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Senpai (先輩, せんぱい) is a Japanese term for a person in a club or other organization, including a school or college, who is a senior. Antonym: kōhai (後輩). These terms are used widely among otaku and in martial arts as well as appearing frequently in anime and manga (especially fansubs and scanlations).
More than simple seniority, senpai implies a relationship with reciprocal obligations. A kōhai is expected to respect and obey their senpai, and the senpai in turn must guide, protect and teach their kōhai as best they can. Senpai/kōhai relationships generally last for as long as the two people concerned stay in contact, even if the original context in which the senpai was senior is no longer relevant.
"Sempai" is an alternate Romanization that is not formally correct. The confusion arises because the character ん represents a single Japanese phoneme with several realisations. The most common of these corresponds roughly the English "n", which is why "n" is the standard Romanization of ん, but before bilabial consonants like "p", it is pronounced "m". The spelling "sempai" is therefore more representative of how native English speakers hear the word 先輩 -- nevertheless, modern Romanization systems prefer "n" to represent all instances of the character ん.
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