Q My friends and I are big fans of karaoke. Can you tell me where the word “karaoke” comes from? – J.K., Reading, Mass.

A: The word “karaoke” names a device that plays instrumental accompaniments for people to sing along with. It also names the activity of using such a machine for entertainment. Japanese speakers gave the machine and activity the name “karaoke,” and English speakers adopted the Japanese name. “Karaoke” is one of a long list of Japanese borrowings that includes “teriyaki,” “futon,” “tofu,” “bonsai,” “honcho,” “origami” and “tycoon.”

In Japanese, “karaoke” literally means “empty orchestra.” It was formed through the combination of the word “kara,” meaning “empty,” and “oke,” a short form of the word “okesutora,” meaning “orchestra.” “Okesutora” was adopted by Japanese speakers from the English word “orchestra.” So the etymology of “karaoke” takes us full circle from English to Japanese and back to English again.

Q My English textbook keeps talking about “synecdoche.” Can you tell me what that is, and where the word comes from? – D.B., Denver, Colo.

A: “Synecdoche” denotes a poetic device for creating vivid imagery by replacing generalities and abstractions with concrete and vivid images. The word arrived in English in the 15th century from Latin, deriving ultimately from the Greek “synekdoche,” formed by combining “syn-” (meaning “with, along with”) and “ekdoche” (meaning “sense, understanding in a certain way, interpretation”). “Synecdoche” most typically involves the replacement of the whole by the name of a part (as when workers are referred to as “hands” or when “fifty ships” becomes “fifty sails”). A close relative of “synecdoche” as a poetic device is “metonymy,” a figure of speech in which the name of one thing is used for the name of another with which it is closely associated (as when “Shakespeare” is used to mean “the works of Shakespeare”).

This column was prepared by the editors of Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, Tenth Edition. Readers may send questions to Merriam-Webster’s Wordwatch, P.O. Box 281, 47 Federal St., Springfield, MA 01102.