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Japanese Research on Linguistics, Literature, and Culture

Japanese Research on Linguistics, Literature, and Culture is an open-access journal that refereed publication devoted to research articles concerned with Japanese linguistics, language, literature, translation, and cultural studies. This journal is an academic journal published twice a year in May and November by the Japanese Department Universitas Dian Nuswantoro, Semarang.

Volume 6, Issue 1, November 2023   

Vol 6, No 1 (2023): November

Table of contents.

ISSN Online:  2655-4836  

This work is licensed under a  Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License .

This journal is published by  Universitas Dian Nuswantoro , Semarang, Indonesia. 

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Japanese Research on Linguistics Literature and Culture Latest Publications

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Style-shifting in Usage Instructions of Food, Beverage, and Pharmaceutical Products in Japanese Language

The present article attempts to describe the shifting use of formal and informal styles in usage instruction discourse of food, beverage, and pharmaceutical products in Japanese. The aim is to explain the background of style-shifting from a formal style, indicated by -desu in adjectives and nouns and -masu in verbs, into an informal style without any -desu or –masu forms in place. The background is reviewed through the perspectives of both sociolinguistics and pragmatics. The data were collected from various food, beverage, and pharmaceutical product packages containing usage instructions in Japanese. Study results indicate that style-shifting does not only occur through spoken language (orally) but via written discourse, which maintains unchanging external factors or definite contexts. Style-shifting is not only affected by the status of the speech partner but also more likely affected by the content of the information delivered to the consumers. Aside from occurring within a single discourse, style-shifting is also observed at a narrower level, namely within one element of discourse conveying a relatively homogenous information.

Animal Elements on Japanese Kotowaza and the Implementation of Japanese Socio-Cultural Values: A Cognitive Linguistics Point of View

This study aims to describe the relationship between the lexical meaning and the idiomatic meaning contained in the Japanese kotowaza and to analyze the level of relevance of each kotowaza to the application of socio-cultural values in Japanese society. This type of research is qualitative descriptive research to describe the meaning of kotowaza through cognitive linguistic studies and conceptual metaphor theory. The data source is a Japanese novel contained in Aozora Bunka. This study found that the animal elements contained in the kotowaza are a conceptualization of attitudes, actions, judgments, circumstances, and feelings. In addition, the city also reflects socio-cultural values that are very relevant to the culture of Japanese society, such as the culture of working hard, being responsible, and being focused and conscientious.

Implementation of Omotenashi in Japanese Ryokan

Omotenashi, often referred to as Japanese hospitality, is a service to customers based on Japanese spirit and culture. Omotenashi is evident in the services provided by a ryokan, which is a traditional Japanese inn. This paper seeks to describe the application of omotenashi in ryokan management, how omotenashi control is implemented, and what the implementations are. The research was conducted by observing the involvement of the Hyoe Koyokaku ryokan, an old ryokan located in the tourist area of Arima Onsen. From the results of observations and analysis, it was found that ryokan employees control omotenashi as a vision of service to customers through training, instruction, and improvement based on feedback. The implementation of ometenashi is manifested in personalization, host-guest relationships, hospitableness, and lots of little surprises

Marginalization of Women in Higuchi Ichiyou's Nigorie Short Story: A Feminism Studies

The purpose of this study is to describe the marginalization experienced by women in Higuchi Ichiyou's short story Nigorie, and the effects it causes. This research focused on marginalization because marginalization is the root of various unfair treatments experienced by women. As a literature study with the feminism approach, data in the form of dialogues, acts, and events related to women in this short story were analyzed based on Lorber’s and Fakih’s theory of gender inequalities, through the point of view of feminist literary criticism. As the result, it is known that the marginalization experienced by women who work in brothels has resulted in other unfair treatments, which in Fakih's opinion can be categorized as gender inequalities. Such unfair treatments are in the form of impoverishment, putting women in a lower position than men, negative labeling, violence, and double workload. Marginalization and various unfair treatments experienced by women in this short story, which gives the impression that the society in this short story doesn’t consider women as human beings in general, are the manifestations of hegemonic patriarchism that is deeply rooted in the life of the Japanese nation.

The Philosophy of Wabi-Sabi on Chashitsu Tai-an Myokian Shrine: A John Fiske's Semiotic Analysis

The purpose of this study is to describe the meaning of wabi-sabi that contained in the Tai-an tea room at Myokian Shrine, Kyoto Prefecture, Japan. The research of data is a video from the television program produced by NHK television station with a duration of five minutes named Hyouge Mono: Meihin Meiseki episode 7. The program features three sections of the tea room, there are nijiriguchi (the door), chashitsu (the tea room) and tokonoma (the alcove). This research used John Fiske's television semiotics theory which consists of three levels, the reality level, the representation level and the ideology level to find the codes that seen in the three sections. The method used is a qualitative descriptive method. The analysis of the reality and representation levels produces an ideology level in the form of a wabi-sabi philosophy represented by the zen aesthetic by Shinichi Hisamatsu. The results of this study indicate that in the Tai-an tea room contain several zen characteristics, there are kanso (simple), datsuzoku (free), fukinsei (asymmetric) and yugen (subtle). These characteristics represent simplicity, resignation, humility and tranquility in wabi-sabi and help to realize the concept of ichi go ichi e that aimed by Sen no Rikyu

The Contextual Meaning of Japanese Setsuzokushi

This study describes the contextual meaning of the noni and kuseni conjunctions in the drama dialogue Dragon Zakura. This study uses a qualitative paradigm with syntactic and semantic research approaches. The research data source is a Japanese drama entitled Dragon Zakura with data in conversational sentences. There is noni or kuseni conjunction, which is collected through the ‘simak-catat’ technique. Through Makino (1994) and Chandra (2009)'s concept of noni and kuseni, data are interpreted using contextual meaning. The results of this study indicate that the noni and kuseni conjunctions are included in gyakusetsu no setsuzokujoshi. The two conjunctions, namely noni and kuseni, although they have similarities in stating the contradiction between two things, namely between what the speaker thinks/suspected/should have, and the facts that occur, noni is more broad and objective. Noni can express negative feelings, such as disappointment, criticism, and frustration, but can also express neutral or positive emotions, such as admiration. Meanwhile, kuseni are only used to describe the speaker's negative feelings, such as criticism, annoyance, and disappointment

Analisis Skema Aktansial dan Model Fungsional Greimas pada Cerita Pendek Tsuru no Ongaeshi

AbstractA short story is one of the literary works that is not very long and generally focuses on a single event with one or two characters. This paper tries to describe the narrative structure in the story ツルの恩返し. Source of data uses short story ツルの恩返し, taken from  https://www.wasabi-jpn.com. The research approach uses structuralism especially Greimas’s actantial scheme  and the functional narrative model. The results show that the short story ツルの恩返し  formed by one functional narrative model and 6  actual schemes. The functional narrative model consists of initial situation, transformation stage (qualifying test, main test, glorifying test), and the final situation. From 6 actan schemes, there are 4 complete actantial schemes and 2 incomplete actantial schemes (actantial schemes without opponent). There are 6 acting roles that make up the short story ツルの恩返し;sender, receiver, subjects, objects,  helpers,  and opponent .

Kesalahan Penggunaan Kata Ganti Demonstratif Ko-So-A pada Kalimat Bahasa Jepang dalam Ujian Akhir Semester Penerjemahan Lisan

AbstractBunmyakushiji type of ‘Ko-So-A’ demontrative pronouns are words that are being used to replace word(s) or to refer word(s) or thing(s) which have said before. The Ko-So-A demonstrative pronouns have difference usage with pronoun in Indonesian language. Writer found out there are many Japanese learners in Japanese Language Department of Dian Nuswantoro University including were having difficulties to distinguish functions of each pronoun. Because of that, writer is interested in analyzing the errors made by learner when using bunmyakushiji type of demonstrative pronoun. Writer use qualitative method and analytic descriptive. The data were collected from conversations of  Interpreting class’s Final Exam. The result was error usage of So and A demonstrative pronouns often happened than error usage of Ko and So demonstrative pronouns.  Keywords: kosoa, error, demonstrative, understanding. AbstrakKata ganti demonstratif Ko-So-A yang berfungsi kontekstual digunakan untukmerujuk atau menggantikan kata yang dituturkan sebelumnya. Penggunaannyaberbeda dengan kata ganti demonstrative dalam bahasa Indonesia.Karena dalamUjian Akhir Semester mata kuliah Penerjemahan Lisan yang merupakan percakapan antara penguji dengan mahasiswa cukup banyak ditemukan kesalahan penggunaan kata ganti ini, maka penulis tertarik untuk meneliti kesalahan tersebut.Metode yang digunakan adalah metode kualitatif dengan analisis deskriptif. Data diperoleh dari percakapan/tanya jawab dalam ujian. Hasilnya yaitu kesalahan penggunaan kata ganti demonstrative So dan A lebih banyak ditemukan dibandingkan kesalahan penggunaan kata ganti demonstratif Ko dan So. Kata Kunci: ko-so-a, kesalahan, demonstratif, pemahaman 

Tindak Tutur Penolakan Bahasa Jepang oleh Mantan Kenshuusei (Pekerja Magang di Jepang)

This study is intended to describe the speech act strategy of rejection in Japanese language by former apprentices (kenshuusei). The descriptive qualitative method used in this research is under the approach of interlanguage pragmatic study because the participants are foreign speakers of Japanese. The data were collected using the oral-discourse completion test technique. The findings of this study have shown three types of refusal processes, namely 1) pre-refusal - main refusal - post refusal; 2) pre-refusal - the main refusal; and 3) major refusal - post refusal. In the refusal utterances, there are 2 forms of refusal, namely direct refusal and indirect refusal. The strategies used in refusing are apology strategy, refusal reason strategy, alternative statement strategy, hope statement strategy, future demand strategy, negation form, fukushi, and aizuchi. The refusal strategies mostly used by former apprentices are the excuse strategy for refusal and almost all refusal speeches also use apologies.

Studi Metafora Konseptual pada Idiom Bahasa Jepang yang mengandung Bagian Tubuh dan Bermakna Emosi

Kanyouku is used to express human emotions. This study discusses the mapping of the meaning of Japanese idiom related to emotions in human cognition by using Knowles and Moon’s metaphor theory and conceptual metaphor theory by Lakoff and Johnson. The study utilizes 28 idioms that related to human basic emotions such as anger, happiness, sadness, fear, love, shame, pride, and surprise. These basic emotions are obtained from Goo Jiten online Japanese dictionary. The results show that human cognition viewing emotion concept as an entity and representing emotions into human body. In Japanese people’s cognition, anger represented as belly, chest, and head; fear represented as tongue, heart, and foot; happiness represented as cheek, chest, and heart; sadness represented as shoulder, chest, and heart; love represented as eye and heart; pride represented as chest; shame represented as face and cheek; and surprise represented as eye, tongue, and heart. Human cognition represented emotion concept as human body to measure the level of emotion. This study mapped the emotion concepts as a concrete entity: the entity as fluid in a container or entity as parts of body. Keywords: Cognitive Linguistic, Conceptual Metaphor, Image Scheme, Idiom, Emotion

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Journal of Japanese Linguistics

• Online ISSN: 2512-1413
• Print ISSN: 0197-3150
• Type: Journal
• Language: English
• Publisher: De Gruyter Mouton
• First published: January 20, 1972
• Publication Frequency: 1 Issue per Year
• Audience: Researchers in the field of Japanese linguistics and language education, Japanese language teachers

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1 Introduction

Shigeru Miyagawa is Professor of Linguistics and Kochi-Manjiro Professor of Japanese Language and Culture at MIT. His publications include Why Agree? Why Move? Unifying Agreement-Based and Discourse Configurational Languages (MIT Press, 2010) and Structure and Case Marking in Japanese (Academic Press, 1989).

Mamoru Saito Nanzan University, [email protected] Expletive replacement reconsidered: Evidence from expletive verbs in Japanese. In Form, structure, and grammar: A festschrift presented to Günther Grewendorf on occasion of his 60th birthday, ed. Patrick Brandt and Eric Fuss, 255–273. Berlin: Akademie Verlag. (2006) Subjects of complex predicates: A preliminary study. SBOPL 1: Intensionality and sentential competition, ed. Tomoko Kawamura, Yunju Suh, and Richard K. Larson, 172–188. Stony Brook, N.Y.: Stony Brook University. (2006) Ellipsis and pronominal reference in Japanese clefts. Studies in Modern Grammar 36:1–44. (2004)

• Published: 18 September 2012
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This handbook selects the topics that capture the excitement of Japanese linguistics over the past fifteen years or so. It focuses on “formal” studies of Japanese syntax, semantics, morphology, phonetics, phonology, acquisition, sentence processing, and information structure. The articles cover a variety of topics, are written by linguists who have directly contributed to the understanding of the particular topics, and are relatively short. The last fifteen years have seen theoretically oriented works on Japanese syntax and semantics in vast numbers. The topics featured in the handbook cover a wide range of phenomena: ellipsis, compounds, quantifiers and numerals, and operator binding, to name just a few. Acquisition research on Japanese has a long history of its own, comparable to syntax and phonology. Finally, an overview of the articles included in the handbook is provided.

In his 1977 keynote address to the Japanese linguistics community gathered for the LSA Linguistic Institute in Honolulu, Susumu Kuno congratulated the field for the enormous body of work produced on Japanese, which, as he observed, gave the Japanese language the distinction of being the most studied language within the generative tradition next to English (Hinds and Howard 1978 : 213). Today, the sheer number of linguists working on Japanese and the immense volume of research that continues to be published serve as witnesses to the fact that the Japanese language continues to engender high-quality work in vast amounts. Susumu Kuno's congratulatory comment in 1977, if repeated today, would be just as apt.

For this Handbook of Japanese Linguistics , we selected topics that capture this excitement of the field over the past fifteen years or so. In making the selections, we made two decisions. First, we wanted this handbook to have an overall coherence in approach. For this reason we decided to focus our coverage on “formal” studies of Japanese—syntax, semantics, morphology, phonetics, phonology, acquisition, sentence processing, and information structure. The chapters relate to each other across the different subdisciplines not only in the general approach taken but also at times even in the particular phenomenon being studied. For example, we find issues of word order taken up in syntax, acquisition, processing, and information structure. Moreover, although the topics we chose center on some aspect of Japanese, they also contribute to linguistic theory in general. As we discuss in this introduction, many works that have appeared in the last fifteen years or so have this characteristic: not only do they provide new and exciting analyses of aspects of Japanese, but also they make a direct and important contribution to our understanding of human language. Each chapter indicates precisely in what way the study of a particular topic has a bearing on the general linguistic theory. Due to this focus on “formal” approaches to Japanese linguistics, we did not attempt to cover other areas such as discourse analysis and sociolinguistics. This is not to say that there have not been important contributions beyond Japanese in these research domains—for example, in the area of “politeness” there are a number of important achievements that have contributed to our overall understanding of this topic. Nevertheless, we feel that, because of fundamental differences in approach, it would take away from the coherence of the Handbook to try to include works from these areas.

1.1 Syntax and Semantics

The main enterprise of this era was to seek empirical generalizations within Japanese that made it possible to describe some significant aspect of Japanese grammar in a formal and insightful fashion. In other words, the focus was principally on Japanese independent of other languages, and linguistic theory was a tool by which one could gain insights into the language. It is important to point out that this singular focus on the analysis of a specific language reflected the linguistic theory of the time—the standard theory developed by Chomsky and his colleagues and students in the 1950s and 1960s. Transformational-generative grammar, as it was known, set out a framework that tended to steer researchers to look deeply into a single language as opposed to seek generalizations across languages. Exemplary works in this enterprise include Kuno 1973 , Inoue 1976 , and Shibatani 1976 , among many others.

In the 1980s, alongside the “Japanese-specific” research agenda of earlier years, a fundamentally new research direction in Japanese linguistics arose. This new direction is captured in the following question, which echoes the title of a WCCFL paper Kuroda gave in 1983: What can Japanese say about linguistic theory?

That is, works began to appear in vast numbers that used Japanese as the basis for making a direct contribution to linguistic theory. In most cases these works also embodied the spirit of the earlier era in presenting an extensive analysis of some aspect of Japanese grammar. The difference is that the analysis of Japanese is not an end in itself, but it is used to make a direct contribution to our knowledge of human language. It is no accident that this new trend in Japanese linguistics coincided with a fundamental shift in linguistic theory, from the rule-based transformational-generative grammar to what has come to be known as the principles-and-parameters approach to human language.

The principles-and-parameters approach postulates that the core of all human languages is defined by a uniform set of principles. The differences among languages arise from the fact that these principles are parameterized; the job of the language learner is to set the parameter of each principle according to the language encountered in the environment (Chomsky 1981 ). To give a couple of examples, there is a principle that requires that every phrase be headed; this principle is parameterized for head initial (e.g., Indonesian) or head final (e.g., Turkish). (See also Stowell 1981 .) In another work, Rizzi ( 1982 ) observed that English and Italian have different parametric settings for bounding nodes for Subjacency: the bounding nodes S (present-day TP or IP) and NP (DP) are what are set for English, but in Italian they are set for S′ (CP) and NP (DP). This allows extraction out of some wh -islands in Italian, for example. The principles-and-parameters theory set a new research agenda that sought to identity the universal principles and the nature of the parameter associated with them. To carry out this agenda, it often became necessary to pursue cross-linguistic analysis as opposed to simply looking deeply into one language.

An early work in this period that used an analysis of Japanese to shed light on linguistic theory is Saito and Hoji 1983 . 1 They challenged Ken Hale's ( 1980 , 1982 ) Configurationality Parameter, which had emerged as a highly influential theory of human language within the principles-and-parameters approach. Hale suggested a parameter that partitioned the languages of the world into two groups: configurational and nonconfigurational.

Unlike configurational languages, which have the typical hierarchical structure of the subject separated from the VP, nonconfigurational languages lack the VP node, so that they are associated with a flat structure, with all phrases being dominated directly by the S node. A reflex of this nonconfigurational property of flat structure is free word order: because all phrases have a symmetrical (mutual c-command) relation with the verb, they are free to occur in any order without disturbing the meaning of the sentence. Because Japanese is a free-word-order language, Hale ( 1980 ) suggested that it belongs to the nonconfigurational group of languages.

In response to this, Saito and Hoji ( 1983 ) used arguments based on weak crossover, condition C effects, and other phenomena to show that Japanese is just as configurational as English. Although their empirical work focused by and large on the Japanese language, the principal message that the field took away from it is that there is no such thing as a nonconfigurational language. Thus, to the question, what can Japanese say about linguistic theory? Saito and Hoji's work had a clear message: every language is configurational. Although the “flat” structure has been rejected, it is important to point out that linguists in recent years have “rediscovered” Hale's proposal and have incorporated parts of it in dealing with free word order and related issues (e.g., Bošković and Takahashi 1998 ; Miyagawa 1997 , 2001 ; Oku 1998 ; Saito 2003 ).

Other works of this nature—using Japanese to shed light on linguistic theory—include Miyagawa 1989 , which, based on earlier works by Haig ( 1980 ) and Kuroda ( 1980 , 1983 ), showed that the distribution of numeral quantifiers in Japanese gave evidence for NP trace, a theoretical notion whose existence has been questioned throughout the history of generative grammar (see also Ueda 1986 ). In another work, Watanabe ( 1992 ) analyzed wh -questions in Japanese as involving overt movement of a phonetically empty operator, in a fashion that parallels overt wh -movement languages. He concluded that in a wh -question, some element of the wh -phrase must move overtly, and that this is a universal requirement. This laid the groundwork for the notion of “strong” (and, by implication, “weak”) features in the early period of the Minimalist Program (Chomsky 1993 ).

The last fifteen years have seen theoretically oriented works on Japanese syntax and semantics in vast numbers. The topics discussed cover a wide range of phenomena: ellipsis, compounds, quantifiers and numerals, and operator binding, just to name a few. Whenever there is an important theoretical issue, it is now almost always possible to find relevant works on Japanese. It is this sense of excitement that we wish to convey in this Handbook , and we have included articles on various topics in syntax and semantics for this reason.

We cannot close out the section on syntax and semantics without a mention of scrambling. No other topic has attracted as much attention among those who work on Japanese, and the interest has only grown as we have attained a deeper understanding of the phenomenon. One reason why scrambling has intrigued so many linguists is that at any given point, there are at least two theories competing for the correct analysis of it. In the 1970s and 1980s, the issue was whether scrambling resulted from movement or if the various word orders were base generated. Harada ( 1977 ) was the first to take a clear position on scrambling as movement. Shortly thereafter, Hale ( 1980 , 1982 ) proposed the configurationality parameter and suggested that Japanese belongs to the nonconfigurational family of languages, with the result that scrambling is a function of the flat phrase structure, thus base generated. As we noted earlier, Saito and Hoji ( 1983 ) responded to Hale's characterization of Japanese as being a nonconfigurational language by showing that Japanese is associated with a configurational syntactic structure.

Saito and Hoji's characterization naturally led to the view that scrambling is due to movement. But now, a question arises: What motivates this movement? This is a hotly debated issue today. One view, held by the majority of linguists working on scrambling, is that the movement responsible for scrambling is purely optional, and no motivation is necessary (e.g., Fukui 1993 ; Kuroda 1988 ; Saito 1992 , 2005 ; Saito and Fukui 1998 ). An early work that represents this view of scrambling is Saito 1989 , which argued that scrambling—he was making use of long-distance scrambling—is semantically vacuous and must be radically reconstructed at LF. The semantic vacuity of scrambling provides the crucial argument for those who wish to view scrambling as purely optional: if it has no semantic import, it makes sense for it to be optional. The other view of scrambling is that it must be motivated by some factor. One of the earliest analyses to adopt this view is from Kitahara ( 1994 ), who suggests that scrambling is subject to what we would now call Closest Attract, a notion that requires a triggering feature for the movement. In a series of works, Miyagawa ( 1994 , 1997 , 2001 , 2003 , 2005a , 2005b , 2006 ) develops a study of scrambling that requires some motivation—either a formal requirement such as the EPP or, in the case of optional scrambling, the idea that it must lead to a new interpretation not possible without the movement (see Fox 2000 ). Other works that assume some sort of motivation include Grewendorf and Sabel 1999 , Kawamura 2004 , Kawashima and Kitahara 2003 , and Sabel 2001 , among others. In a slightly different vein, Bošković and Takahashi ( 1998 ) argue that the minimalist notion of “last resort” applies to scrambling. Two books devoted to scrambling and related issues have recently appeared (Karimi 2003 , Sabel and Saito 2005 ), and in this Handbook , we decided not to take it up beyond what we just described, because so much has recently been written and it would be difficult to do justice to the phenomenon in one chapter. That is not to say that we completely ignore the issue. Miyamoto's chapter on sentence processing, and Murasugi and Sugisaki's chapter on acquisition, treat scrambling among other constructions from the perspectives particular to these chapters.

1.2 Phonology

Largely parallel to research in syntax and semantics, work in Japanese phonology has undergone a reorientation from focusing on the analysis of the language to focusing on the conclusions to be drawn from such analysis for general phonological theory; the relation between phonology, morphology, and syntax; and the structure of the lexicon. 2 Although this perspective was not absent from leading works of the earlier period, such as McCawley 1968 and Haraguchi 1977 , it has taken center stage since the mid-1980s.

Work on the prosodic morphology of Japanese (Ito 1990 ; Ito and Mester 2003 ; Kubozono 1995 ; Mester 1990 ; Poser 1984a , 1990 ) revealed the overwhelming importance of the bimoraic foot—a unit realized as a single heavy syllable or as a sequence of two light syllables—in many kinds of word formation where canonical patterns play a role, such as nicknames, truncations, and the like. The fact that such higher level organization into feet asserts itself in Japanese, a language lacking an intensity-based system of prominence (“stress”; see Beckman 1986 ), was instrumental in establishing the view that prosodic structure—and most prominently, foot structure—is a general kind of rhythmic skeleton present in all languages, not just in those where foot heads are marked with phonetic stress. In a different vein, Ito and Mester ( 1986 , 2004 ; Mester and Ito 1989 ) used some of the central morphophonemic alternations of Japanese to argue for specific properties of auto-segmental representation and feature specification and, more recently, for a specific version of markedness principles operating in tandem with constraints on word structure in Optimality Theory.

The modern understanding of pitch accent systems is to a significant extent based on studies devoted to Japanese, such as Poser 1984b , Kubozono 1993 , Pierrehumbert and Beckman 1988 , and Selkirk and Tateishi 1988 , which have established the general result that such systems involve only a few tonal landmarks (boundary tones and accentual tones) assigned at well-defined locations within an articulated prosodic constituent structure. As a last example, the segregation of the Japanese lexicon into separate layers governed by somewhat different principles (native, Sino-Japanese, Western loans) served as an empirical model for different variants of a universal theory of the phonological lexicon in Optimality Theory that can adequately represent such internal variation (Fukazawa, Kitahara, and Ota 1998 ; Ito and Mester 1995a , 1995b , 1999 , 2001 , 2002 ).

In one of the phonology chapters, “Lexical Classes in Phonology,” Junko Ito and Armin Mester explore loanword phonology from the perspective of substructures that are known to exist in the Japanese lexicon. In another, “Japanese Accent,” Haruo Kubozono reexamines the Tokyo Japanese accent and develops a much simplified analysis. In “Prominence Marking in the Japanese Intonation System,” Jennifer J. Venditti, Kikuo Maekawa, and Mary E. Beckman show that Japanese employs a variety of prosodic mechanisms to mark focal prominence, although, crucially, this does not include manipulation of accent.

1.3 Acquisition

Acquisition research on Japanese has a long history of its own, comparable to syntax and phonology. One of the main topics has been word-order variation as in syntax. Given that both SOV and OSV orders are available in adult grammar, with S and O carrying morphological nominative and accusative case markers, respectively, the question often addressed has been at what age children can correctly comprehend the “scrambled” OSV order (e.g., Hayashibe 1975 , Sano 1977 ). The early works noted that young children had difficulty with the OSV order, mistaking it as SOV, which suggests that in early stages word order plays a prominent role, and it is the “neutral” SOV order that they assume. However, Otsu ( 1994 ) questioned this result by showing that children had no problem with the scrambled OSV order if a proper context introduced the sentence, thus showing that scrambling occurs earlier than previously believed. This result was reinforced by Murasugi and Kawamura ( 2005 ), who demonstrated that even three-year-olds were able to comprehend OSV sentences and, further, had knowledge of the reconstruction properties of scrambling.

Although it has been shown that many grammatical properties are acquired quite early, it has also been noted that the acquisition of others may be delayed. One candidate for late acquisition is A-chain. Here, the relevant theoretical proposal is Borer and Wexler's ( 1987 ) A-Chain Deficit Hypothesis, which states that maturation is required for the formation of A-chains. A number of works have appeared, for example, on Japanese passives and unaccusatives to examine this hypothesis, and a definite conclusion is yet to be attained. Whereas Miyamoto et al. ( 1999 ) argue for the hypothesis, Sano ( 2000 ) and Sano, Endo, and Yamakoshi ( 2001 ) argue against it, both on the basis of acquisition data on unaccusatives. Sugisaki ( 1999 ) and Minai ( 2000 ) take the late acquisition of passive as evidence for the hypothesis. Machida, Wexler, and Miyagawa ( 2004 ) concur with them, offering an alternative interpretation for the unaccusative data. But Murasugi and Kawamura ( 2005 ) suggest that the late acquisition of passive may be due to factors independent of A-chain maturation. The debate is yet to be settled.

In their chapter on acquisition, “The Acquisition of Japanese Syntax,” Keiko Murasugi and Koji Sugisaki explore a number of issues concerning parameter setting and developmental factors in language acquisition. They consider those cases that fall under Wexler's ( 1998 ) Very Early Parameter Setting (VEPS) hypothesis and those that apparently involve delayed parameter setting. They discuss some data that pertain to A-chain maturation as well as to the gradual process of the acquisition of lexical items.

1.4 Processing

Paralleling its study in syntax and semantics and also acquisition, scrambling is a prominent topic of research in Japanese sentence processing. The question is, is there a difference in processing load between SOV and OSV word orders? There is an important theoretical implication. By Hale's ( 1980 , 1982 ) configurationality parameter, languages with flexible word order are nonconfigurational. According to this characterization, different word orders such as SOV and OSV are base generated. No movement is involved, so that, from the viewpoint of processing, there should be no difference in the processing load across different orders. However, the “scrambling” analysis (Harada 1977 , Saito 1985 ) could predict a difference. SOV is the “base” order, and OSV involves movement of the object over the subject, thus increasing complexity and processing load. As Edson T. Miyamoto discusses in his chapter on sentence processing, “Processing Sentences in Japanese,” the results of experiments on this topic have been mixed.

Another area that has attracted attention is the relative clause. Given that Japanese is head final, including the head of the relative clause, researchers wonder how speakers process relative clauses. Here, too, there are consequences for the general theory of sentence processing. What Miyamoto in his chapter calls a “head-driven” model predicts that Japanese is processed nonincrementally. Everything must be kept in working memory until the pertinent head appears and assigns each phrase an appropriate role. This makes Japanese sentence processing fundamentally different from the processing of head-initial languages. That claim, in fact, has been made (e.g., Mazuka and Lust 1990 ; see Hasegawa 1990 in the same volume for comments). Moreover, the nonincremental processing places a huge burden on memory. Miyamoto summarizes the research on Japanese relative-clause processing, including discussion of alternatives to this language-specific model.

1.5 Information Structure

In her chapter, “Japanese - Wa , - Ga , and Information Structure,” Caroline Heycock revisits the important descriptive observations in Kuno 1973 and develops a view of - wa and - ga based on modern theories of information structure. This is a continuation of the project she initiated in Heycock 1993 , where she provided an explanation for what Kuno ( 1973 :49–59) called “exhaustive-listing ga ” in the mapping from syntactic structure to information structure. As Heycock shows, the information-structure analysis of - wa and - ga not only can successfully account for their complex properties but also may help to clarify aspects of the theory of information structure itself. Moreover, there may very well be contributions to be made to the analysis of other languages (e.g., verb-second).

1.6 Brief Summary of the Chapters

1.6.1 phonetics and phonology.

In “Lexical Classes in Phonology,” Junko Ito and Armin Mester explore class distinctions, such as Germanic versus Latinate in English, which occur in virtually all languages. 3 The synchronic status of such lexical strata is controversial in linguistics, and Japanese plays a prominent role in the discussion, partially because lexical class distinctions are so clearly visible, even in the writing system. With the shift in phonology from a rule-based derivational framework to a system of ranked and violable constraints that came with Optimality Theory, a new perspective on this topic has developed. This chapter takes up some of the conceptual issues connected with the theoretical shift and its empirical predictions and problems.

In “Japanese Accent,” Haruo Kubozono demonstrates the simplicity of (Tokyo) Japanese accent through a review of the recent studies. He specifically argues for the following two points. First, word accent is only sparsely specified in the lexicon; that is, only certain classes of words in the whole vocabulary are lexically specified with their accent patterns, whereas a majority of words are literally unmarked in the lexicon. Second, major accent rules previously proposed as independent rules in Tokyo Japanese—such as the loanword accent rule, compound accent rules, and the accent rule for verbs and adjectives—can all be generalized.

In “Prominence Marking in the Japanese Intonation System,” Jennifer J. Venditti, Kikuo Maekawa, and Mary E. Beckman show that Japanese uses a variety of prosodic mechanisms to mark focal prominence, including local pitch range expansion, prosodic restructuring to set off the focal constituent, postfocal subordination, and prominence-lending boundary pitch movements, but (notably) not manipulation of accent. In this chapter, they describe the Japanese intonation system within the Autosegmental-Metrical model of intonational phonology and review these prosodic mechanisms that have been shown to mark focal prominence. They point out potentials for ambiguity in the prosodic parse and discuss their larger implications for the development of a tenable general theory of prosody and its role in the marking of discourse structure.

1.6.2 Acquisition, Sentence Processing, Information Structure, and Syntax-Semantics-Morphology

In “On the Causative Construction,” Heidi Harley shows that the analysis of the affixal Japanese causative morpheme - (s)ase requires an explicit treatment of the morphology-syntax interface, because it exhibits syntactic characteristics typical of both monoclausal and biclausal constructions, despite forming a single phonological word in combination with the verb stem to which it attaches. The arguments bearing on both lexicalist and syntacticocentric approaches are considered, and an articulated syntax-based treatment is presented. Additionally, the relationship between the lexical causatives and the productive causatives of Japanese is discussed in detail, and Harley argues that the allomorphic properties of the former support a Late Insertion approach to the syntax-phonology interface.

In “Japanese - Wa, -Ga , and Information Structure,” Caroline Heycock discusses two of the most long-standing interrelated issues in the synchronic study of Japanese: the interpretation of the “topic marker” wa and the “nominative/subject/ focus marker” ga . Descriptively, it appears that the former can have both contrastive and noncontrastive interpretations, and that the latter sometimes, but not always, expresses narrow focus. Similar patterns have been observed in languages where topic and focus are not marked morphologically; Japanese then may hold the key to a better understanding of these very contentious notions and, in particular, to the questions of how and why the different interpretations arise.

In “On Verb Raising,” Hideki Kishimoto discusses issues and controversies surrounding verb raising in Japanese by looking at the null-object construction, unusual coordination, and emphatic verbal sequences. In the null-object construction, overt verb raising is argued to take place alongside VP-ellipsis (Otani and Whitman 1991), and the unusual coordination is claimed to involve overt verb raising (Koizumi 1995, 2000). By contrast, it is claimed that the emphatic verbal construction signals the absence of overt verb raising (Sakai 1998, Aoyagi 1998). A number of counterarguments as well as some alternative views are advanced in the literature in response to these arguments, so the claims still remain highly controversial.

In “Nominative Object,” Masatoshi Koizumi presents a study of sentences in which the object is marked with the nominative case-marker ga (the nominative object construction). Such sentences contrast with prototypical transitive sentences where the subject and the object bear nominative and accusative cases, respectively. The nominative marking of objects is found in many languages of the world and has raised a number of important questions such as: (1) Is the nominative object really an object rather than a subject? (2) When does it occur? (3) Why does the nominative object tend to have wider scope compared with the accusative object?

In “ Ga/No Conversion,” Hideki Maki and Asako Uchibori examine the two major approaches to the Japanese ga/no (nominative/genitive) conversion phenomenon: the DP approach by Miyagawa (1993) and Ochi ( 2001 ), and the non-DP approach by Hiraiwa (2001a). They compare the strengths and weaknesses of each approach and then suggest a refined analysis that incorporates ideas from both approaches. In the suggested analysis, D licenses the genitive Case as in the DP approach, but movement into Spec,DP is not involved in genitive Case licensing, as in the non-DP approach.

In “Processing Sentences in Japanese,” Edson T. Miyamoto discusses many of the major topics in sentence processing, including incremental processing of head-final constructions, clause-boundary ambiguities, implicit prosodic contours, relative clauses (attachment ambiguities, relativized position), wh -phrases, word order, and center embedding. A recurring theme is that the mechanisms and strategies used in processing are language independent (although some potential counterexamples are also discussed), so one crucial goal is to determine how seemingly distinct phenomena in typologically diverse languages can be subsumed under a unified account.

In “The Acquisition of Japanese Syntax,” Keiko Murasugi and Koji Sugisaki begin by noting that the theory of language acquisition attempts to answer the foundational question of how innate linguistic knowledge, or Universal Grammar (UG), interacts with linguistic experience to yield a particular grammar in the actual time course. They review some representative studies on the acquisition of Japanese that attempt to answer this question and hence have a direct bearing on the construction of the theory of language acquisition. These studies are discussed along the following theoretical dimensions: (1) early emergence of UG principles, (2) parameter (re)setting, (3) A-chain maturation, and (4) the acquisition of lexical items.

In “The Syntax and Semantics of Floating Numeral Quantifiers,” Kimiko Nakanishi looks at two competing views on floating numeral quantifiers (FNQs)—that is, numerals that appear away from their host NPs. One view holds that FNQs are transformationally derived from their nonfloating counterparts, whereas the other view assumes no transformational relation. The chapter compares the two by investigating how they fare with various syntactic and semantic properties of FNQs. In particular, at issue are distributional restrictions, such as why the object cannot intervene between the subject and its FNQ, and semantic restrictions, such as why FNQs permit distributive but not collective readings.

In “V-V Compounds,” Kunio Nishiyama discusses V-V compounds as a construction that has inspired the lexicon versus syntax debate for the place of morphology. Some major lexical and syntactic analyses are reviewed, and Nishiyama examines how they fare empirically with the main properties of V-V compounds. Basically, transitive-transitive combinations are rather easy to capture, but complications arise when one of the verbs is intransitive. To accommodate some idiosyncrasies of V-V compounds within the syntactic approach, principles of Distributed Morphology are invoked—in particular, the root-as-categorially-neutral hypothesis. The goal of the chapter is to examine the implications of V-V compounds for the organization of grammar.

In “ Wh -Questions,” Norvin Richards considers some approaches to the syntax of Japanese wh -in-situ, contrasting movement with nonmovement accounts. The representative nonmovement account is Shimoyama's ( 2001 ), which gives Japanese wh -words a semantics that allows them to be interpreted in situ. The discussion of covert-movement approaches centers on the type first proposed by Nishigauchi (1986), with covert pied-piping of islands; the approach is modified, following von Stechow ( 1996 ), to allow subsequent reconstruction of the island. Data are drawn from conditions on the placement of ittai , quantifier intervention effects, multiple- wh questions, additional- wh effects, the distribution of mo , and semantic conditions on interpretation of pied-piped structures.

In “Indeterminate Pronouns,” Junko Shimoyama provides a survey on issues surrounding the so-called indeterminate pronouns in Japanese such as dare ‘who’ and nani ‘what’, of which similar counterparts are found cross-linguistically. It focuses on two contexts, interrogative and universal, which easily allow apparently long-distance association of indeterminates with the particles ka and mo . The chapter examines two major types of analyses for the association, the movement and nonmovement analyses, in light of questions concerning (1) what the semantics of indeterminates are, and how the appropriate sentential meaning can be derived from the syntactic structure; and (2) how the intriguing locality pattern found in the association should be dealt with.

In “Noun Phrase Ellipsis,” Daiko Takahashi presents an overview of the analysis of null arguments in Japanese in terms of ellipsis. The idea of “noun phrase ellipsis” was put forth in part to overcome certain difficulties faced by the traditional analysis based on empty pronouns. There are two main varieties of ellipsis analysis: one employs VP-ellipsis (Otani and Whitman 1991 ) and the other, more directly, NP-ellipsis (Oku 1998 , Kim 1999 ). Although the former proposal is quite ingenious, this chapter shows that there are fairly strong arguments in favor of the latter. The NP-ellipsis analysis also has the possibility of relating the presence of null arguments to the free-word-order phenomenon (Oku 1998 ), which sheds a new light on the issue of (non-)configurationality.

In “Ditransitive Constructions,” Yuji Takano looks at the syntactic properties of the two objects in Japanese ditransitive constructions. One major issue he takes up is whether or not word-order alternation between the two objects is to be attributed to movement (scrambling). It is shown that various arguments have been presented in the literature in favor of both approaches. Given this, Takano suggests a possible way to unify the two approaches.

In “The Structure of DP,” Akira Watanabe looks at two peculiarities of Japanese nominals—namely, multiple possibilities for numeral placement and the existence of an indeterminate system. The internal structure of DP is explored by investigating the parametric sources of these two interesting characteristics. The possibility that emerges is that Japanese has more agreement relations within DP than has English and that the movement operations fed by these agreement relations produce the diversity of numeral placement. The indeterminate system is also shown to depend on agreement. Additionally, the behavior of nonnumeral quantifiers is taken up and compared with that of numerals.

Acknowledgments

Notes for chapter 1.

The configurational analysis of Japanese is further developed in Saito 1985 and Hoji 1985 .

We thank Junko Ito and Armin Mester for extensive assistance with this section on phonology.

The summaries of the chapters presented here are based on the abstracts written by the authors. Please see the reference sections of the individual chapters for the works cited in these summaries.

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Languages and Culture

• Japanese Language and Literature

Understanding and identifying the Essence and Current State of Japanese Culture through Words Sparkling in a Forest of Literature

Native Japanese speakers find themselves speaking the language before they knew it. But when did the language originate, and why did it arise? You may want to understand the mechanisms and functions of all the words you might not know as well as you think you do. Why is it that those of us living today believe that we can understand the poems of the Manyoshu , which were written by people who lived such a long time ago?

The Japanese people of every era have entrusted their thoughts to words that have become steadily more sophisticated over time. Literary works are the treasure troves that contain these thoughts. Why not explore the wide forest of literature, branching off into the distant past or the modern era? This discipline will serve as a reliable compass to lead you forward.

 Objective: Focusing on Literary Works

Students in the Japanese Language and Literature program attain a fundamental ability to learn Japanese and Japanese literature, as well as to express their insights in words and master techniques for analyzing works of literature.

There are various methods of doing research. You can read old manuscripts written on traditional Japanese paper with sumi ink; meticulously reconstruct the lives of people who lived during the Heian Period; apply the latest theories for focusing on works of literature; or statistically process huge amounts of linguistic data on a PC. Whichever path you choose, you will come to learn that the crucial thing is to carefully read and deeply consider the texts for yourself.

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This program teaches the characteristics of English as a language and how to use and master it, as well as literary and cultural representations produced by English speakers to express thoughts, feelings and the imagination, and presents methodologies of analyzing them.

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To prepare for learning about the literature and culture of English and the English-speaking world, first-year students take basic lectures on grammar, and second-year students take the Seminar: English Grammar, Seminar: English Phonetics, Introduction to English Linguistics 2, and other courses that build on the basics. These are all offered with the goal of helping students attain advanced levels of ability. Second- and third-year students can select their specialties from British literature, American literature, and English linguistics. They take seminars and lectures to deepen their specialized knowledge. Students of English linguistics take the Advanced Seminar: Methodology in Linguistic Research I and various Advanced Lectures in English Linguistics courses. Students of American literature take the History of English Literature, Advanced Seminar: Literary Theory, Advanced Lecture in English Literature (U.S.), and so on. Fourth-year students also take advanced seminars and various special lectures designed separately for linguistics and literature, deepening their specialized knowledge, and write their graduation theses in English.

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Europe as Viewed from France, and France as Discussed in Europe　 Traversing the Entire French-Speaking World, from Immigration Issues to Modern Thought

France has been at the center of European politics and culture since the seventeenth century. In the second half of the twentieth century, France played a major role alongside Germany in founding the European Union, and continues to wield considerable influence throughout Europe.

Therefore, when considering French culture and society, it is vital to keep in mind Europe as a whole, as well as the pivotal role France played whenever discussing issues facing Europe.

Students also expand their perspectives to include the cultures and societies of other nations within the French-speaking realm, and study a wide array of topics beyond language and culture, including everything from movies to philosophy, and from fashion to immigration issues.

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Students attain practical proficiency in French and a deep understanding of the various linguistic cultures existing within French, as well as the state of societies in the French-speaking world. They also gain an interest in exchanges between different cultures, including the German-speaking language cultures and other European countries as well as other cultures in the French-speaking world. This program is designed to produce people with these capabilities and a strong intellectual curiosity.

Students gain a wider perspective and the ability to think flexibly by studying the culture and society of the French-speaking world, including everything from literature and philosophy to movies and art, and from food culture to immigration issues.

Graduates go out into the world with the ability to meet the needs of modern global society, working for private companies in trade, finance and other fields, as well as in government, the media and other areas.

Features: Learn French through Both Current Events and Literature

This program’s curriculum is based on the assumption that newly enrolled students have not studied French at all. Students develop basic French linguistic proficiency by taking core French courses during the first and second years.

In the specialized courses that start in the second year, students strengthen their ability to write and converse, and study a diverse range of French texts regarding current events, business, literature and social issues. At the same time, they gradually deepen their professional knowledge regarding culture and society in the French-speaking world.

The graduation thesis is compulsory in the fourth year, and should be fruit of what the student learned over four years.

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Article contents

Japanese linguistics.

• Natsuko Tsujimura Natsuko Tsujimura Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures, Indiana University
• https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780199384655.013.168
• Published online: 25 January 2017

The rigor and intensity of investigation on Japanese in modern linguistics has been particularly noteworthy over the past 50 years. Not only has the elucidation of the similarities to and differences from other languages properly placed Japanese on the typological map, but Japanese has served as a critical testing area for a wide variety of theoretical approaches.

Within the sub-fields of Japanese phonetics and phonology, there has been much focus on the role of mora. The mora constitutes an important timing unit that has broad implications for analysis of the phonetic and phonological system of Japanese. Relatedly, Japanese possesses a pitch-accent system, which places Japanese in a typologically distinct group arguably different from stress languages, like English, and tone languages, like Chinese. A further area of intense investigation is that of loanword phonology, illuminating the way in which segmental and suprasegmental adaptations are processed and at the same time revealing the fundamental nature of the sound system intrinsic to Japanese.

In morphology, a major focus has been on compounds, which are ubiquitously found in Japanese. Their detailed description has spurred in-depth discussion regarding morphophonological (e.g., Rendaku—sequential voicing) and morphosyntactic (e.g., argument structure) phenomena that have crucial consequences for morphological theory. Rendaku is governed by layers of constraints that range from segmental and prosodic phonology to structural properties of compounds, and serves as a representative example in demonstrating the intricate interaction of the different grammatical aspects of the language. In syntax, the scrambling phenomenon, allowing for the relatively flexible permutation of constituents, has been argued to instantiate a movement operation and has been instrumental in arguing for a configurational approach to Japanese. Japanese passives and causatives, which are formed through agglutinative morphology, each exhibit different types: direct vs. indirect passives and lexical vs. syntactic causatives. Their syntactic and semantic properties have posed challenges to and motivations for a variety of approaches to these well-studied constructions in the world’s languages.

Taken together, the empirical analyses of Japanese and their theoretical and conceptual implications have made a tremendous contribution to linguistic research.

• pitch-accent
• lexical strata
• conjugation paradigms
• Case particles
• zero pronouns
• relative clauses

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Ph.D. in Japanese Literature and Culture

The Ph.D. program is designed to prepare students for a doctoral degree in Japanese literature and culture.

Students should consult the most up-to-date version of the degree plan on the  Stanford Bulletin  as well as the  EALC Graduate Handbook . Each student should meet with their faculty advisor at least once per quarter to discuss the degree requirements and their progress.

Admission to Candidacy

Candidacy is the most important University milestone on the way to the Ph.D. degree. Admission to candidacy rests both on the fulfillment of department requirements and on an assessment by department faculty that the student has the potential to successfully complete the Ph.D.

Following University policy ( GAP 4.6.1 ), students are expected to complete the candidacy requirements by Spring Quarter of the second year of graduate study.

Pre-Candidacy Requirements

Demonstrate proficiency in modern and classical Japanese by completing the following courses or demonstrating equivalent linguistic attainment by passing the appropriate certifying examinations.

• JAPANLNG 213 - Fourth-Year Japanese, Third Quarter (2-4 units)
• JAPAN 264 - Introduction to Premodern Japanese (3-5 units)
• JAPAN 265 - Readings in Premodern Japanese (2-5 units)
• EALC 201 - Proseminar in East Asian Humanities I: Skills and Methodologies (3 units)
• EALC 202 - Proseminar in East Asian Humanities II: Current Scholarship (1 unit)

Complete eight advisor-approved courses numbered above 200 from among the offerings of the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures. At least four of these eight courses must be advanced seminars numbered above 300. At least one of these eight courses must deal with Japanese linguistics. For students focusing on modern literature, at least two of these eight courses must deal with premodern material. For students focusing on premodern literature, at least two of the eight courses must deal with modern material.

Complete two upper-division or graduate-level courses in two supporting fields for a total of four courses outside of Japanese literature or linguistics. Supporting fields, to be determined in consultation with the student’s primary advisor, may include Japanese anthropology, art, art history, history, philosophy, political science, religious studies, Chinese literature, Korean literature, comparative literature, etc.

All Doctoral students must complete an MA qualifying paper. An MA thesis is accepted instead of a qualifying paper for students initially admitted as EALC MA students. Students seeking an MA en route to the PhD must secure approval from the primary advisor and submit an MA thesis.

A graded MA qualifying paper or thesis must be submitted to the DGS and SSO with an accompanying note from the student’s primary advisor by week five of spring quarter of the second year of study for the annual review and candidacy decision.

During the quarter when students complete the MA qualifying paper or thesis (25-30 pages), they must enroll in  EALC 299 .

Teaching Requirement

• DLCL 301 - The Learning and Teaching of Second Languages (3 units)

Demonstrate pedagogical proficiency by serving as a teaching assistant for at least three quarters, starting no later than autumn quarter of the third year of graduate study. The department may approve exceptions to the timing of the language teaching requirement.

Post-Candidacy Requirements

Demonstrate proficiency in at least one supporting language to be chosen in consultation with the primary advisor according to the candidate’s specific research goals. Students concentrating on classical Japanese literature usually are expected to fulfill the supporting language requirement by completing  kanbun , JAPAN 265 - Readings in Premodern Japanese (2-5 units). For the supporting language, students must be proficient at the second-year level, at the minimum; a higher level of proficiency may be required depending on the advisor’s recommendation. Reading proficiency must be certified through a written examination or an appropriate amount of coursework to be determined on a case-by-case basis. When deemed necessary by the student’s advisor(s), working knowledge of an additional supporting language may also be required.

Pass a comprehensive qualifying examination that tests the candidate’s breadth and depth in the primary field of research and methodological competence in the relevant discipline before advancing to Terminal Graduate Registration (TGR) status.

Students should submit a dissertation prospectus before advancing to Terminal Graduate Registration (TGR) status. The prospectus should comprehensively describe the dissertation project and include sections on the project rationale, key research questions, contribution to the dissertation’s field, literature review, chapter-by-chapter description, a projected timeline, and bibliography.

Pass the University Oral Examination (dissertation defense). General regulations governing the oral examination are found in Graduate Academic Policies and Procedures ( GAP 4.7.1 ). The candidate is examined on questions related to the dissertation after acceptable parts have been completed in draft form.

Following university policy ( GAP 4.8.1 ), submit a dissertation demonstrating the ability to undertake original research based on primary and secondary materials in Japanese.

Japanese Literature and Culture Ph.D. students must complete a Qualifying Paper by week 5 of spring quarter of the second year as part of the Candidacy evaluation process. The Qualifying Paper should be 25-30 pages in length not including bibliography and must demonstrate the ability to develop and carry out an original research project using primary and secondary materials in Japanese. The Qualifying Paper can be an extension of a seminar paper, but its topic should be discussed with the student’s primary advisor prior to writing.

The Dissertation Prospectus Defense constitutes the first step toward faculty approval for the student’s proposed dissertation project and should be completed before the student begins to apply for external funding to conduct doctoral research in Japan – typically by Spring quarter of the third year, but sometimes in Spring or Summer quarter of the second year if the student’s research agenda is already well defined by that time. The defense is a two-hour oral exam conducted by the student’s dissertation reading committee (minimum of three faculty members, including the primary advisor). The prospectus, 12-15 pages not including bibliography, must be submitted to committee members at least two weeks prior to the defense.

The Comprehensive Exam is a two-hour oral exam on Japanese literature with three examiners. The reading list (maximum 150 titles) must be approved by them at least one quarter in advance. The list must include primary texts in Japanese literature as well as core texts in methodology; students may also add a subfield and a fourth examiner if deemed necessary by their primary advisor for their research and credentialing. To pass the exam students must demonstrate competency in literary history and critical issues for the field of Japanese literary studies, selected methodologies, and key issues in any subfield. The Comprehensive Exam must be completed by the end of the fourth year.

Implementation of Japanese Sociocultural Values in Japanese Kotowaza: A Cognitive Linguistics Perspective

• Published: 03 February 2023
• Volume 52 , pages 1205–1219, ( 2023 )

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• Xichun Fan 1  

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Kotowaza were created by gaining experience and through recurring events over the years of existence of the Japanese people. The purpose of this study is to conduct a qualitative analysis of Japanese kotowaza in cognitive-linguistic discourse to divide idioms into categories and groups with specific sociocultural features. The paper focuses in detail on the semantic features of 20 kotowaza that use animal symbols as an idiomatic metaphor. In this paper, 10 proverbs with the central animal visualization, neko, were analyzed. Visionary metaphors are developed based on the comparison of cat's body parts and behavior with human qualities or characteristics of objects and phenomena. The analysis of the remaining 10 kotowaza showed that the meaning of imagery could originate from Chinese tradition and then change under the influence of Japanese style. Hence, it follows that the meanings of some kotowaza, or the animals they use, can be interpreted differently depending on context. However, the key meanings of proverbs are engrained in the national consciousness of native speakers. It was also observed that kotowaza used oxymoron. It is possible to gain a correct understanding of what kotowaza means through analyzing literal and idiomatic relations in the proverb. Each proverb has an animal symbol, the meaning of which is engrained and originates from the cultural and historical development of the Japanese nation. The practical application of the study lies in the fact that these findings can be used for further study of the special aspects of manifestation of sociocultural heritage at the linguistic level within the phraseology of the Japanese language.

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The paper was suported by the Scientific Research Fundings for Provincially-Administrated Universities in Heilongjiang Province in 2022. Project Number: 145209165. Entitled “A Contrast Study on Usages of Chinese and Japanese Homographic Classifiers: A Cognitive Ecolinguistics Approach.”

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Fan, X. Implementation of Japanese Sociocultural Values in Japanese Kotowaza: A Cognitive Linguistics Perspective. J Psycholinguist Res 52 , 1205–1219 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10936-022-09930-3

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Accepted : 26 December 2022

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DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s10936-022-09930-3

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