zaibatsu en · NOUN
Pronunciation
- (Southern-England) audio
- /zaɪˈbɑtsu/ (General-American)
- /zaɪˈbætsuː/ (Received-Pronunciation)
Etymology
Borrowed from Japanese 財閥(ざいばつ) (zaibatsu), coined from Middle Chinese 財 (d͡zoj, “wealth”) + 閥 (bjot, “powerful family”).
Meanings
-
(historical) A large business conglomerate founded under the Empire of Japan, generally controlled by a single family or individual.
He wondered briefly what it would be like, working all your life for one zaibatsu. Company housing, company hymn, company funeral.
1984, William Gibson, Neuromancer (Sprawl; book 1), New York, N.Y.: Ace Books, →ISBN, page 37:At other points, the film suggests the motive is financial, depicting the Kobayashi clan as staging an industrial coup of sorts, like a quirky Andersonian take on the zaibatsu (a term for the family-controlled business monopolies that dominated Japan until the end of World War II).
2018 March 31, Nina Li Coomes, “Unpacking the Fictional Japan of ‘Isle of Dogs’”, in The Atlantic:
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(US, broadly) Any large corporation.
Near-synonyms: megacorporation, supercorporation
Forms
| Spelling | Features | Labels | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| zaibatsu | Number=Plur | lexicographic | |
| zaibatsus | Number=Plur | lexicographic |
Relateds
Synonyms
supercorporation · megacorporation
Translations (12)
ko 자이바쓰 (a Japanese conglomerate founded under the Empire of Japan) · ja 財閥 (a Japanese conglomerate founded under the Empire of Japan) · pl zaibatsu (a Japanese conglomerate founded under the Empire of Japan) · et zaibatsu (a Japanese conglomerate founded under the Empire of Japan) · cmn 財閥 /财阀 (a Japanese conglomerate founded under the Empire of Japan) · pt zaibatsu (a Japanese conglomerate founded under the Empire of Japan) · de Zaibatsu (a Japanese conglomerate founded under the Empire of Japan) · fi zaibatsu (a Japanese conglomerate founded under the Empire of Japan) · ru дзайба́цу (a Japanese conglomerate founded under the Empire of Japan) · ko 재벌 (a Japanese conglomerate founded under the Empire of Japan) · fr zaibatsu (a Japanese conglomerate founded under the Empire of Japan) · vi tài phiệt (a Japanese conglomerate founded under the Empire of Japan)