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Paper short abstract:

The presentation explores the teaching benefits of tsukkae, a type of disfluent utterance used by native Japanese speakers. It was found that learners of Japanese can acquire and use tsukkae, but not all learners’ utterances conveyed empathy and interactivity owing to its frequency and variation.

Paper long abstract:

To establish intercultural cohesion in Japan, it is necessary to transform learners’ Japanese speaking skills from being “understandable” to being “empathetic” to native speakers. We believe that teaching that transforms learner disfluency to native-speaker levels (Lickley 2015) is an effective method. Therefore, this presentation discussed teaching effects of disfluent utterances tsukkae (Sadanobu 2019)—that is, getting-stuck utterances—that are less commonly introduced to Japanese language education compared to fillers. In the presentation, a set of self-learning slides was made that includes two types of tsukkae as learning items— “break + continuation” and “prolongation + continuation”—which are commonly found in native speakers’ speech and are likely to be difficult for learners to acquire. It was designed for learners to provide an explanation of tsukkae forms with video examples by native speakers, to practice the prolongation and the break in short sentences with sample audio from native speakers and apply these skills in long sentences. This study included a total of six learners of Japanese language at a university in France who learned these skills with the set of slides. Consequently, we summarized the findings in the following two points: (1) the acquisition and application of tsukkae skills were confirmed in the learners’ speech, but (2) the way in which they applied tsukkae skills varied, and not all demonstrated a good balance of breaks and prolongations. The balance affects the levels of interactivity and empathy. In incorporating disfluent tsukkae into Japanese language education, it is suggested that it is necessary to explain the role and frequency of each tsukkae type.

References:

Lickley, Robin J. (2015) Fluency and disfluency. In Melissa A. Redford (ed.), The Handbook of Speech Production, pp. 445-474. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.

Sadanobu, Toshiyuki（2019）Bunsetsu-no Bumpo. Tokyo: Taishukan Shoten.