All articles starting with J
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Japanese passport (旅券)
Japanese passport (旅券, Nipponkoku ryōken): travel document issued by Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs; first issued 1866, IC chip since 2006, plastic 2025 version, fees cut to 8,900 yen from July 2026, joint 2nd on Henley Index 2026.
Japanese patent law
Japanese patent law (特許法, Tokkyoho) governs patents in Japan under the 1959 Patent Act, administered by the JPO. First-to-file, 20-year term, examination on request within three years, opposition within six months.
Japanese people
Japanese people are the population native to the Japanese Archipelago, formed by admixture of Jomon foragers and Yayoi-era continental farmers (10-20% Jomon ancestry). Key groups: Ainu, Ryukyuans, Burakumin, zainichi Koreans, and a ~2.5 million-strong Nikkei diaspora.
Japanese Peruvians (日系ペルー人)
Japanese Peruvians (日系ペルー人), the nikkei community of Japanese descent in Peru, began with 790 Sakura Maru contract workers on April 3, 1899; 18,727 arrived by 1923, and about 200,000 descendants now span six generations, despite WWII deportations to US camps.
Japanese phonology
Japanese phonology (日本語音韻論) is the sound system of Japanese: five vowels, mora-based timing, phonemic length, lexical pitch accent varying by dialect, rendaku with Lyman's Law, and vowel devoicing.
Japanese poetry
Japanese poetry: verse in Japanese (waka/tanka 31 units 5-7-5-7-7, renga, haiku 5-7-5) and kanshi in classical Chinese; counted in morae not syllables, spanning Man'yōshū, Meiji shintaishi, and postwar modernism.
Japanese popular culture
Japanese popular culture: mass-produced commercial culture of Japan (manga, anime, games, J-pop, fashion), rooted in the 17th century, globally exported; 2024 overseas content sales 6.0044 trillion yen, anime about 2.2 trillion yen, Cool Japan Fund policy since 2013.
Japanese prisoners of war in World War II
Japanese POWs of WWII: only 42,543 surrendered to Western Allies before the war's end due to anti-surrender doctrine; about 575,000 went to Soviet labor camps, with roughly 55,000 deaths, and repatriation ran to 1956.
Japanese proletarian literature
Japanese proletarian literature (プロレタリア文学, puroretaria bungaku) was a left-wing literary movement in Japan, active chiefly from 1921 to 1934, that depicted workers, peasants, and women in inexpensive fiction, poetry, and theater.
Japanese pronouns
Japanese pronouns (人称代名詞): the many words for I, you, and he/she in Japanese, chosen by social relationship, historically unstable, largely converted from nouns, and often omitted as zero pronouns in this pro-drop language.
Japanese punctuation
Japanese punctuation (kutōten, 句読点) is the system of marks structuring written Japanese, centered on the full stop 。and comma 、. Adopted under Western influence in the Meiji era, standardized by the 1946 kugiri fugō rules, with Japanese-only marks like emphasis dots and the middle dot.
Japanese quarter of Ayutthaya
The Japanese quarter of Ayutthaya was a foreign settlement in the Siamese capital, headed by Yamada Nagamasa, that was attacked and burned in 1630 under King Prasat Thong.
Japanese raccoon dog
Japanese raccoon dog (tanuki, 狸, Nyctereutes viverrinus), a small canid endemic to Japan, split from the mainland raccoon dog N. procyonoides; known for winter sleep, latrine sites, roadkill and mange threats.
Japanese Red Army (日本赤軍)
Japanese Red Army (日本赤軍, Nihon Sekigun), far-left terrorist group founded 1971 by Fusako Shigenobu in Lebanon with PFLP ties; Lod airport massacre, Hague siege, Dhaka hijacking; dissolved 2001, succeeded by Rentai.
Japanese Red Cross Society
The Japanese Red Cross Society (日本赤十字社) is Japan's national Red Cross society, founded in 1877 as the Philanthropic Society during the Satsuma Rebellion and renamed in 1887.
Japanese Residents' Association
Japanese Residents' Associations, also called kyoryūmin-kai or kyoryūmin-dan (居留民会, 居留民団), were self-governing bodies of Japanese residents abroad, chiefly in China and colonial Korea from the Meiji era until 1945.
Japanese rice
Japanese rice: short-grain japonica Oryza sativa grown nationwide, staple of the Japanese diet. About 300 varieties planted; Koshihikari (1956) leads at 33.4%. Prices doubled in the 2024-25 shortage.
Japanese Romantic School
The Japanese Romantic School (日本浪曼派, Nihon rōmanha) was a group of Japanese writers and critics formed around the journal Nihon rōmanha, founded in 1935 and closed in 1938, which sought to revive traditional Japanese art.
Japanese Sign Language (日本手話)
Japanese Sign Language (JSL) is a visual language of Japan's deaf community, distinct from spoken Japanese, with a history tracing back at least 140 years.
Japanese Sign Language family
Japanese Sign Language family: JSL, Taiwan Sign Language, and Korean Sign Language, descending from Old Japanese Sign Language spread via deaf schools during Japan's colonial rule before 1945.
Japanese spider crab
Japanese spider crab (Macrocheira kaempferi, Takaashigani): marine crab off Pacific Japan with the longest leg span of any arthropod, up to about 3.7–4 m, weighing up to 19 kg, living 50–600 m deep.
Japanese Spitz
Japanese Spitz (日本スピッツ, Nihon Supittsu): small white companion dog breed from Japan, developed from imported white German Spitz around 1920, standardized by the Japan Kennel Club in 1948; FCI Standard No. 262, dogs 30–38 cm, pure white double coat.
Japanese street fashion
Japanese street fashion: Tokyo youth dress culture centered on Harajuku, Shibuya, and Ura-Harajuku backstreets; subcultures like Lolita and kawaii produced by teens, now anchored commercially by brands such as BAPE and Human Made.
Japanese sword (日本刀)
The Japanese sword (日本刀, nihontō) is a forged, curved, single-edged blade made in Japan by folding steel and hardening the edge, produced since the late Heian period.
Japanese sword mountings
Japanese sword mountings (koshirae) are a sword's complete exterior, scabbard, hilt, tsuba, and fittings such as menuki, kozuka, and kogai, protecting the blade and displaying samurai rank, distinct from plain storage shirasaya.
Japanese swordsmithing
Japanese swordsmithing, also known as Japanese sword construction, is the traditional craft of forging Japanese sword blades from tatara-made tamahagane, folded and differentially hardened with clay.
Japanese tanks of World War II
Japanese tanks of World War II were the Imperial Japanese Army's light and medium tanks, such as the Type 95 Ha-Go and Type 97 Chi-Ha, kept far lighter than Allied designs.
Japanese tea ceremony
Japanese tea ceremony (chanoyu, 茶の湯; chadō, 茶道): the traditional Japanese practice of preparing and serving matcha to guests, refined by Murata Jukō, Takeno Jōō, and Sen no Rikyū, with koicha and usucha, many schools, and wabi aesthetics.
Japanese telegraph code
Japanese telegraph code, or Wabun code (和文電信符号), is a Morse-style code assigning a dot-dash group to each of the 46 base katakana, used on Japan's telegraph and radio systems.
Japanese television drama
Japanese television drama, also known as dorama, is scripted live-action fiction produced for Japanese television, usually serialized over a three-month season of about ten episodes.