Rock-paper-scissors redux

[Benjamin Barrett]

I have never heard the word "kuronbou" in Japanese except as a
derogatory term and will bring the fact that it's in Jim Breen's
dictionary up. At least, it should be labeled.

I heard roshambo just a few weeks ago in English.

I've never questioned what significance "red" has in akanbou, but my
Nihongo Daijiten says it's (1) a newborn infant, which makes sense, or
(2) a naive person.

FWIW
Benjamin Barrett
a cyberbreath for language life
livinglanguages.wordpress.com

Wilson Gray wrote:
> What you have to say re "kurambo / kuranbo" is good enough for my
> purposes, Doug. After all, the price that you're charging for the info
> is certainly right! Thank you! Since the shift of /n/ to /m/ in the
> environment before /b/ is predictable, I'm aware of the variation in
> transliterations.
>
> As for "roshambo," my point was that the writer had obviously pulled
> that statement out of his ass, uh, hat, given that no right-thinking
> Frenchman would transliterate Japanese
> /S/ as "sh" and not as "ch."
>
> -Wilson
>
> On 5/17/07, Douglas G. Wilson <douglas at nb.net> wrote:
>
>>> "... '[R]oshambo' [is] the French name for the game."
>>>
>> Well, I don't know .... I didn't find this to be self-evident in my
>> previous inquiry .... Maybe I'll take another look.
>>
>>
>>> ... I wonder what game "kurambo" is the French name for.
>>>
>> Apparently the dictionary form of this word is "kuro[n]bo[u]" (the "n" can
>> also be transliterated "m") as expected ("kuroi" = "black").
>>
>> Breen's current on-line Japanese-English dictionary does not show the
>> translation "Negro" (although older dictionaries do), but rather
>> "dark-skinned person, well-tanned person" and of course also "stagehand (in
>> kabuki), prompter" (I suppose a person who traditionally is entirely
>> covered in black cloth?). It may be that this word is becoming obsolescent
>> as a racial term/slur.
>>
>> I suppose the variant "kuranbo"/"kurambo" which I see here and there on the
>> Web may be influenced by "sakuranbo[u]" = "cherry"?
>>
>> As "kuronbou" is to "kuroi"="black", so "akanbou" is to "akai"="red" ...
>> this means [not "person of a red-skinned race", not "well-sunburned
>> person", but] "baby" (cf. "akachan"). I guess maybe folks tend to be born
>> sort of red. (^_^)
>>

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