Paper short abstract:

The basic function of personal pronouns is to indicate the object, but sometimes it functions as a strategy to convey the emotional attitude. By examining the usage of the personal pronouns as a communication strategy, we aim at clarifying the characteristics of the personal pronouns in Japanese.

Paper long abstract:

The basic function of personal pronouns is to indicate the object, but it also functions as a strategy to convey the emotional attitude of speakers especially when it is used exceptionally. For example, in Japanese, when the co-speakers are little children, the speaker can use the first-person pronouns to address them, such as (1). According to Suzuki (1972), this phenomenon is based on the empathetic identification with children.

(1) Boku ikutsu? (*How old am I (are you)?

However, observing actual usage suggests that the use of the first-person pronouns to a co-speaker is not explained by this usage only but it can be classified into several cases, each of which has a different effect. Firstly, there is a usage called "baby talk", made when the co-speaker is a person who cannot physically talk, such as a baby or a pet. Secondly, in Japanese, utterances like (1) are commonly used to address an unknown co-speaker. In those cases, since the use of the second-person pronouns like Anata or Kimi is restricted in Japanese, they serve as temporary nickname. Already, those two uses are born from different factors and have different effects in the communication.

In this paper, in addition to these cases, we would like to point out another usage which imitates the previous co-speaker's utterance, as example below.

(2) Teacher 1 (male): A kurasu no tantōsha tte dare? (Who is in charge of Class A?)

Teacher 2 (female): Aa, hai atashi desu! (Oh, yes, I am.)

Teacher 1 (male): Hai hai atashi ne. (*Okey it's me (you)

We sometimes use the first-person words in such a way, and this usage is accompanied by an affectionate attitude toward the co-speaker and an effect that teases the co-speaker. This is a function completely different from the original function of indicating the co-speaker, but rather a function that indirectly conveys only the empathetic attitudes to co-speakers, like hammering and echo utterances.

Based on such exceptional usage, we clarify the function of personal pronouns as a communication strategy and the characteristics of the personal pronouns in Japanese that enable it.

Paper short abstract:

This presentation discusses the relationship between the notion of 'cases' found in the research of the Dutch language and the research of kakarimusubi in Kokugaku in the modern realm of grammar studies in Japan. The achievement of understanding of cases in modern grammar will show.

Paper long abstract:

This presentation discusses the relationship between the notion of cases found in the research of the Dutch language and the research of kakarimusubi in Kokugaku in the modern realm of grammar studies in Japan.

First, this study will examine how Dutch scholars in the Edo Period understood naamvallen (cases) through Dutch grammar books. Some descriptions of the Dutch scholars were observed, how they reflected on the Japanese cases was also examined, and consequently it became clear that these cases reflected the understanding of the Dutch cases.

How such research of the Dutch language influenced research of the Japanese language will be discussed further. Tsurumine Shigenobu's Gogaku Shinsho, which first introduced research of the Dutch language, treated 'cases' as linguistic phenomena seen in the categories of indeclinable and declinable words. Comparing those descriptions with the Dutch grammar books and Motoori Nobunaga's Kotoba no Tamano-o, it became clear that they incorporated both research of the Dutch language and Kakarimusubi Studies from Kokugaku for studying 'cases'. In other words, Tsurumine equated 'case inflection', a phenomenon in Dutch grammar books, with the addition of 'auxiliaries' to 'indeclinable' and 'declinable' words and word inflection found in the Japanese language. This is the reason that all case particles used for the subject, and the complement, participles and auxiliary verbs connected to declinable words (predicates) were captured as 'cases' en bloc. On the other hand, the concepts of 'moto' and 'sue' in Kokugaku were captured as predicates of sentences and components other than predicates. In addition, syntactic elements that form the sentences, 'kun', 'shin', and 'min'were extracted, using the idea of case classification such as the 'nominative' and 'cases other than nominative' in Dutch grammar books.

Finally, the case in Yamada Yoshio's Nihon-bumpo-ron, which developed the leading theory of modern grammar in the Meiji Period will also be discussed.

On the basis of the above inferences, the achievement of understanding of cases in modern grammar will be shown.

Paper short abstract:

We compare the passive, potential and spontaneous clitic -(r)are- in Japanese with the middle voice clitic se in Spanish. The common character between them is that both have developed passive and potential constructions from the spontaneous meaning.

Paper long abstract:

We compare the passive, potential and spontaneous clitic -(r)are- in Japanese with the middle voice clitic se in Spanish focusing on the animacy of the subject and the agent's implicature. The common character between the voice system of -(r)are- and se is that both have developed passive and potential constructions from the spontaneous meaning.

-(R)are- is said to be formed by reanalyzing the inflection of spontaneous intransitive verbs and has, mainly, the following constructions in Early Middle Japanese (EMJ); Animate Subject Passive, Non-volitional, Impossible, and only a few Inanimate Subject Passive constructions (Kawamura 2013). On the other hand, Spanish se has Reflexive, Ergative (Spontaneous), Potential-Passive, Inanimate Passive and Impersonal (Sánchez López 2002). It has no Animate Passive.

We believe that the EMJ had few Inanimate Passive because it developed mainly Non-volitional and Impossible constructions in the range where Spanish developed Inanimate Passive, while Spanish has Reflexive construction in the range of Animate Passive.

Now in Contemporary Japanese (CJ), while the Non-volitional construction is limited to particular kinds of psychological verbs and Potential/ Impossible constructions are transferring to the new Potential construction with clitic -(r)e- (such as tabe-re-ru, kak-e-ru), the system of -(r)are- is shifting to the passive exclusive. Consequently, it has many Animate and Inanimate Passive types which EMJ did not have.

We compare the voice system of these three languages using original figures, which indicate whether the subject is animate or not, and whether the agent is implicit or not.

Reference

Kawamura, Futoshi (2013) Raru kei jutugobun-no kenkyu. Tokyo: Kuroshio Publisher.

Sánchez López, Cristina. (ed.) (2002) Las construcciones con se. Madrid: Visor Libros.

Paper short abstract:

An aspectual analysis of psych verbs leads us to a better understanding of the Japanese aspect marker -te i-. The multiple interpretations of -te i- can be explained by means of the type of "boundary", i.e. beginning, beginning=ending or ending, that appears in the denotation of the predicate.

Paper long abstract:

Japanese aspect marker -te i- can yield progressive (e.g. Kare-wa aruiteiru 'He is walking') and perfect (resultative, existential) readings (e.g. Kare-wa shindeiru 'He is dead'). It has been argued that the progressive and the resultative interpretations are drawn from the durativity and the punctuality of the verb the marker is attached to, respectively (Kindaichi 1950). Namely, verbs that can appear in the -te i- form with a progressive interpretation are "durative verbs" (e.g. aruku 'to walk' and tateru 'to build'), which correspond to Vendler's (1967) "activities" and "accomplishments," and verbs that can appear in this form with a resultative reading are "instantaneous verbs" (e.g. tsuku 'to arrive' and shinu 'to die'), which roughly correspond to "achievements." However, this temporal account is often rejected because of the existence of counterexamples. In this talk I argue that the multiple interpretations of -te i- can be explained indeed from an event-semantic perspective, applying the fruits of an aspectual analysis on psych verbs.

Cross-linguistically, there are two classes of psych verbs, Experiencer-Subject verbs and Experiencer-Object verbs. In Japanese, there are two subclasses in the Experiencer-Subject class verbs, i.e. nikumu 'to hate' and yorokobu 'to be/become pleased,' and there are also Experiencer-Object causative counterparts of a subclass of Experiencer-Subject verbs (e.g. yorokobaseru 'to please'). Applying Piñón's (1997) descriptions of achievements as "boundary happenings" and Marín and McNally's (2011) study of Spanish reflexive psych verbs into two aspectually distinct classes, i.e. aburrirse 'to be/become bored' and enfadarse 'to become mad,' I propose that the divisions of psych verbs and the different interpretations of their -te i- forms can be ascribed to which types of boundary, i.e. beginning, beginning=ending or ending, the predicates have in their denotation.

References: Kindaichi, H. 1950. Kokugo doushi no ichi bunrui. Gengo kenkyu, 15, 48-63. Marín, R. and McNally, L. 2011. Inchoativity, change of state, and telicity: Evidence from Spanish reflexive psychological verbs. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory, 29:1, 1-36. Piñón, C. 1997. Achievements in an event semantics. SALT Vll, 276-293. Vendler, Z. 1967. Linguistics in philosophy.