Engrish

Viper62 · Jan 10, 2008

Q. What is Engrish?

A. Engrish can be simply defined as the humorous English mistakes that appear in Japanese advertising and product design.

Q. Is Engrish found only in Japan?

A. No, Engrish can be found all over the world, but the vast majority of the really funny and creative Engrish is from Japan. The webmaster has seen many examples of Engrish from around the world, but most are not fit for Engrish.com (ie – they are not funny enough). People are invited to send in Engrish from other countries (including the US) - if some really good examples come in, Engrish.com will be happy to post them.

Q. Why do the Japanese try to use so much English if they can’t do it right?

A. Most of the Engrish found on Engrish.com is not an attempt to communicate - English is used as a design element in Japanese products and advertising to give them a modern look and feel (or just to "look cool"). There is often no attempt to try to get it right, nor do the vast majority of the Japanese population (= consumers) ever attempt to read the English design element in question (the girl wearing the “Spread Beaver” shirt for example, had no idea what it said until a foreigner pointed it out to her). There is therefore less emphasis on spell checking and grammatical accuracy (note: the same can be said for the addition of Japanese or Chinese characters to hats, shirts and tattoos found in the US or Europe).

Quite often it is easier to come up with English names than Japanese for a particular product. New products are brought to the marketplace in Japan more than anywhere else in the world and Japanese words and slogans quickly get used up. Japanese graphic designers will often tell you that English is widespread because the Japanese writing script (or scripts) limits their creativity - there are only so many ways to display their language, and only so many different types of fonts to use.

That said, in most instances Japanese companies do get it right and quite often consult a native English speaker for corrections.
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http://www.engrish.com/