Chinese

Adjective

民主

1. democratic

Noun

民主

1. democracy

   美國終於產生了歷史上第一位黑人總統巴拉克·奧巴馬，這對於美國的民主政治具有劃時代的意義。 [MSC, trad.]

   美国终于产生了历史上第一位黑人总统巴拉克·奥巴马，这对于美国的民主政治具有划时代的意义。 [MSC, simp.]

   From: 2008: 周琪 (Zhou Qi), 【美国大选观察】奥巴马为什么大胜？ ([Observations on the American Elections] Why did Obama have a great victory?)

   Měiguó zhōngyú chǎnshēng le lìshǐ shàng dì yī wèi hēirén zǒngtǒng Bālākè Àobāmǎ, zhè duìyú měiguó de mínzhǔ zhèngzhì jùyǒu huàshídài de yìyì. [Pinyin]

   The historic election of the US’s first black president, Barack Obama, marked an epoch in the history of American democracy.

Synonyms

• (obsolete) 德謨克拉西／德谟克拉西 (démókèlāxī)

Derived terms

Japanese

Etymology

From Sinitic 民主. Repurposed in China in the mid-1860s, giving the word a new meaning, during the translation of the book Elements of International Law into Chinese.^[1]

Pronunciation

• On'yomi
• IPA^(key): [miɴɕʲɯᵝ]

Noun

民主 ‎(hiragana みんしゅ, romaji minshu)

1. democracy

Synonyms

• 民主主義 ‎(minshu shugi) (more commonly used)

Compounds

• 民主党 ‎(minshutō, “democratic party”)
• 民主的 ‎(minshuteki, “democratic”)

References

1. ↑ Chen, Sheng Bao (1996-12-17), “中国語の中の日本語 (Chinese Borrowings from the Japanese Language), paper presented at the Japanese Language Research Forum held by the International Research Center for Japanese Studies”, in (Please provide the title of the work) (in Japanese), International Research Center for Japanese Studies, retrieved 2012-06-15: “古代漢語のことばを利用して訳したものだが、本来の意味とは違うもの。...「民主」”

Korean

Noun

民主 • ‎(minju) ‎(hangeul 민주)

1. Hanja form^? of 민주, “democracy”.