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Paper short abstract

The current study aims to demonstrate gender differences in the diction of short poems contained in The Kokin Wakashuu, the first imperial anthology of poems, compiled during the early Heian period (794-1192) by conducting a quantitative analysis known as collocation network analysis.

Paper long abstract

This study aims to demonstrate gender differences in the diction of the short poems included in The Kokin Wakashuu, the first imperial anthology of poems, which was published during the early Heian period (794-1192). This anthology had a significant impact on Japanese poetry, shaping its future development. Additionally, it embodied the gender ideology of this period (Kondo 2005). While previous research on The Kokin Wakshuu primarily employs qualitative analysis, Kondo (2005) conducts an n-gram analysis on the poems and identifies expressions that appear exclusively in the poems composed by men. She argues that these expressions represent the ideal man of the Heian period. However, her analysis focuses on expressions used only in the male poems, leaving unexamined other expressions that appear only in the female poems or in both male and female poems.

The current study focuses on the verb omou (to think/feel) that appears in the poems contained in The Kokin Wakashuu. Kondo (2005) notes expressions containing this verb, such as omou-hito (person/people), omou-kokoro (heart), and mono (thing)-o (particle)-omou, only appear in the male poems, and they depict the man being active, which is the ideal man of this period. However, the verb omou itself appears in both male and female poems. This study thus examines the patterns of its use by conducting a quantitative analysis known as collocation network analysis to identify gender distinctions in the use of the verb. Collocation network analysis is a data visualization technique, which is based on the idea that, as Firth (1957) summarized, "you shall know a word by the company it keeps." This analysis visualizes patterns of words that frequently co-occur, providing insights that may be difficult to obtain through close reading. By conducting a quantitative analysis, the current study not only provides a thorough and systematic investigation of gender differences in diction in the poems but also sheds light on how quantitative methods contribute to the study of literary texts and reveal patterns, which otherwise would remain undetected.