Talk:National Diet: Difference between revisions

National Diet has been listed as one of the Social sciences and society good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.

Article milestones Date Process Result June 27, 2007 Peer review Reviewed July 20, 2007 Good article nominee Listed August 11, 2009 Good article reassessment Kept Facts from this article were featured on Wikipedia’s Main Page in the “On this day…“ column on November 29, 2004, November 29, 2005, November 29, 2006, November 29, 2007, November 29, 2008, November 29, 2009, November 29, 2010, November 29, 2013, November 29, 2014, November 29, 2019, November 29, 2021, November 29, 2022, and May 20, 2023. Current status: Good article

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someone explain the history behind this absurd naming. Dark1618 (talk) 16:58, 12 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

That translation is established, but basically a translation artifact/historical legacy. A few notes:

• First, its actual name is 國會/国会 (CJKV guóhuì/kokkai/gukhoe/quốc hội), which means in itself nothing but “national assembly”, the same Sino-JKV term as in Korea (Republic) or Vietnam (Socialist Republic) today from where you also translate them as such (National Assembly (South Korea), National Assembly of Vietnam).
• Its predecessor in the Empire was named 帝國議會/帝国議会 – translated without context, gikai basically just means parliament or legislature, so this would be the “Empire’s/Imperial parliament/legislature”, however it has also inversely been used as translation for the Imperial Diet of the German Empire (ja:帝国議会 (ドイツ帝国)). It was in crucial parts modeled on the Diet of the Kingdom of Prussia (elected House of Representatives, mostly hereditary appointed House of Lords/Peers, equal power in legislation, no responsible government), some elements, mostly regarding pomp & circumstances were borrowed from the UK. It is translated as “Imperial Diet”. And when after WWII, the teikoku-gikai was superseded by the kokkai – that term had been in use for long and is actually older; it was used by the Freedom and People’s Rights Movement in its demands for elected representation (Example, only here you translate kokkai arbitrarily differently: as “national assembly”), and had been in use as an informal term for the Imperial Diet, –, the translation as “Diet” to European languages apparently stuck.
• You could even start a step earlier and ask if [Imperial/State/Federal] “Diet” is an ideal translation from German [Reichs-/Land-/Bundes-]tag before you ask if the translation of the translation is suitable. (Many translations between German/ic and Latin/Romance terms are not perfectly corresponding either, we Europeans just have become used to interchanging them in an unreflected manner and often taking them for equivalent for two millennia.)
• Also enlightening in this context: The translations of Japanese subnational legislatures. In 1947, the national legisature changed its name from teikoku-gikai to kokkai, while the prefectural and municipal legislatures were renamed inversely from dō-/fu-/ken-/shi-/chō-/son-/kukai to to-/dō-/fu-/ken-/shi-/chō-/son-/ku-gikai. You translate those to English as “[pref./munic.] assemblies”.

—Asakura Akira (talk) 09:02, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It means assembly, meeting, a historical name for legislative assemblies, especially bicameral (or tricameral) imperial ones. Rankedchoicevoter (talk) 10:31, 13 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

National Diet → Diet of JapanDiet of Japan or Japanese DietJapanese Diet – Like Brazilian National Congress, “of Japan” or “Japanese” specifies the country. ArionStar (talk) 22:40, 21 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose – the name of the body is the “National Diet” [1]. The two proposed names are therefore inaccurate. No other country refers to its legislature as the “National Diet”, meaning disambiguation is unnecessary, similar to Mexico’s Congress of the Union or Cuba’s National Assembly of People’s Power. estar8806 (talk) ★ 23:31, 21 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Also note – as this article is currently linked on the main page as WP:ITN, this discussion should not be closed as moved by a non-admin as it must be moved by an admin who can edit the main page to correct a redirect per WP:MPNOREDIRECT. estar8806 (talk) ★ 00:48, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Strong oppose; National Diet is the official name, the WP:COMMONNAME and creates a WP:NATURAL disambiguation as Estar8806 mentioned. Thanks, Glasspalace (talk | contribs) 01:49, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose: “Diet of Japan” feels like it would be an article about Japanese cuisine. from Piperium (chit-chat, i did that) at 10:45, 22 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose – This article’s topic is the primary topic for the name / phrase “National Diet”. Yue🌙 04:09, 23 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]