Hikikomori

8/2/2021

Hermits, hikikomoris in Russian#

Today I got around and collected words that mean roughly the same as "a hermit" or "a recluse" in English.

In Finnish, one would say "erakko". Someone who lives alone and avoids social contact. In Finland this probably is more common than in many other places as our culture puts far less value on active social life than most cultures.

In Japan the name of the phenomena is "hikikomori", which also builds upon the culture. Quote from the Wikipedia article for hikikomori.

The Chinese word for hikikomori is 家里蹲(jiā lǐ dūn) (characters are "home", "inside", and "to squat").

Finally, a Russian word that means "a hermit" is затворник (затворница is the feminine form).