Author ｜
Chi Yang
Abstract ｜
This article selects the two-character modern Chinese-Japanese isomorphous verbs yazha 壓榨 and zhaqu 榨取 as the objects of investigation. By investigating the English-Chinese dictionaries, English-Japanese dictionaries, newspapers, and magazines, etc., it examines the origin and the history of the words in question. This article tries to trace the appearance and spread of the two words in modern China and Japan. It is indicated that both yazha and zhaqu were originated from Japan and the Chinese counterparts were formed by extracting the Chinese characters from the Japanese “oshitsukeru” (おしつけ), “shiboru” (しぼる), and “shiboritoru” (搾り取る). At the beginning of their birth, yazha and zhaqu only implied the physical actions of squeezing and extracting. In the 1820s, the Japanese yazha acquired the extended meaning of exploiting and grabbing. At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, through the translation of newspapers, magazines, and Japanese books, yazha and zhaqu flowed into China and their meanings became finalized in Chinese. At first, yazha mostly took the form of compound nouns such as squeezer or squeezing machine, appearing as the concept of artifact. Later, extended meanings in political context such as “squeezing the workers” and “squeezing the surplus value” began to emerge on a large scale.
keywords ｜
yazha, zhaqu, etymology, Japanese loanwords, wakansoutsu