The , often abbreviated as the and sometimes known in English as ''

Shogakukan is a Japanese publisher of dictionaries, literature, comics ( manga), non-fiction, DVDs, and other media in Japan. Shogakukan founded Shueisha, which also founded Hakusensha. These are three separate companies, but are together called the ...

's Japanese Dictionary'', is the largest

Japanese language is spoken natively by about 128 million people, primarily by Japanese people and primarily in Japan, the only country where it is the national language. Japanese belongs to the Japonic or Japanese- Ryukyuan language family. There have been ...

dictionary A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged alphabetically (or by radical and stroke for ideographic languages), which may include information on definitions, usage, etymologie ...

published. In the period from 1972 to 1976, Shogakukan published the 20-volume first edition. The 14-volume second edition was published in the period from November 2000 to December 2001. It includes substantial additions to and improvements over the first edition.

Composition

The first edition of 1972–76 included some 450,000 entries in 20 volumes, while the second edition reduced the number of volumes to 13 (by making each volume much bigger) and added 50,000 entries. The Second edition is the largest Japanese dictionary published with roughly 500,000 entries and supposedly 1,000,000 example sentences. It was composed under the collaboration of 3000 specialists, not merely Japanese language and literature scholars but also specialists of

History History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbrella term comprising past events as well ...

Buddhist studies Buddhist studies, also known as Buddhology, is the academic study of Buddhism. The term ''Buddhology'' was coined in the early 20th century by the Unitarian minister Joseph Estlin Carpenter to mean the "study of Buddhahood, the nature of the Budd ...

, the

Chinese Classics Chinese classic texts or canonical texts () or simply dianji (典籍) refers to the Chinese texts which originated before the imperial unification by the Qin dynasty in 221 BC, particularly the "Four Books and Five Classics" of the Neo-Confuci ...

, and the

social Social organisms, including human(s), live collectively in interacting populations. This interaction is considered social whether they are aware of it or not, and whether the exchange is voluntary or not. Etymology The word "social" derives from ...

and

physical Physical may refer to: * Physical examination, a regular overall check-up with a doctor * ''Physical'' (Olivia Newton-John album), 1981 ** "Physical" (Olivia Newton-John song) * ''Physical'' (Gabe Gurnsey album) * "Physical" (Alcazar song) (2004) * ...

sciences, over the course of 40 years. Entries are listed by ''

kana The term may refer to a number of syllabaries used to write Japanese phonological units, morae. Such syllabaries include (1) the original kana, or , which were Chinese characters ( kanji) used phonetically to transcribe Japanese, the most ...

'', in the ''

gojūon In the Japanese language, the is a traditional system ordering kana characters by their component phonemes, roughly analogous to alphabetical order. The "fifty" (''gojū'') in its name refers to the 5×10 grid in which the characters are disp ...

'' (五十音) order (the native alphabetical order of the Japanese syllabary). They provide the most common kanji used to write the word, the part of the speech, the various definitions, some early examples of the use of the word, and notes on the pronunciation. The first edition required the use of a slim supplementary pamphlet to track down the date and author of the historical works cited, but the dates have now been incorporated into the actual entries in the second edition. A supplementary volume includes an index of kanji, dialect words, and greater detail of the historical citations. Shogakukan has compared its ''Nikkoku'' dictionary to the ''

Oxford English Dictionary The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the first and foundational historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP). It traces the historical development of the English language, providing a c ...

'' ''(OED)'' because the ''Nikkoku'' represents the largest and most thorough dictionary of the Japanese language, and also provides etymologies and historical citations for its entries. Most entries contain citations from early known usages of the word in a text. Concise edition (〔精選版〕日本国語大辞典) is based on the 2nd edition, with 3 volumes, 300,000 entries, 300,000 examples.

Uses

The ''Nikkoku'', because of its size, has many features normally found only in specialized dictionaries. These include: definitions and etymologies of foreign loan words (''

gairaigo is Japanese for " loan word", and indicates a transcription into Japanese. In particular, the word usually refers to a Japanese word of foreign origin that was not borrowed in ancient times from Old or Middle Chinese (especially Literary Chine ...

'', 外来語), highly recent words ('' gendai yōgo'', 現代用語), archaic words ('' kogo'', 古語), idiomatic compound phrases ('' jukugo'', 熟語), words that can be written using more than one possible Chinese character to produce subtle differences in meaning ('' dōkun iji'', 同訓異字), and Chinese characters that are written differently but have the same pronunciation ('' iji dōkun'', 異字同訓), some slang ('' ingo'', 隠語), and words used only in regional dialects ('' hōgen'', 方言). Certain specialized dictionaries may have a few entries that do not exist in the ''Nikkoku'', and many specialized scholars will need to rely on specialized dictionaries, but it is certainly sufficient for most general reference needs.

Evaluation

The cost and size of this dictionary makes it somewhat unsuitable as a desktop reference; however, it is essential for learning the full range of a word's meanings.

Online

On July 2, 2007, the dictionary became available online via Japan Knowledge. For a monthly fee, it is accessible to individuals and institutions.

External links

Introduction to ''Nihon kokugo daijiten''
*Shogakukan pages
2nd editionConcise edition
{{Dictionaries of Japanese Japanese dictionaries 1972 non-fiction books