Banzai literally means "Ten thousand years", It is written with the combination of the kanji characters for "ten thousand"（万) and "age"（歳), It means Hurrah, Long Life, Cheers.
Originated in ancient China as an expression used to wish long life to the Emperor, and is typically translated as "long live" in English. The Chinese term was introduced to Japan as banzei (Kana: ばんぜい) in the 8th century, and was used to express respect for the emperor in much the same manner as its Chinese cognate.
It is usually repeated three times to express enthusiasm, with arms stretched out above their heads to celebrate a victory, applause and favor on happy occasion. It is commonly done together with the large group of people, a kind of traditional Japanese form of applause.
During World War II, banzai served as a battle cry of sorts for Japanese soldiers, where japanese soldiers or pilots would shout "Tennouheika Banzai!"(天皇陛下万歳!) while making suicide charges against other soldiers or making ramming missions against enemy ships (in that context what they meant was "Long live the Emperor" or "Salute the Emperor"), as a result the term "banzai charge" (or alternatively "banzai attack") gained common currency among English-speaking soldiers and remains the most widely understood context of the term in the west to this day.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
0 comments:
Post a Comment