Paper short abstract

Hachijō is an endangered Japonic variety, spoken in the south of the Izu islands. While it is often considered a descendant of Eastern Old Japanese, other estimate that there is not enough evidence yet for its classification. This talk aims at examining arguments for and against this hypothesis.

Paper long abstract

Hachijō (locally simply called 島言葉 Shima-kotoba ‘island speech’) is an endangered minority language of Japan, originally spoken in some of the southern Izu islands (primarily Hachijōjima, Kojima and Aogashima). Like most Japonic varieties, it was long considered one of many dialects of Japanese, but it tends nowadays to be rather described as a separate language having itself several dialects (Iannucci, 2019).

Though traditionally unwritten, Hachijō does have rich literary oral traditions (including folk songs, poems, theatre plays, folktales, prayer, proverbs, riddles, etc.), and has been documented and intensively commented at least since the late Edo period. It was also included in 2009 in the online version of UNESCO’s Atlas of the world’s languages in danger (Moseley, 2009), alongside Ainu and six of the Ryukyuan languages.

The classification of Hachijō within Japonic has been a matter of discussion since at least the early 20th century (see for instance Tachibana and Tōjō, 1934).

Early on, Hachijō has been compared with the Eastern dialects of Old Japanese (EOJ) attested in the Man’yōshū, based on several phonological, morphological and lexical similarities already noted by Dickins and Satow (1878: 464). Because of these similarities, Hachijō is still often considered to be a living descendant of EOJ (see for instance Kupchik, 2011:7).

However, Hachijō was also compared with other Japonic branches, such as north-eastern Japanese dialects (especially Tōhoku, Akiyamagō and Toshima varieties), Kyūshū dialects and Ryukyuan languages; and, based on these comparisons, some specialists estimate that most of the similarities between EOJ and Hachijō are, in fact, mostly due to shared archaism rather than to shared innovation. Thus, according to them, there is not enough evidence yet to assert whether there is a direct genetic relationship between them (see for instance Pellard, 2018:2).

Thus, this talk aims at taking a closer look at the most recent Eastern Old Japanese data (developed most notably by Ikier, 2006; Kupchik 2011 and Vovin 2021) and at the most recent Hachijō data (notably developed by Kaneda, 2001; Kibe, 2013; Iannucci, 2019 and Baudel, 2023), in order to examine phonological, morphological and lexical arguments for the classification of Hachijō.

Paper short abstract

This paper focuses on the historical development of Modern Japanese multiverb mono-clausal predicates containing constructions such as V-te oku, V-te shimau, etc. It deals with their ongoing grammaticalization and possible contact influences.

Paper long abstract

Modern Standard Japanese is filled with various multiverb mono-clausal predicates (MMC) of different types. This paper focuses on the development of MMC that in general contain a converb form of a content verb (colloquially known as the te-form) and an auxiliary/semi-auxiliary, such as V-te iru, V-te oku, V-te shimau, V-te iku, etc. While these constructions nowadays may seem as if they were always an integral part of the Japanese grammar, the whole picture is actually rather more complicated. This paper deals with the diachronic development and possible contact influences leading to the grammaticalization of these MMC. As these constructions differ both in their age and level of grammaticalization, the diachrony of the individual constructions will be discussed in detail first separately (using extant textual sources ranging from Manyōshū, through Esopo no Faburasu, to 19th century novels) and then as a whole to give a complex picture of the processes through which this salient feature of Modern Japanese came to be. Afterwards, the development of MMC in Japanese will be put into context by contrasting them with similar constructions found in the typologically similar languages of the area, predominantly Korean, but also nearby Tungusic languages (mostly Manchu and Sibe).

Paper short abstract

The notation of Romanized Japanese in 16th and 17th centuries is mainly in Portuguese style, but some examples in manuscripts show the influence of other languages. I will show the multilingual process of Japanese Romanization using the examples of Nihon Ōkokuki, a Spanish text by Ávila Girón.

Paper long abstract

In this presentation, I will describe the multilingual process of Romanization of Japanese in the Kirishitan documents in Late Middle Japanese.

In documents written by Europeans in the 16th and 17th centuries, the Romanization of Japanese vocabulary follows the Portuguese style Romanization devised by the Jesuits, regardless of whether the main text is written in Portuguese or not. This is evidenced not only by Jesuit texts, but also by the Dominican’s prints.

However, in manuscript documents, not only the Portuguese style notation is used, but there are also examples of notation influenced by the language of the main text. For example, both Portuguese style and English style notation are used in the manuscript text by Englishman John Saris (1579/80-1643). Similarly, in the Relación del Reino de Nippon (Nihon Ōkokuki) by Bernardino de Ávila Girón (?-1619?), the Romanization of Japanese vocabulary is based on the Portuguese style, but partially influenced by Spanish. This is probably because the main text is written in Spanish.

Nevertheless, among the extant manuscripts of Relación del Reino de Nippon, only the copy in the Jesuit Archives in Rome (ARSI), which is annotated by the Jesuit priest Pedro Morejon, shows no Spanish influence in the Romanized Japanese. It can be assumed that the Jesuits corrected the notation of Romanized Japanese from the Spanish-influenced style to the “normative” Portuguese style.

In general, the notation of Romanized Japanese in the Kirishitan documents is treated as material that reflects the phonology of Late Middle Japanese. However, especially in manuscript material, the language of the text and the language used by the author can affect the notation. Furthermore, we must consider the modification of notation due to the Jesuits’ normative consciousness.