also often used to emphasize certain words and set them apart from others, so it's not difficult to find native Japanese words being written in this manner. An interesting phenomenon is what happens to words after they become introduced to the Japanese language via katakanization -- some of them end up completely disconnected from their original meaning. For example, バイキング actually refers to a buffet!
とにかく、カタカナはいろいろなおもしろいてんがありますから、たくさん勉強して、使って下さい！日本語の勉強もがんばって！