Not a new thing, but I didn’t know enough Japanese language or culture when I first watched Working!! or Black Rock Shooter, so I didn’t realize this tidbit of information until I rewatched BRS the other day, and I remembered now so I felt like blogging about it :P
The name 小鳥遊 in both Working!! and BRS is pronounced “Takanashi,” even though the characters are literally “kotori asobi” (“xiao4 niao4 you2” in Pinyin) which means “little birds playing.” Takanashi Yomi in BRS explains to Mato the meaning behind the pronunciation: “There are ‘no hawks’ where ‘little birds play’.” Perhaps I’ve been brainwashed by my high school English teacher, since we always went over the history of vocabulary in class, but I love this kind of language stuff, particularly since it’s unique to character-based languages and not really something found in letter-based languages, so it’s one of the first times I’ve been exposed to it.
To go a little more in-depth, “taka” means “hawk” or “falcon.” The suffix “nashi” means “without” or otherwise signifies a lack of the noun it’s modifying. For example, “Otonashi” from Angel Beats means “no sound.”
Why did I all of a sudden remember to make this post? I was rereading Skip Beat (since it’s awesome like that) and went past the areas where they explain Kyoko’s name (Kyoko is commonly written in Hiragana きょうこ but Skip Beat’s Kyoko is written in kanji 京子), and was musing to myself about Japanese names, then remembered about Working!! and BRS. Stream of consciousness enough for you? :)
simplephobia 