Forum - View topic"Anime" comes from French?
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Delirium
Posts: 18 |
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Just read your column about the definition of "anime". The sentence "The general consensus is that the Japanese word anime is derived from the French word animé" however puzzles me. From what I know and my experience with other fans this is a common misunderstanding fact, the word "anime" doesn´t come from French. It originated from the Japanese abbreviation of "animeshon" (written in Katakana) which obviously came from the english word "animation".
Just because some English fan thought it´d be cool to add an apostrophe at the end of "anime" to indicate that "e" should be accentuated it doesn´t make "anime" to a French word. ;) |
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Tempest
 I Run this place.ANN Publisher  Posts: 10455 Location: Do not message me for support. |
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I've heard that arguement as well. And did take it into concideration before writting that it came fron French. However, I've heard more people say that it comes from French, and I've seen more sources, reliable sources, state that it originates from French. Hence my use of the phrase "the general consensus..." as opposed to a statement of fact, ie: "The word Anime is derived from..." Furthermore, given that it is 100% identical to a Ffrench word and only 50% of an English word... My bet's on French 
But if anyone can show me a verifiable, reliable source for the origin of the word, preferably with documentation, then I would change my tune for future writting, as well as an entry in the Encyclopedia. (I wanted to call it Encyclopaedia as the word should be properly written, unfortunately bastardized English prevailed, but who am I to speak? I use words such as color and lieutenant.... well, that last one is a bad example since both are written the same.) |
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cookie
Former ANN Editor in Chief
 Posts: 2460 Location: Do not contact me for support. |
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Ask John covered this pretty well, a while back: http://www.animenation.net/news/askjohn.php?id=317 [EDIT] He forgets to mention that French animators actually developed quite a few animation techniques that influenced early Japanese animators, but then again, Americans were developing new animation techniques too... as were the Japanese themselves. (Hm. It sounds like it could be a Master of Orion-style game.. "Build Animation Technology! Train Animators! Make animation! Dominate the World!") [/EDIT] |
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Dan42
Chief Encyclopedist
 Posts: 3791 Location: Montreal |
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Hmm, john's answer doesn't impress me that much. He claims that there is a "provable correlation between the word "anime" and the English word animation" but in fact it's the exact same thing with French. "animé" by itself may not mean animation, but "dessin animé" does, and that's what cartoons are called in French. And english doesn't have a monopoly on having words borrowed by the Japanese. A majority of the Japanese language is formed of words that have a non-Japanese origin. I think Chinese was the language that had the most words integrated into Japanese but I think today it's more English. Either way, words from other languages have also been borrowed, including French. There's no reason that "anime" couldn't come from French. Of course, there's no reason it couldn't come from English either...
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Delirium
Posts: 18 |
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The difference, however, is that you can find the connection between "anime" and "animeshon" (=engl. animation) in every Japanese dictionary, while I haven´t read any linguistic text claiming "anime" is a descendant from "animé". If you don´t believe me, just check your dictionary of choice or refer to Goo Japan: http://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/cgi-bin/dict_search.cgi?MT=アニメ&sw=2 --- ANIME ANIMEESHON no ryaku (abbreviation). --- At least now you can´t speak from general consensus anymore. ;) |
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Tempest
I Run this place. ANN Publisher Posts: 10455 Location: Do not message me for support. |
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I Just read John's Answer and I can claim quite certainly that some of his facts are somewhat incorrect.
I'm not going to argue that Anime did not derive from English, but I am going to point out that his facts about the French language and the word animation are quite incorrect. Both in French and in English the original verb "to animate" / "animer" refers to giving soemthing life. Scolars of the English language will quickly point out that English has no latin roots, with the exception of some modern words (to animate is not a modern term) any and every English word with latin roots was imported to the English language from French, not directely from Latin. However, I concede that the exact same can be said for Japanese. While "animé" and "animation" are both French words, they could have arrived in Japan via the English word "animation." I must also concede that John is very correct in stating the following
If one was to bet on the source of a Japanese word that is clearly derived from some western language or other, English would be a much safer bet than French.
As I said, animation was a French word before the English language even existed.
Granted. I think finding out where that accent (not apostrophe) came from would be fairly important (but one sided) in solving this debate. -t |
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cookie
Former ANN Editor in Chief
Posts: 2460 Location: Do not contact me for support. |
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While accents "aren't used" in English, that doesn't mean that they aren't used in English. ;) It seems that proper titles ("pokémon") are probably the most likely to use accents (in English). I'll wager there are a few words in the English language that (properly) use the accent, but can be discarded when writing. I certainly can't think of any non-French origin words, but I'm sure there are a few out there. The accent is something that _some_ English speakers would recognize, which is (perhaps) why it was included with the é. Of course, given the sheer number of people who call it "Pokey-mon", I'm not so sure it was successful. :p A search on groups.google.com places the first use of "anime" in proper Japanese animation context to 1985. The first English post with the accent (animé) dates to 1992, but then disappears again for 2 years. "Japanese Animation" hails back to 1981 (and appears to have been in wide use before then), while "Japanimation" doesn't appear until 1984. In fact, the first use of 'animé' is by a .ch (Chile) poster.. and, as we know, Spanish/Spanish-based languages use accents. Additionally, the second use of it comes from Calum Tsang (in 1994), who was/is from the Toronto area (I'm a stalker! Har!). That could've had an influence on why he chose to write with an accent. Animé never really caught on, however, compared to plain "anime", probably in part due to the fact that English is a typically unaccented language. Also, if we take into account the theory of simultaneous spontaneous development/usage/invention, then 'animé' probably only entered into the English fandom in the late 80s/early 90s. Meanwhile, "anime" trickled in at nearly the same time as "Japanimation", in the early/mid 80s. So, that's my research on the subject. |
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Tempest
I Run this place. ANN Publisher Posts: 10455 Location: Do not message me for support. |
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But what about in Japan? |
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cookie
Former ANN Editor in Chief
Posts: 2460 Location: Do not contact me for support. |
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$B%"%K%a(J (katakana 'anime') :) |
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Ataru
 Posts: 2327 Location: Missouri (Strikeman) |
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Talk about a grey area. Is it from France or is it from Japan. The only person who knows for sure is the guy that started to call animation from Japan, anime.
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Dan42
Chief Encyclopedist
Posts: 3791 Location: Montreal |
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If you consider that "animation" is pronounced
a-ni-ma-seeyon in French and a-ni-may-shan in english and a-ni-may-shon in Japanese it seems to me the Japanese pronunciation is derived from English, not French. |
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Hotaru
Posts: 481 Location: NY |
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*whips our her old, duct-taped and falling apart french dictionary* there's two translations for animate: animer, as tempest wrote, and animé. animated is also translated as animé. now, i didn't get a 96 on the french proficiency for nothing, so here we go.
my offering is which ever came first. france or japan (i suck at world history, got a 70 on the regents) and when the word was invented so to speak. the japanese do in fact have a lot of american words "japanized" (i use the term for lack of a better way to write it). sure, that's understandable. so yeah. this was just brewing in my head for a while so i just got it out. um...anything else...nupe. except that animate may be the same in several other languages, so we'll never be sure where it came from perhaps |
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Tempest
I Run this place. ANN Publisher Posts: 10455 Location: Do not message me for support. |
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[French 101] Animer is the verb, ie: To Animate animé is the past particip, which can also be used as an adjectve (as can all past particips), animé is "animated". If your French-English dictionary translates animé <-> animate then it's wrong. [/French 101] |
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Tempest
I Run this place. ANN Publisher Posts: 10455 Location: Do not message me for support. |
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[quote="Tempest"]
[French 101] Animer is the verb, ie: To Animate animé is the past particip, which can also be used as an adjectve (as can all past particips), animé is "animated". If your French-English dictionary translates animé <-> animate then it's wrong. [/French 101] As for world history, Japan is about 2000 years old as a culture and has no roots prior to that (Japanese people emigrated to the Island from Mainland Asia 2000 years ago). French Culture is only about 1500 years old, but has (non-roman) roots going back a further 1000 years or so. North American (non indian) Culture is about 400 years old and has no (non-European) roots prior to that. Japanese and American cultures are similar in that they are formed of emigrants. Both lands have their own indigenous populations as well (Ameridiens and Ainu). |
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Hotaru
Posts: 481 Location: NY |
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just burst my bubble, tempest! *cries* i used that thing for years, but i don't recall ever using the word "animer". j'adore l'animation du japon.
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