外来

• 読み: がいらい
• ローマ字: gairai
• 漢字の分解: 外 (gai) — outside, foreign; 来 (rai) — come, arrive
• 発音: /ɡa.i.ɾa.i/

意味

Foreign; imported; from outside. Also refers to outpatient care at a hospital.

A noun used as a modifier meaning 'from outside' or 'foreign.' Most commonly appears in 外来語 (loanword, especially from Western languages), 外来種 (invasive/non-native species), and 外来患者 or 外来診療 (outpatient). In the medical sense, 外来 refers to hospital visits where the patient does not stay overnight, as opposed to 入院 (hospitalisation).

例文

1. 日本語には英語からの外来語がたくさんある。
2. 外来種が在来の生態系を脅かしている。
3. 午前中に病院の外来を受診してきた。

使い方ガイド

場面: linguistics, medicine, ecology, education

トーン: neutral

起源と歴史

From Sino-Japanese 外 (gai, outside/foreign) + 来 (rai, to come). Literally 'coming from outside,' originally used for anything arriving from abroad, later extended to the medical meaning of visiting a hospital from outside.

文化的背景

時代: Modern

世代: All ages

社会的背景: Universal