＜prologue＞
I started a blog called “The Baby Boomer Generation’s Miscellaneous Blog”（Dankai-sedai no garakutatyou:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳） in July 2018, about a year before I fully retired. More than six years have passed since then, and the number of articles has increased considerably.
So, in order to make them accessible to people who don’t understand Japanese, I decided to translate my past articles into English and publish them.
It may sound a bit exaggerated, but I would like to make this my life’s work.
It should be noted that haiku and waka （Japanese short fixed form poems） are quite difficult to translate into English, so some parts are written in Japanese.
If you are interested in haiku or waka and would like to know more, please read introductory or specialized books on haiku or waka written in English.
I also write many articles about the Japanese language. I would be happy if these inspire more people to want to learn Japanese.
my blog’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳 | 団塊世代が雑学や面白い話を発信しています
my X’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多帳（@historia49）さん / X
To prevent an outbreak of COVID-19, Prime Minister Abe urged the public to “refrain from traveling from urban areas to rural areas as much as possible during Golden Week” and to “return home online via video calls.”
This year’s Golden Week was also mockingly referred to as “Ganman Week,” due to requests to “refrain from going out” and “refrain from traveling outside of the prefecture for sightseeing.”
By the way, have you noticed that NHK consciously avoids using the term “Golden Week” in its news programs and instead uses the term “long holiday” instead?
I would like to consider this in this article.
1. Why NHK Doesn’t Use the Term “Golden Week”
I’m not an NHK employee, so I don’t have any solid evidence, but there seem to be several theories about this.
(1) They Don’t Use It Because It’s “Japanese-English”
The term “Golden Week” is a Japanese-English word coined by the film industry. NHK’s broadcasting policy is to “broadcast in correct Japanese, avoiding the use of foreign words and katakana as much as possible,” so it seems that this does not fit with NHK’s policy. I seem to recall that in the past, newspapers would call it “Golden Week.”
However, there are countless examples of Japanese-made English words, such as “base up,” “four ball,” “level down,” “office lady,” “pan,” “cider,” “hotcake,” “purin,” and “syue cream”.
It does not appear that all of these have been replaced with Japanese words. It also does not appear that, as during wartime, “enemy words” were avoided (e.g., in baseball, strike was called “よし（good）,” ball was called “no good（だめ）,” a curveball was called “曲球（curveball）,” and a foul ball was called “邪球（bad ball”) and replaced entirely with Japanese. In that sense, this reason alone is not very persuasive.
As an aside, the following anecdote about the translation of baseball terms into Japanese is included in Noboru Aota’s book.
Baseball terminology was also deemed offensive and therefore forbidden to use, so a strike became “good”, a ball “no”, a curveball “a curveball”, and a foul ball “a bad ball”.
This caused a lot of trouble for announcers (called broadcasters) covering live baseball games.
“The pitcher threw with his specialty underhand throw, or rather, underhand throw. He threw a curveball right down the middle and it was a strike — no, it was a ‘good’. The batter, no, the batter Aota, looked disappointed that he had missed it. The pitcher threw the second pitch. He hit it, but it was a foul ball toward first base — no, it was a bad ball.”
The pitcher nodded at the catcher’s sign, no, no, signal, and got into a pitching stance that was not a big windup, and threw the third pitch. Ah, Aota hit it. The right fielder — no, no, the right fielder stepped back, stepped back as hard as he could, and the ball was passed
Over right field, no, over right field. Aota, who hit the ball, went to first base — no, he kicked the first-base plate to second, then the second-base plate, and then to third. The ball, no, the ball, was thrown back from the right fielder, and the second baseman relayed it to third. Aota slid furiously into third base, safe.”
The announcer then announced, “S-sorry. I got excited and said he slid into third base, but I’d like to correct that and say he slid into the third-base plate.” (From “Aota Noboru’s Skyward Battlefield Story,” pp. 9-10)
野球の用語も、敵性語だから使用はならぬとなり、ストライクは「よーし」、ボールは「だめ」、カーブは「曲球」、ファウルは「邪球」という事になった。
このため、野球の実況中継をするアナウンサー（放送員といった）は苦労した。
「投手、得意のアンダースロー、いや下手投げで投げました。ドまん中に曲球が投げられて、ストライク――ではなかった、”よし”です。バッターの、い、いや打者の青田、見逃して残念そうな顔。第二球、投手投げました。打ちましたが、一塁側にファウル――い、いえ、邪球でした。
投手、捕手サインに、い、いや、信号にうなずくと、大きくワインダップではない投球姿勢に入って、第三球投げました。あっ、青田打ちました。ライト・バック――い、いえ、右翼手後退、けんめいに後退、抜かれました。
ライト・オーバー、いや、右翼越え。打った青田は一塁ベース――いや、一塁版を蹴って二塁へ、二塁版を蹴って、さらに三塁へ。ボールは、いえ、球は右翼手から返球、二塁手がこれを中継して三塁へ。青田、モーレツに三塁ベースへスライディング、セ、セーフです」
アナウンサーは、こう放送してから
「し、失礼しました。ただ今、興奮して三塁ベースにスライディングと申し上げましたが、これは三塁版へ滑りこみと訂正いたします」（「青田昇の空ゆかば戦陣物語」P9～10より）
(2) Don’t use it because it’s a “commercial term.”
Originally, the film industry coined the phrase “Let’s go see a movie during Golden Week, a long weekend.” Unlike commercial broadcasters, NHK is a broadcasting station funded by reception fees, so the rationale is to avoid expressions that endorse specific companies. “In order to maintain neutrality, it would be inappropriate to use promotional slogans created by the film industry.”
However, I think they did broadcast news about department stores’ “summer gift sales,” “year-end gift sales,” and “Valentine’s Day.” I don’t closely monitor every NHK broadcast, so I’m not sure…
By the way, the custom of women giving chocolates to men on Valentine’s Day is unique to Japan, created by the Japanese confectionery industry (Morozoff Confectionery).
(3) Don’t use it out of consideration for those who don’t have long weekends.
While Golden Week is a long weekend for many people, there are also those who can’t take time off. In the past (around the time of the oil crisis), NHK apparently received phone calls complaining, “What’s the point of calling it prime time when we can’t even take time off during the recession?”
People come in all different circumstances, and some people find the term “Golden Week” repugnant, so they changed it to “long consecutive holidays.”
However, while they’ve removed the word “golden,” the word “long consecutive holidays” remains. So people who can’t take time off during the long holidays might complain, “Don’t use the word long consecutive holidays!” And the fact remains that “there are people who can’t take time off during the long consecutive holidays,” so fundamentally, it doesn’t solve anything. Should they have said something like, “A week (or period) that is a long holiday for some people”? It sounds like a definition from a Japanese dictionary.
(4) Production reasons: “It’s too long to fit in subtitles.”
Some people cite the production reason that “Golden Week” has nine characters, and including it in subtitles would block out other information they want to include.
However, I think it would generally be understood if they wrote it as “GW” like commercial broadcasters do…
(5) It doesn’t fit the original meaning of “week” (7 days), since it can refer to a holiday of more than a week.
Strictly speaking, this is certainly true, but for example, “2020 Spring Traffic Safety Week” was 10 days long, from April 6 (Monday) to April 15 (Wednesday). This also seems a weak reason.
As an aside, when I was younger, the period from April 29 (Emperor’s Birthday) to May 3 (Constitution Memorial Day) to May 5 (Children’s Day) was called the “stepping stone long weekend.” Saturday wasn’t a day off, but a “half-day off.” Sunday fell into this period, giving people four days off, albeit in a scattered fashion. However, there was no system for “substitute holidays,” so if a public holiday fell on a Sunday, it felt like I’d lost a day off, which was disappointing.
As a result, it seems that the autumn “Silver Week” is also referred to as a “long consecutive holiday.” I haven’t checked every single one, but considering that NHK avoids using “Golden Week” as much as it does a “banned word,” this makes sense.
In conclusion, although I don’t know the exact reason, it seems that NHK is avoiding using the term “Golden Week” after taking various circumstances into consideration.
However, Prime Minister Abe also appealed to the public, saying, “I would like to ask that people refrain from traveling from urban areas to rural areas during Golden Week and that they visit their hometowns online via video calls,” and the caption accompanying his statement read “Golden Week.”
Since it’s such a commonly used term, I don’t think there’s any need to be shy about using it or make a fuss about it…
2. An NHK newscaster accidentally blurted out “Golden Week.”
NHK was being extremely careful, but one newscaster accidentally blurted out the phrase.
On April 24, 2015, during “News Watch 9,” the topic turned to the “Tulip Festival” in Niigata Prefecture. After the weathercaster mentioned, “This festival runs until May 6th,” another newscaster blurted out, “So you can enjoy it during Golden Week.”
The female newscaster next to her quickly followed up with, “Yes, it’s during the long holiday period,” so the situation was resolved.
3. Concerns about “Word Hunting” and “Political Correctness”
I believe NHK’s approach of “replacing Golden Week with “long holiday” and not “Golden Week” is a form of “word hunting.”
“Word hunting” refers to the process by which commonly used words are deemed inappropriate by some people and become taboo.
The term “political correctness” refers to the replacement of commonly used words with socially correct words.
This term was coined in the multi-ethnic United States in the 1980s and refers to the use of politically and socially fair and neutral words and expressions to prevent discrimination and prejudice based on gender, race, ethnicity, religion, etc.
However, the use of “political correctness” does not eliminate racial or gender discrimination. The same goes for renaming diseases that are considered discriminatory, such as “infectious disease,” “dementia,” “schizophrenia,” or “leprosy.”
I think that both “word hunting” and “political correctness” are misguided trends that make people seem hypocritical and only care about appearances.