The Anime Glossary

Every word this site explains, in one place. Each entry answers the question people actually type, then corrects what the internet usually gets wrong about it — the etymology that is repeated everywhere and false, the register nobody supplies, the meaning that narrowed in the borrowing.

96 words in 8 groups, each with its own page How every entry is checked

Words the Shows Made Famous 11, Honorifics & Address 8, Everyday Speech 16, Fans & Character Types 13, Genres & Formats 8, The Industry & Publishing 13, Ideas, Aesthetics & Folklore 21, Daily Life & Society 6

Words the Shows Made Famous (11 words)

あらあら Ara Ara: Ara ara (あらあら) is a mild interjection meaning roughly my my. It is closer to a mother finding a mess than to anything seductive.
卍解 Bankai: Bankai (卍解) is the second sword release in Bleach, after shikai (始解). Its first character is the Buddhist manji, a temple symbol on Japanese maps.
だってばよ Dattebayo: Dattebayo (だってばよ) is Naruto's insisting sentence ending, roughly I'm telling you. VIZ's editor thinks the dub's Believe it! was chosen to fit his mouth movements.
木偶 Deku: Deku (木偶) is a Japanese word for a wooden puppet, and by extension an insult meaning a useless person. Anime fans mostly know it as Izuku Midoriya's hero name in My Hero Academia, where it starts as a taunt and gets reclaimed.
計画 Keikaku: Keikaku (計画) just means plan. A meme parodying literal fansubs kept it in a Death Note line and footnoted it, and the note became a fandom joke.
何 Nani: Nani (何) simply means what. English fandom knows it as a cry of shock because of Fist of the North Star remixes that became a meme in 2017.
お前はもう死んでいる Omae Wa Mou Shindeiru: Omae wa mou shindeiru (お前はもう死んでいる) means you are already dead: Kenshiro's line from Fist of the North Star, delivered before the victim knows.
人は殺されれば死ぬ People Die If They Are Killed: People die if they are killed is, in Wikipedia's words, an infamous out-of-context quote from the 2006 Fate/stay night anime. Wikiquote gives Rin Tohsaka a close variant.
領域展開 Ryouiki Tenkai: Ryouiki tenkai (領域展開) is Domain Expansion in Jujutsu Kaisen. Both words are plain Japanese, and tenkai means unfolding or deploying more than growing.
心臓を捧げよ Shinzou Wo Sasageyo: Shinzou wo sasageyo (心臓を捧げよ) means offer up your heart: the organ, not the feelings, in the written command form. It is the cry of Attack on Titan.
やれやれだぜ Yare Yare Daze: Yare yare daze (やれやれだぜ) is Jotaro Kujo's catchphrase: a sigh that the Daijisen dictionary lists first as relief, made rough and masculine by the ending daze.

Honorifics & Address (8 words)

僕 Boku: Boku (僕) is a Japanese word for I whose use depends on the speaker, setting and listener. Actual conversation records complicate simple age and personality rules.
ちゃん Chan: Chan (ちゃん) is a diminutive honorific that developed from san. It marks intimacy, not femininity or cuteness.
後輩 Kohai: Kohai (後輩) means a junior relative to a senior. Organizational seniority can differ from age, and the word does not establish a universal set of duties.
君 Kun: Kun (君) is added to the name of an equal or a junior. It is used for boys far more often than girls, and seniors also use it for juniors of either sex.
お兄ちゃん Oniichan: Oniichan (お兄ちゃん) is a soft word for older brother, and Japanese also uses kinship terms for strangers, which English almost never does.
様 Sama: Sama (様) is the honorific above san. Fantasy settings make it sound lordly, but it is the ordinary form for customers and on every envelope.
先輩 Senpai: Senpai (先輩) means a senior in a shared setting or field of experience. Organizational seniority can differ from age, and the word does not imply a crush.
先生 Sensei: Sensei (先生) can mean teacher or serve as a respectful title for professionals such as doctors and lawyers. Its literal spelling is not a rule based on age.

Everyday Speech (16 words)

馬鹿 Baka: Baka (馬鹿) means fool or idiot. Its horse-and-deer spelling is ateji; the sentence, tone and relationship determine whether it insults or teases.
大丈夫 Daijoubu: Daijoubu (大丈夫) began as a phrase for a sturdy man and now means all right. It has also become a polite way of refusing, which trips up learners.
駄目 Dame: Dame (駄目) comes from go, where it marks a point worth nothing to either side. It now means no good, useless, or an outright no.
頑張って Ganbatte: Ganbatte (頑張って) means do your best, or keep at it. Subtitles can render it "good luck", which swaps a word about effort for a word about luck.
はい Hai: Hai (はい) confirms receipt more than agreement. It is why a Japanese speaker can say it steadily through a proposal and then decline it.
いただきます Itadakimasu: Itadakimasu (いただきます) means "I humbly receive". Subtitles render it "let's eat" or "bon appétit", both of which point the sentence at the wrong party.
可愛い Kawaii: Kawaii (可愛い) means cute or endearing. Its lexical history and the history of commercial cute styles are related questions, rather than one definition.
マジ Maji: Maji (マジ) is short for majime, earnest. Its slang use is attested as early as 1781, in the Edo period.
仲間 Nakama: Nakama (仲間) can mean a companion, fellow member or something of the same kind. One Piece adds the bonds of its crew; the word alone does not promise chosen family.
お疲れ様 Otsukaresama: Otsukaresama (お疲れ様) acknowledges that someone has expended effort. It greets and farewells at once, and English has nothing that does the job.
流石 Sasuga: Sasuga (流石) praises by confirming a reputation: you did the thing you are known for. The English of course sounds sarcastic doing the same job.
すみません Sumimasen: Sumimasen (すみません) apologizes, gets attention, and thanks, because its sense is that something between two people is not yet settled.
ただいま Tadaima: Tadaima (ただいま) means just now, all that survives of I have just returned. It comes paired with a required response, which English greetings do not.
和製英語 Wasei Eigo: Wasei-eigo (和製英語) is English-derived vocabulary coined in Japan. These are Japanese words built from English parts, not mistakes in English.
ヤバい Yabai: Yabai (ヤバい) began as criminal slang for dangerous and now means both terrible and wonderful, the same reversal English performed on bad and sick.
よろしく Yoroshiku: Yoroshiku (よろしく) asks someone to treat you favorably going forward. Nice to meet you is the usual subtitle and faces the wrong direction.

Fans & Character Types (13 words)

美少年 Bishounen: Bishounen (美少年) is a beautiful boy: 美 for beauty, plus the same 少年 behind shonen. It also names an aesthetic with roots in older Japanese literature.
ちび Chibi: Chibi (ちび) means short or small, and said of a short person it can be a jibe. English fandom took the name of an art style from it by way of the Japanese chibi kyara.
中二病 Chuunibyou: Chuunibyou (中二病) is a joke diagnosis for adolescent posturing, coined on a radio program in 1999 by a presenter admitting he still had it.
コスプレ Cosplay: Cosplay was coined in Japan in 1983 by Nobuyuki Takahashi, who with university friends found the Japanese translation of masquerade too noble and old-fashioned.
ギャル Gyaru: Gyaru (ギャル) comes from the English gal and can mean a young woman, but it also names a subculture: a deliberate look and stance.
痛車 Itasha: Itasha (痛車) means painful car: a vehicle decorated with anime characters. The name is self-deprecating and puns on older slang for an Italian import.
クーデレ Kuudere: Kuudere (クーデレ) joins the English cool with dere. It is a real character type, and the word is largely a fandom coinage by analogy.
萌え Moe: Moe (萌え) comes from a verb meaning to sprout, with a homophone meaning to burn. It names a response in the viewer, not an attribute of a character.
推し Oshi: Oshi (推し) comes from a verb meaning to push forward. It names the person you actively promote, which is why favorite is too weak a translation.
お宅 Otaku: Otaku can mean an intensely absorbed fan; お宅 also has respectful household and address uses. Its fan sense is not a diagnosis or an insult in every context.
ツンデレ Tsundere: Tsundere (ツンデレ) joins an aloof manner with affectionate behavior. It describes a pattern; the label alone does not prove why a character acts that way.
ワイフ Waifu: Waifu (ワイフ) is the English word "wife" borrowed into Japanese. English took it back with a new meaning after a 2002 anime scene, so it is a loanword twice over.
ヤンデレ Yandere: Yandere (ヤンデレ) joins yanderu (to be mentally unwell) with deredere (lovestruck). The first half is about illness, not temperament, which is what separates it from tsundere.

Genres & Formats (8 words)

エッチ Ecchi: Ecchi (エッチ) is the letter H spoken aloud, standing for hentai. The English idea that it names a milder tier than hentai is an English development.
ハーレム Harem: Harem (ハーレム) names a household's secluded women's quarters; Japanese fiction turned it into a genre label, now used in English in that sense too.
異世界 Isekai: Isekai (異世界) means other world. Unlike shonen it is a real genre label in Japanese, and its modern boom came from web novels published on the Shosetsuka ni Naro platform.
癒し系 Iyashikei: Iyashikei (癒し系) means the healing type: works classified by the calm they produce in the viewer rather than by what happens in them.
怪獣 Kaiju: Kaiju (怪獣) means strange beast, or simply monster. It also names the giant creatures of monster films.
メカ Mecha: Mecha (メカ) is a clipping of mechanism and covers machinery in general in Japanese. The narrow English sense of piloted giant robots is an English invention.
日常 Nichijou: Nichijou (日常) means the everyday. Attached to kei it names fiction about the unremarkable, where nothing much happening is the intended effect.
スポ根 Spokon: Spokon (スポ根) blends sports with konjou, guts. The genre began in the 1960s and its subject is endurance rather than athletic achievement.

The Industry & Publishing (13 words)

アニメ Anime: Anime (アニメ) is short for animation and means animation of any origin in Japanese. The sense of Japanese animation specifically is an English narrowing.
コミケット Comiket: Comiket is the doujinshi fair that began in 1975 with about 700 attendees and grew into the largest fan convention in the world.
クール Cour: A cour is a roughly three-month broadcasting unit, not a promise of exactly twelve or thirteen episodes. Official season and part labels still matter.
同人誌 Doujinshi: Doujinshi (同人誌) means self-published work by a circle. It describes the publishing route, not the content, and includes wholly original material.
女性 Josei: Josei means woman or women. Its manga category concerns an intended readership, not explicit content or the age of the protagonist; Chihayafuru shows the distinction.
漫画 Manga: Manga (漫画) means comics in Japanese, including foreign ones. The claim that Hokusai coined the word in 1814 is repeated everywhere and is an oversimplification.
漫画家 Mangaka: Mangaka (漫画家) uses the suffix 家, which marks a practitioner of an art. The English manga artist misses that the same person usually writes the story too.
オーブイエー Ova: OVA means Original Video Animation, traditionally made for home video. Hunter x Hunter shows why an OVA can be a continuation rather than a disposable extra.
作画 Sakuga: Sakuga (作画) means the drawing work of animation, including the ordinary parts. The fandom sense of a spectacular sequence is a narrowing of it.
青年 Seinen: Seinen refers to youth or a young man. The manga category concerns readership, not a required level of violence: Chi’s Sweet Home is a useful counterexample.
声優 Seiyuu: Seiyuu means voice actor, with work extending beyond anime. Maaya Sakamoto’s documented credits and audition account show why the job and an individual career differ.
少年 Shonen: Shonen means boy. In manga it points to an intended readership, while genre and age rating answer different questions. Sports and thrillers both fit.
少女 Shoujo: Shoujo means girl. As a manga category it concerns readership, while a title such as Yona of the Dawn can also be fantasy, adventure and romance.

Ideas, Aesthetics & Folklore (21 words)

甘え Amae: Amae (甘え) is presuming on someone's affection and expecting indulgence. Takeo Doi built a famous 1971 book on it, and his central claim is contested.
我慢 Gaman: Gaman (我慢) means enduring hardship without complaint. It began as a Buddhist word for arrogance, which is a reversal worth knowing.
義理 Giri: Giri (義理) is obligation owed because of a relationship rather than because of feeling, and its classic partner is ninjou, human feeling.
本音 Honne: Honne (本音) is what a person really thinks; tatemae is what the situation requires them to say. The pair is not duplicity, it is vocabulary.
生き甲斐 Ikigai: Ikigai (生き甲斐) means whatever makes life feel worth living. The famous four-circle diagram is Spanish, from 2012, and was relabeled ikigai in 2014.
神 Kami: Kami (神) covers deities, spirits, natural forces and ancestors alike. English god is much narrower, which is why the standard translation misleads.
心 Kokoro: Kokoro (心) covers heart, mind and spirit in one word. English has to pick one, which is why translations of it always lose something.
木漏れ日 Komorebi: Komorebi (木漏れ日) means sunlight filtering through leaves. Dappled describes a broader pattern; an English phrase can preserve the trees and sunlight.
空気を読む Kuuki Wo Yomu: Kuuki wo yomu (空気を読む) means reading the unspoken mood of a room. English has read the room, which is close enough to undercut the usual claim.
間 Ma: Ma (間) is the interval between things, treated as something present rather than as absence. English pause and empty space both imply nothing is there.
物の哀れ Mono No Aware: Mono no aware (物の哀れ) is the feeling produced by things that pass. The scholar Motoori Norinaga made it a critical term in the 18th century while writing about The Tale of Genji.
もったいない Mottainai: Mottainai (もったいない) objects to waste on behalf of the thing wasted. Wangari Maathai adopted it in 2005 as an environmental rallying cry.
懐かしい Natsukashii: Natsukashii (懐かしい) describes the object that brings the past back, and the feeling is warm. English nostalgic describes the person and carries melancholy.
鬼 Oni: Oni (鬼) are large, dangerous beings of Japanese folklore, usually called demons or ogres in English. The character also appears in ordinary compounds meaning exceptional.
渋い Shibui: Shibui (渋い) began as the taste of an unripe persimmon and became an aesthetic term for beauty that is understated and precisely sufficient.
死神 Shinigami: Shinigami (死神) joins death with kami, a spirit. The figure is not ancient: the word generally does not appear in classical Japanese literature and is attested from the Edo period.
しょうがない Shouganai: Shouganai (しょうがない) says no method exists for a situation. English calls it fatalism while using it is what it is for exactly the same purpose.
積ん読 Tsundoku: Tsundoku (積ん読) is buying books and letting them pile up unread. The word is a Meiji-era pun and it says nothing about intent.
侘寂 Wabi Sabi: Wabi and sabi are two terms, not one. Sen no Rikyu did not invent them; he applied an existing austerity to tea and made it famous.
妖怪 Yokai: Yokai (妖怪) is built from two characters that both mean strange. It names the experience of the inexplicable rather than a species, so events can be yokai too.
幽玄 Yugen: Yugen (幽玄) names beauty that is suggested rather than shown. Zeami made it the standard of excellence in Noh, above straightforward imitation.

Daily Life & Society (6 words)

弁当 Bento: Bento (弁当) is a packed meal, typically in a box. In fiction it is rarely about food, because making one for someone is the message.
花見 Hanami: Hanami (花見) is cherry blossom viewing, and it is a picnic with drink and colleagues rather than the solemn contemplation English writing suggests.
引きこもり Hikikomori: Hikikomori (引きこもり) is prolonged social withdrawal, defined by Japan's health ministry as lasting six months or more. It is documented well beyond Japan.
過労死 Karoshi: Karoshi (過労死) is death from overwork, defined in Japanese law and treated as an occupational condition for compensation purposes.
お任せ Omakase: Omakase (お任せ) means leaving it up to you, in any situation. The English restaurant sense is a narrowing of an ordinary act of entrusting.
サラリーマン Salaryman: Salaryman (サラリーマン) is Japanese-made English for a company employee, naming a life path rather than a job: long hours, loyalty, and a career at one firm.