THERE has been a remarkable surge of global interest in Japan recently, a trend most visibly evidenced by the dramatic influx of tourists. Filipino travelers, in particular, are arriving in record numbers; often, after an initial experience of the country’s unique allure, they find themselves drawn back for repeated visits. As a resident here, I have maintained an empirical vantage point on this growth, witnessing the surge not merely through statistics but through the increasing frequency of friends and acquaintances arriving on these shores.
Language, as always, serves as a vital repository that documents these social predilections. The Oxford English Dictionary (OED), as a historical dictionary, never misses such trends. In its December 2025 update, the venerable dictionary added 11 words of Japanese origin. Beyond English’s Indo-European relatives, Japanese remains one of the languages with the highest number of borrowings in the OED. There are currently 522 words of Japanese origin in the dictionary, some entering the English lexicon as early as the 16th century. While the full update notes are available on the OED website (https://www.oed.com/discover/new-words-from-around-the-world-in-the-oed-december-2025-update/), I wish to highlight a few items I find particularly interesting.
One of my favorite additions we helped with in the Oxford English Dictionary is tonkatsu, added in March 2024. My second favorite entry was added in this December 2025 update. It does not look too Japanese at first instance — White Day. The OED defines it as “a holiday celebrated on 14 March, on which men reciprocate the presents they receive from women on Valentine’s Day by giving them chocolate or other gifts, esp. items that are white in colour.” The entry notes that while the holiday originated in Japan, it has spread across East and Southeast Asia. This is proof that the development of English is no longer Anglo-American-centric; nations like Japan, often categorized as an English-as-a-foreign-language nation, possess the capacity to influence global English usage. The OED’s earliest evidence for the term dates back to 1984 in “The Standard-Speaker”: “Valentine’s Day is celebrated throughout Japan... Candymakers are trying to stretch it out, too, with the creation of ‘white day’ on March 14, when boys are supposed to return sweet for sweet, candy for chocolate.”
Another notable entry is Washlet. Though a proprietary name, it is a clever combination of the English wash and -let from toilet. As high-tech Japanese toilets become a global phenomenon — even appearing on international flights in Japanese airlines — the word has solidified its place in the lexicon. Like White Day, Washlet is a boomerang word — a term borrowed from English into Japanese, localized, and eventually borrowed back into English.
Several other cultural staples have also made the cut. Senpai (a senior member of a group who receives regard due to age or experience) has transitioned from anime subcultures into common parlance. Senbei (the beloved savory or sweet rice cracker) and mottainai (an interjection expressing regret over wastefulness) are also among the new additions in the 2025 December update of OED.
However, a word I find likewise intriguing in the broader December 2025 update is related to Japan but not categorized in the 11 words of Japanese origin: Spam musubi. A hybrid of the iconic American canned meat and the Japanese omusubi (rice ball), it was invented by Japanese migrants in the United States. While Spam is a long-standing OED entry, omusubi has yet to be added. This migrant invention has since gained such popularity in Japan that the word has been borrowed back into Japanese — a testament to how human mobility reshapes language across borders.
Like the 23 words added in March 2024, these new entries are the outcome of an ongoing collaboration between my university, the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, and the Oxford English Dictionary. I am particularly grateful to Danica Salazar, executive editor for World Englishes at the OED, for our continued work in documenting the evolution of Japanese English and migration-related vocabulary.
Ariane Macalinga Borlongan is a public intellectual, language scholar and migrant advocate. He is one of the leading researchers on English in the Philippines and one of the pioneers of migration linguistics. He is the youngest to earn a doctorate in linguistics, at age 23, from De La Salle University, and has had several teaching and research positions in Germany, Japan, Malaysia, the Philippines, Poland and Singapore. He is currently associate professor of sociolinguistics at the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies.