Wapanese is a word that has been argued about many many times. It is commonly known as a white person who wants to be japanese.
Someone who watches anime, listens to japanese music and draws manga from time to time but also has a social life, bf and respects there own culture like myself can be classed as someone who has interest in the culture.

Wapanese on the other hand display some of these unhealthy obsessions:

They try to dress harajuku/lolita by applying mountains of makeup and mixing up clothes which makes them look like they are in drag or a wannabe emo.

Watches 2 episodes of an anime and instantly becomes obssessed and brags about it to everyone they know.

Overuses japanese phrases online and in real life.

On youtube they comment japanese music videos with such things as 'omgz ruki looks so kawaii <3~~!!'.

They add any random japanese people on myspace hoping to make some japanese friends and litters them with japanese phrases.

They think the terms 'visual kei' and 'oshare kei' are some kind of religion.

If someone in some way insults japan, they themselves also feel insulted.

They learn one hiragana/kanji/katakana phrase and begin drawing it all over there books/work...

They watch anime such as pokemon and think its 'uber cool'.

For the girls there idol is Gwen Stefani.

They change there names to some japanese name and tells everyone to start calling them that.

They think making the peace sign makes them look japanese.

Anything that looks remotely japanese they go mental for, even if its a wall scroll that is in chinese they still go mad for it.

I could go on for ages but these are the things i have witnessed in the past in the 'wapanese'.

“Wapanese” are decidedly caucasian individuals who, by means of thoroughly warped postmodern acculturation processes, have come to the decision that it is in their best interest to act as if they were denizens of the nation of Japan. The term “wapanese” can be accurately though of as an analog to wigger. A whitey can be classified as a “Wapanese” if they are in possession of two or more of the following defining traits:


1. Has an unhealthy obsession with shallow, saccharine and intellectually insulting animation shows (also refered to as anime by the nerd elite) originally tailored for young Japanese children

2. Operates under the erroneous belief that every aspect of American culture is vastly inferior to that of Japan’s – even though 99.9% of Wapanese have never had firsthand experience of any sort with their preferred culture (in other words, they’ve never set so much as one foot upon the island(s) of Japan)

3. Halfheartedly studies Japanese language and/or is a part-time practitioner of martial arts

4. Has a sword (samurai swords only, of course) collection

5. Is a Virgin
6. May be afflicted with a terminal case of yellow fever

There is a difference between watching anime and being Wapanese.

An anime watcher does just that, he watches anime.

The Wapanese watch anime and will think they were born and raised in Japan.

An anime watcher may use a quote now an then from an anime he likes.

The Wapanese will try to learn Japanese, but not the correct way, from watching anime. They'll only learn a few words and use them with English, using what is called Japanglish.

An anime watcher will watch what he can on television or maybe buy a video or DVD.

The Wapanese will buy untranslated anime and translate them horribly. They will proceed to gripe and complain that their hacked up garbage is better than anything ever made.

An anime watcher will do nothing else.

Due to a chemical imbalance in their heads, the Wapanese will denounce their country, stalk Asian girls, eat nothing but Asian food, grow disgustingly huge and/or pale, live in their parents house until they are 30 or older, and generally be annoyances for the rest of their lives or until they snap out of it, which usually happens around 9th or 10th grade.

Wapanese is the term used to describe a person of non-japanese descent (usually white, however some others are lumped in there as well) who is incredibly obsessed with Japanese things.

A person who watches anime or majors in Japanese language at university is not counted as wapanese.

These are common behaviours displayed by wapanese:

1. Being obsessed with anime. The typical anime watcher enjoys the shows because they are fun to watch and interesting (not all are for children, that is a myth). However, wapanese will take it to an unhealthy level.

2. Their rooms will be filled with japanese things. Anything from anime stuff to japanese things such as Tatami. A true wapanese will have next to nothing non-japanese in their room.

3. Many wapanese will believe that Japan is the best country ever and that if they go there they will be adored. However, most wapanese don't understand that Japan is a very racist society and they don't like white people very much.

4...

Wannabe Japanese. NOT "white japanese" or anything like that, WANNABE JAPANESE.

Those outside of Japanese culture, who, through fandom and such, have somehow gotten the idea that Japan is better than wherever they are living, and try their hardest to be Japanese. This behavior, however, may show in people who aren't Japanese, and simply enjoy the Japanese culture they know, having no desire to be Japanese or idea that Japan is better than where they live. Wapanese are the extreme stereotype of obsession with Japanese culture.

See "The Last Samurai"

A derogatory term used to describe any person fanatical about the Japanese culture and tries to become Japanese at any expense(and usually failing.)

A wapanese person is more acurately described as a social misfit that tries to find belonging by means of the Japanese Culture by entering a group or other groups of people with similar background and common interest(that being the Japanese culture.)

This person often finds the Japanese culture to be superior to any other culture(usually in defense of their newly found place of being), and finds great pride in showing off a new word or new words he/she has learned from an anime or a word from a manga he/she translated, and often insults those that DO know Japanese because the speaker doesn't truly know what he/she said.(there are no true curse words in Japanese, btw, just different terms which can be insulting in a situation).

This term (wapanese) is often indiscriminately applied to any person whom watch anime in general (a generally mild misnomer as anime is simply a cartoon and should be treated as such. Even though the drawing style and types of activity are mildly different(note that Dragon Ball Z is only loosely an anime as it more poorly animated gibberish that hyperactive 14 year-olds lose pent up energy on.))