How are 造語 like ググる or スタバる used and by whom?

Hi! I'm trying to find out more about innovative verbs that come from loanwords, and i have a couple questions about them:

Are they used by older people/in formal situations? Or are they really slang? I'm curious if youth invent them or anyone starts using them. Also are 造語 made because there is no "traditional" Japanese word for them? Or can any loanword be made into one?

Do you use both stem + る and loanword + する or do you have to choose one? Like I've heard of ゲットる and ゲットする, is one used more/differently?

Anything you can tell me would really help! I'm writing a paper about it and a primary source is very helpful

minimijn said:

Are they used by older people/in formal situations?

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Yes, because many are well established and are just normal words now. ゴルフする etc.

minimijn said:

Or are they really slang? I'm curious if youth invent them or anyone starts using them.

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I don't think most are slang and there must be a variety of ways they all got their start.

minimijn said:

Also are 造語 made because there is no "traditional" Japanese word for them? Or can any loanword be made into one?

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There are many cases where a traditional words exists yet still there's a loanword. デリバリー for example.

minimijn said:

Do you use both stem + る and loanword + する or do you have to choose one? Like I've heard of ゲットる and ゲットする, is one used more/differently?

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I've never heard of ゲットる and I don't see it in my dictionary. Are you sure this is a thing?

(mdchachi beat me to the thread, but hopefully this is still relevant)

Its the same as in English. You now see all kinds of people saying phrases like "let me google that". It simply becomes easier to say "Google it" rather than "look it up in a search engine". You might not say something like "Let's Starbucks today", but then again you could probably say it and everyone would understand. You could certainly say, "Let's do Starbucks", which is essentially turning Starbucks into a verb. It really is quite similar in Japanese.

As you probably know, Google in Japanese is グーグル, which conveniently already sounds like a verb thanks to the ル ending. So it is a very short step to start using Google as if it were a Japanese verb, with proper verb conjugations and tenses. A technology-centered word/name like グーグル will naturally spread most quickly in the population that most uses that technology: so yes you could say that it starts out with the 20-30 year olds, and then spreads in acceptance and adoption from there. Any loanword can enter common usage, but Google is especially suited to Japanese because of the sound, and because of the dominance of Google in the market, and because it is a technology most of us use nowadays. I think another reason it might have had very little resistance is because it sounds kind of cute and funny. グーグル、ググってください、 etc... all sound kind of funny in a cute way.
(Since Google ends in the ル sound, you don't need to add +する).

I think the use of Starbucks as a verb is a bit less common, simply because "Starbucks" doesn't sound like quite like a Japanese verb - at least, not as naturally as Google sounds. Also, The accessibility and use of Starbucks isn't as pervasive as Google, so I think it is probably limited in use to mostly young people or people who have frequent opportunity to enter a Starbucks.

I have never heard ゲットる. However ゲットする is very common. So common that it started to sound like a cliche about a decade or two ago.

Regarding your question about a verb like "ググル" being used in formal situations - I think here, too, it is just like English or any European language. If the situation calls for it, then yes you could imagine a formal situation where someone says "I googled the results...". But it really depends on the situation.

mdchachi said:

Yes, because many are well established and are just normal words now. ゴルフする etc.

There are many cases where a traditional words exists yet still there's a loanword. デリバリー for example.

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I'm really talking about verbs where there's a -る ending, not -する. I know all about normal loanwords, I've just come across these "smashed" verbs and was wondering about them specifically. I thought it would be a good topic for my paper, but because of COVID I really don't have access to Japanese native speakers personally so I decided to go through forums.

mdchachi said:

I've never heard of ゲットる and I don't see it in my dictionary. Are you sure this is a thing?

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I've seen it on twitter. I don't know if it's used because it's a proper "word" or if it's used just to be able to fit more characters in a single tweet, which is my theory. I'm asking exactly because I don't know if it's a thing, and Japanese native speakers would most likely know.

Majestic said:

(mdchachi beat me to the thread, but hopefully this is still relevant)

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Definitely! I'm looking to get as many perspectives as I can on it! I know about how the verbs are made and conjugated, luckily there's already a few articles about it! There isn't a lot on who uses it and when, though, and that's mainly my question.

Majestic said:

Regarding your question about a verb like "ググル" being used in formal situations - I think here, too, it is just like English or any European language. If the situation calls for it, then yes you could imagine a formal situation where someone says "I googled the results...". But it really depends on the situation.

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hmm yeah, I can see that. I just thought that maybe the Japanese importance of tradition could kind of limit the use in formal situations, but I agree that it could totally depend on the situation.

minimijn said:

I'm really talking about verbs where there's a -る ending, not -する. I know all about normal loanwords, I've just come across these "smashed" verbs and was wondering about them specifically.

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Oh sorry I wasn't aware of any of these situations where +る is added and then it works like a regular verb. But then I don't hang out on Japanese twitter. Can you post some actual examples (tweets)?

mdchachi said:

Oh sorry I wasn't aware of any of these situations where +る is added and then it works like a regular verb. But then I don't hang out on Japanese twitter. Can you post some actual examples (tweets)?

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Like Majestic said above, the use of the 造語 verb ググる to mean "to Google [something]" (i.e. "to look something up using the Google search engine") is actually relatively common and mainstream, and not limited to Twitter or even the internet in general. (You'll hear people occasionally say things like ググってみて or ググっても出てこなかった, etc. in actual conversation.) If you're looking for examples of it being used, it should be easy enough to, well, Google it.

To address some of the other verbs being tossed around here:

I'll concur with Majestic that スタブる and ゲットる are far less mainstream than ググる. (I live in Japan and interact in Japanese with native speakers, consume Japanese media, etc., every day, and I can't remember the last time I've heard/seen these "in the wild.") I won't say they don't exist at all, but the situations in which you'll find them are probably quite rare.

Some more mainstream/common examples of these sorts of coined verbs are ディスる／ディスって (from the English word "to dis", i.e. "to disrespect"), ミスる (to make a mistake, from the English loanword ミス, which itself is very common in Japanese, though obviously with a different meaning than the English word "miss"), ハモる (to "harmonize", in the literal sense or sometimes with the meaning of just being in tune with or saying the same thing as someone at the same time), etc.

minimijn said:

mm yeah, I can see that. I just thought that maybe the Japanese importance of tradition could kind of limit the use in formal situations, but I agree that it could totally depend on the situation.

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To whatever extent the "Japanese importance of tradition" exists, it doesn't really apply to the use of loanwords and buzzwords, especially (but not limited to) in the business/IT world. If you ever have the opportunity to take part in a meeting at a Japanese company, I suspect you'd be amazed at how many 横文字 (some directly borrowed from English, others uniquely Japanese adaptations/bastardizations) are thrown around.

Regarding this subject, I quickly ググってみた, and turned up this article (it's in Japanese, but fairly simple and straightforwardly written).


It's described by this author as 若者言葉 (younger generation speak) and 体言＋る form, and as the author explains, there are also examples of this pattern that date back further and are more established to the point that they appear in authoritative dictionaries like 広辞苑 (e.g. サボる, 愚痴る／グチる, テンパる, etc.)

Wow I never knew that. Maybe I should hang out with more 女子高生?
This is another example why the Japanese constantly put up subtitles for their own language. Often nobody knows what they hell they are talking about!

Haha. I mean, I know you're partially being tongue-in-cheek, but let me just again make the point that using ググる as a verb is actually pretty widely heard.
I mean, I'm talking about people my own age (thirty and forty-somethings in IT and whatnot), not some niche teenager slang that is going to make the average adult scratch their head.

There is such a thing as 女子校正 slang that would probably be incomprehensible to people like me (and even native Japanese closer to my age), but the verb constructions being discussed in this thread (at least, the more widespread ones; as mentioned above, some are more rare) don't fall under that category.

(edited for clarity)

I'm going to try it. Next time somebody asks me something dumb, I'll just say in a snarky voice ググれば.

There you go!


See? That's exactly how you use it. You're already a master.

Thanks everyone! This helps a lot! I didn't know about ディスる、it's interesting 'cause we have that one in the Netherlands too! And thanks for the extra words, I realise I only know a few of them.