The excellent Japanese manga and pop culture site Pink Tentacle posted a list compiled by the publisher Jiyu Kokuminsha of the 60 most popular new words and phrases in Japan during this past year. Among them:

- Arafo – Short for ‘around 40′. Taken from Around 40 the name of a popular television series, to describe anyone in their 40s. Spin-off word: ‘Arasu’, coined by Japanese fashion marketers to mean ‘around 30′.

- Asa banana – ‘Morning banana’. Describes a recent fad of eating bananas for breakfast, made more intense by the occasional banana shortage throughout the year.

- Change – Excitement over Obama and also the name of a hit Japanese TV series about a schoolteacher who reluctantly becomes prime minister

- Sabuparaimu – ‘Subprime’. The garbage from the New York-based financial companies eventually washed up on Japan’s shores.-

- Akiba-kei – ‘Akihabara style.’ The geek culture epitomized by Tokyo’s surreally geeky Akihabara electronics district.

- Guu! – A bastardization of the English word ‘Good!’, made popular by comedian Takahiro Yamamoto, who delivers it with an exaggerated two thumbs-up.

- Maiku Regendo – ‘Make Legend’. Slogan for the Yamuiri Giants baseball team, which, against the odds, won the Central Division pennant. (Another Giants team slogan ‘Make Drama’ was, according to Pink Tentacle, voted the Trendiest Saying of 1996.)

Words work at the cosmetic level of communication. When they are new, freshly minted as these are, they can provide a glimpse into deeper levels of emotional and meta meaning, and even touch on the zeitgeist.

Here’s the complete list.