DOCSLIB.ORG

The Japanese Mental Lexicon

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
The Japanese Mental Lexicon The Japanese Mental Lexicon: The Lexical Retrieval and Representation of Two-Kanji Compound Words from a Morphological Perspective Terry Joyce 975058 Thesis Submitted to the Institute of Psychology, University of Tsukuba in Part Fulfillment of Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Psychology) 2001 Academic Year Abstract At its most general level, this research takes a psycholinguistic approach in seeking an acceptable answer to the question how do kanji function as a writing system? In pursuing this answer, the thesis takes the two-kanji compound word as its principle frame of reference. The emphasis on the two-kanji compound word, rather than on the single kanji character, follows from a belief that to understand how a writing system functions it is essential to identify the principles that govern the combination of graphic units. In searching for an answer to the research question, this thesis explores and traces the connections between four broad areas; namely, the classification of the Japanese writing system, Japanese word formation, visual word recognition, and, in particular, the Japanese mental lexicon. Given that the nature of a writing system will be reflected in the structure of the literate mental lexicon, the transition from writing system to mental lexicon is simply a shift in perspective—from external form to internal representation. The answer that emerges from the exploration of these areas is that kanji function as a morphographic writing system, and, moreover, this is reflected in the Japanese mental lexicon. Part 1 of this thesis is linguistic in nature, focusing primarily on the external form. Based on discussion concerning the appropriate classification of the Japanese writing system, and, especially of kanji, within a linguistic taxonomy of writing systems, it is argued that kanji may be most accurately characterized as a morphographic writing system. Evidence for this is provided by looking ii Abstract at the word formation processes that underlie two-kanji compound words, which are primarily morphological. Compounding is the combining of abstract linguistic elements—morphemes—to form larger word units, with the representation of these larger word units being a product of combining the constituent representations. The discussion of two-kanji compound word morphology also provides background for the experiments presented in this thesis. Part 2 of the thesis is psycholinguistic in nature, focusing primarily on the internal representation. After arguing in Part 1 that kanji function as a morphographic writing system, Part 2 investigates the implications of this for the organization of the Japanese mental lexicon. Specifically, a lemma unit model version (Joyce, 1999, in press) of the multilevel interactive-activation framework is proposed as a model for the Japanese mental lexicon. The major feature of the lemma unit model is the incorporation of lemma units that mediate the links between access representations and semantic units. This model is examined through a series of constituent-morpheme priming experiments, which investigated the lexical retrieval and representation of two-kanji compound words within the Japanese mental lexicon from a morphological perspective by controlling for the word-formation principle of compound word stimuli as an experimental condition. As background to the conducted experiments, important tasks and effects are discussed in a brief review of visual word recognition research, which focuses on the two central issues for the mental lexicon—lexical retrieval and lexical representation. A short review of models of lexical representation, which all allow for some form of morphological involvement in the lexical retrieval of iii Abstract polymorphemic words, also highlights the language-universal importance of morphology for the organization of the mental lexicon. As any model of the Japanese mental lexicon must in some way capture the morphological relations that exist between polymorphemic words, two proposals for models of the Japanese mental lexicon—Hirose’s (1982, 1994, 1996) hypotheses and Joyce’s (1999, in press) suggestion for a Japanese lemma unit model—are investigated in terms of their ability to cope with the diversity in the morphology of two-kanji compound words. Because these proposals make different predictions concerning constituent-morpheme priming, the patterns of facilitation are examined in two experiments varying stimulus onset synchronicity (SOA) with five word-formation principles as experimental conditions. The results from these experiments, of similar levels of priming for both constituents in all but one word-formation condition, are more consistent with the predictions from the Japanese lemma-unit model. The lemma unit model is investigated further through a series of seven experiments that seek to examine various aspects of this model of the Japanese mental lexicon. While these experiments retain a focus on the lexical retrieval and representation of two-kanji compound words from a morphological perspective, they also investigate the extent to which the results in the first two experiments might be task specific, the possibility that the lemma unit model offers to integrate both kana and kanji processing within a single model, and the potential to model the dual reading system of on-readings and kun-readings. In addition, by employing recently compiled constituent-morpheme frequency data (Joyce & Ohta, in press), the issue of positional sensitivity is examined for verbal constituent morphemes of two-kanji compounds words. Although the iv Abstract results from this series of experiments raise further questions, they are generally consistent with the lemma unit model, which is undoubtedly an extremely appealing way of thinking about the relations that exist between semantic representations, and access representations for orthography and phonology, as well as accounting for the morphological information that underlies two-kanji compound words in the Japanese mental lexicon. This investigation of the lexical retrieval and representation of two-kanji compound words within the Japanese mental lexicon from a morphological perspective has serious implications for our understanding of kanji, as well as for our perception of writing systems and of language itself. v Acknowledgements I would like to thank many of the wonderful people I have been privileged to meet and know in the course of my studies. Without their kind help, in various ways, it simply would not have been possible for me to undertake this research and to write this thesis. For failing to make better use of all this kind help, much to the detriment of this thesis, I can only offer my sincere apologizes. I shall be eternally indebted to Professor Ohta Nobuo, who has supervised and supported my research over the past five years with so much patience, kindness, and consideration. I shall also always remember the advice, support, kindness, and friendship of all associated with Professor Ohta’s laboratory during that time. The visiting foreign lecturers: Firstly, Dr. Bradford Challis, for advice on the preparation of my first experiments, and, later, Dr. Ulrich Olofsson, for help with analyzing those initial results. The post-doctoral research fellow: Dr. Eleanor Olds Batchelder for beneficial ‘prodding’ and discussion as I struggled to write my master’s thesis. The senpai: Dr. Terasawa Takafumi, Dr. Kawano Rie, and Yoshida Tetsuya for the benefit of their experience and kindness. The dōkyūsei: Gotoh Fumiko, Hayashi Mitsuko, and Hoshino Satoshi for support throughout. Beyond Professor Ohta’s laboratory, I have also benefited greatly from the advice, help, and kindness from many at the Institute of Psychology during this time, and I would like to thank everyone for that. In particular, I would like to mention the following people: Professor Kaiho Hiroyuki for his kind concern vi Acknowledgements and encouragement. Professor Kikuchi Tadashi for the loan of equipment used in conducted naming experiments. Dr. Aoyama Masahiko, for advice on the preparation of a number of experiments, as well as helpful comments on a draft manuscript. Dr. Nanbu Misako, for her generous time and help with so many of the conducted experiments. Dr. Yugawa Shintaro, for various help. Dr. Kobayashi Takefumi, for help with a translation. Shimada Hideaki for helpful discussion of ratios. Nakajima Masato for advice on waveform data. My special thanks also to Yagi Yoshihiko for his technical knowledge in making the naming experiments possible. And, to Simon Downes for his friendship and for sharing the experience of being a foreign graduate student in the department. Beyond the Institute of Psychology, I have received help from many people in other departments at the University of Tsukuba. I would like to express my thanks to Dr. Stefan Kaiser for his advice and help as supervisor during my first two years in Tsukuba and since then, and to all the Japanese language teachers at the Foreign Student Center. For allowing me to recruit participants for my experiments at their classes, I am grateful to the following lecturers: in the Area Studies program, Dr. Philip Hansen, and at the Foreign Language Center, Andrew Barfield, Dr. Joe Johnson, Alan Milne, Sakuma Yasuyuki, and Garth Warries. In addition to their help with recruiting, I also wish to thank Dr. Yvonne Stapp for all her kindness and words of encouragement, and at the Institute of Literature and Linguistics, Dr. John Shillaw for much help and advice, especially
Load more

Recommended publications
  • A Functional MRI Study on the Japanese Orthographies
    Modulation of the Visual Word Retrieval System in Writing: A Functional MRI Study on the Japanese Orthographies Kimihiro Nakamura1, Manabu Honda2, Shigeru Hirano1, Tatsuhide Oga1, Nobukatsu Sawamoto1, Takashi Hanakawa1, Downloaded from http://mitprc.silverchair.com/jocn/article-pdf/14/1/104/1757408/089892902317205366.pdf by guest on 18 May 2021 Hiroshi Inoue3, Jin Ito3, Tetsu Matsuda1, Hidenao Fukuyama1, and Hiroshi Shibasaki1 Abstract & We used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to left sensorimotor areas and right cerebellum. The kanji versus examine whether the act of writing involves different neuro- kana comparison showed increased responses in the left psychological mechanisms between the two script systems of prefrontal and anterior cingulate areas. Especially, the lPITC the Japanese language: kanji (ideogram) and kana (phono- showed a significant task-by-script interaction. Two additional gram). The main experiments employed a 2 Â 2 factorial control tasks, repetition (REP) and semantic judgment (SJ), design that comprised writing-to-dictation and visual mental activated the bilateral perisylvian areas, but enhanced the lPITC recall for kanji and kana. For both scripts, the actual writing response only weakly. These results suggest that writing of the produced a widespread fronto-parietal activation in the left ideographic and phonographic scripts, although using the hemisphere. Especially, writing of kanji activated the left largely same cortical regions, each modulates the visual word- posteroinferior temporal cortex (lPITC), whereas that of retrieval system according to their graphic features. Further- kana also yielded a trend of activation in the same area. more, comparisons with two additional tasks indicate that the Mental recall for both scripts activated similarly the left parieto- activity of the lPITC increases especially in expressive language temporal regions including the lPITC.
    [Show full text]
  • Chinese Script Generation Panel Document
    Chinese Script Generation Panel Document Proposal for the Generation Panel for the Chinese Script Label Generation Ruleset for the Root Zone 1. General Information Chinese script is the logograms used in the writing of Chinese and some other Asian languages. They are called Hanzi in Chinese, Kanji in Japanese and Hanja in Korean. Since the Hanzi unification in the Qin dynasty (221-207 B.C.), the most important change in the Chinese Hanzi occurred in the middle of the 20th century when more than two thousand Simplified characters were introduced as official forms in Mainland China. As a result, the Chinese language has two writing systems: Simplified Chinese (SC) and Traditional Chinese (TC). Both systems are expressed using different subsets under the Unicode definition of the same Han script. The two writing systems use SC and TC respectively while sharing a large common “unchanged” Hanzi subset that occupies around 60% in contemporary use. The common “unchanged” Hanzi subset enables a simplified Chinese user to understand texts written in traditional Chinese with little difficulty and vice versa. The Hanzi in SC and TC have the same meaning and the same pronunciation and are typical variants. The Japanese kanji were adopted for recording the Japanese language from the 5th century AD. Chinese words borrowed into Japanese could be written with Chinese characters, while Japanese words could be written using the character for a Chinese word of similar meaning. Finally, in Japanese, all three scripts (kanji, and the hiragana and katakana syllabaries) are used as main scripts. The Chinese script spread to Korea together with Buddhism from the 2nd century BC to the 5th century AD.
    [Show full text]
  • Source-Based Translation and Foreignization: a Japanese Case
    Source-Based Translation and Foreignization Source-Based Translation and Foreignization: A Japanese Case Yukari Fukuchi Meldrum Modern Languages and Cultural Studies, University of Alberta Introduction Foreignization, as currently understood in Translation Studies, is a concept that is charged with “more emphasis on the ideological pressure against the target-language culture than on the faithfulness to the original text” (Tamaki, 2005: 239). In other words, it is a conscious operation of bringing a foreign flavor into translations in order to counteract the effects of domestication, claimed by Venuti (1995) to be the cause of invisibility of translation and translators. Tamaki, in her 2005 paper, also cautions that the concept of foreignization should not be confused with a literal method of translation. Literal translation does not involve ideological intentions and is a mere translation method. In this paper, I will attempt to provide a supporting view that source-based translation, often seen in Japanese translation, needs to be understood outside of foreignization in the above sense. Specifically, I will illustrate that Japanese readers, in premodern times, had to gain specific knowledge and adapt to what was required in order to read and interpret texts in a satisfactory manner. This could have been a factor for the source-orientedness of Japanese translations still observed in a certain form today. By examining this background of Japanese text culture, the more source-based translation is shown to be merely a translation carried out by a literal method without any political or ideological intentions. Therefore, the concept of foreignization does not have a place in Japanese translation.
    [Show full text]
  • A Comparative Analysis of the Simplification of Chinese Characters in Japan and China
    CONTRASTING APPROACHES TO CHINESE CHARACTER REFORM: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE SIMPLIFICATION OF CHINESE CHARACTERS IN JAPAN AND CHINA A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE DIVISION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF HAWAI‘I AT MĀNOA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS IN ASIAN STUDIES AUGUST 2012 By Kei Imafuku Thesis Committee: Alexander Vovin, Chairperson Robert Huey Dina Rudolph Yoshimi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express deep gratitude to Alexander Vovin, Robert Huey, and Dina R. Yoshimi for their Japanese and Chinese expertise and kind encouragement throughout the writing of this thesis. Their guidance, as well as the support of the Center for Japanese Studies, School of Pacific and Asian Studies, and the East-West Center, has been invaluable. i ABSTRACT Due to the complexity and number of Chinese characters used in Chinese and Japanese, some characters were the target of simplification reforms. However, Japanese and Chinese simplifications frequently differed, resulting in the existence of multiple forms of the same character being used in different places. This study investigates the differences between the Japanese and Chinese simplifications and the effects of the simplification techniques implemented by each side. The more conservative Japanese simplifications were achieved by instating simpler historical character variants while the more radical Chinese simplifications were achieved primarily through the use of whole cursive script forms and phonetic simplification techniques. These techniques, however, have been criticized for their detrimental effects on character recognition, semantic and phonetic clarity, and consistency – issues less present with the Japanese approach. By comparing the Japanese and Chinese simplification techniques, this study seeks to determine the characteristics of more effective, less controversial Chinese character simplifications.
    [Show full text]
  • The Japanese Writing Systems, Script Reforms and the Eradication of the Kanji Writing System: Native Speakers’ Views Lovisa Österman
    The Japanese writing systems, script reforms and the eradication of the Kanji writing system: native speakers’ views Lovisa Österman Lund University, Centre for Languages and Literature Bachelor’s Thesis Japanese B.A. Course (JAPK11 Spring term 2018) Supervisor: Shinichiro Ishihara Abstract This study aims to deduce what Japanese native speakers think of the Japanese writing systems, and in particular what native speakers’ opinions are concerning Kanji, the logographic writing system which consists of Chinese characters. The Japanese written language has something that most languages do not; namely a total of ​ ​ three writing systems. First, there is the Kana writing system, which consists of the two syllabaries: Hiragana and Katakana. The two syllabaries essentially figure the same way, but are used for different purposes. Secondly, there is the Rōmaji writing system, which is Japanese written using latin letters. And finally, there is the Kanji writing system. Learning this is often at first an exhausting task, because not only must one learn the two phonematic writing systems (Hiragana and Katakana), but to be able to properly read and write in Japanese, one should also learn how to read and write a great amount of logographic signs; namely the Kanji. For example, to be able to read and understand books or newspaper without using any aiding tools such as dictionaries, one would need to have learned the 2136 Jōyō Kanji (regular-use Chinese characters). With the twentieth century’s progress in technology, comparing with twenty years ago, in this day and age one could probably theoretically get by alright without knowing how to write Kanji by hand, seeing as we are writing less and less by hand and more by technological devices.
    [Show full text]
  • Language Specific Peculiarities Document for Cantonese As
    Language Specific Peculiarities Document for Cantonese as Spoken in the Guangdong and Guangxi Provinces of China 1. Dialects The name "Cantonese" is used either for all of the language varieties spoken in specific regions in the Guangdong and Guangxi Provinces of China and Hong Kong (i.e., the Yue dialects of Chinese), or as one particular variety referred to as the "Guangfu group" (Bauer & Benedict 1997). In instances where Cantonese is described as 'Cantonese "proper"' (i.e. used in the narrower sense), it refers to a variety of Cantonese that is spoken in the capital cities Guangzhou and Nanning, as well as in Hong Kong and Macau. This database includes Cantonese as spoken in the Guangdong and Guangxi Provinces of China only (i.e. not in Hong Kong); five dialect groups have been defined for Cantonese (see the following table)1. Three general principles have been used in defining these dialect groupings: (i) phonological variation, (ii) geographical variation, and (iii) lexical variation. With relation to phonological variation, although Cantonese is spoken in all of the regions listed in the table, there are differences in pronunciation. Differences in geographic locations also correlate with variations in lexical choice. Cultural differences are also correlated with linguistic differences, particularly in lexical choices. Area Cities (examples) Central Guangzhou, Conghua, Fogang (Shijiao), Guangdong Longmen, Zengcheng, Huaxian Group Northern Shaoguan, Qijiang, Lian Xian, Liannan, Guangdong Yangshan, Yingde, Taiping Group Northern
    [Show full text]
  • Approaches to Endangered Languages in Japan and Northeast Asia (Poster Session)”
    Non-Core Vocabulary Cognates in Ryukyuan and Kyushu* JAROSZ, Aleksandra Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń The present paper provides an overview of eighteen identified likely cognates from Ryukyuan and Kyushu regiolects which the author argues have been inherited from Common Kyushu-Ryukyuan (CKR). The alleged cognates all belong to non-core vocabulary, the working definition of which adopted here is “vocabulary not found on the basic vocabulary lists of Swadesh 200 and Leipzig-Jakarta.” Following Hock (1991), the author presumes that in equal relations between language communities – the relations between Pre-Proto-Ryukyuan speakers while they still inhabited the Kyushu area and speakers of other Kyushu-Japonic regiolects are believed to have been such – the so-called basic vocabulary is no more resistant to borrowing than the non-basic (including culture-specific and environment-specific) lexicon. One can thus infer that a study of non-core vocabulary would be a valuable contribution to the state of knowledge on the history of the southern Japonic language area. Consequently, this paper analyzes the distribution of putative CKR cognates in both Kyushu and the Ryukyus as well as the typology of shared features among them, discussing these against a broader Japonic background when relevant. Preliminary results show the most shared features between the Ryukyuan and Tokara regiolects, encouraging an identification of the final stage of Pre-Ryukyuan with Common Tokara-Ryukyuan. The division of the next lowest order also includes Ōsumi and Koshiki islands, implying that the pre-final stage of Pre-Ryukyuan was what is here called Common Insular Kyushu-Ryukyuan. Keywords: comparative linguistics, Kyushu, Ryukyuan, Kyushu-Ryukyuan, Japonic 1.
    [Show full text]
  • Kanbun 漢文 Had Played for That
    Self-introduction Sota TANAKA 田中 草大 Faculty of Letters, Kyoto University 京都大学 文学部 Studying the history of Japanese language, especially written Japanese. “A Study on Hentai Kanbun in the Heian Period ”, Bensei Pubishing, 2019 2 Aims of this talk To give an overview of the history of written Japanese languages and to explain what role kanbun 漢文 had played for that. More specifically... This talk explains how classical written Chinese became a means to write Japanese (the key to that is kundoku 訓読, by which Chinese texts are read as Japanese). Furthermore, I will show that kanbun had contributed to the long-term usage of bungobun 文語文(written Japanese by the classical grammar) in the history of Japanese. 3 An overview of the history of written Japanese (1) It began with the introduction of kanji 漢字 (Chinese characters), so writing in Japan was nothing else than writing Chinese at first. It is estimated that it dates back to the 5th century. Later, people began to use kanji for writing Japanese, by making use of two functions of kanji. (1) Its phonographic 表音 function → Writing with man’yōgana 万葉仮名文 (2) Its morphographic 表語 function→ Kanbun style writing 漢文 6 An overview of the history of written Japanese (1) (1) Its phonographic 表音 function → Writing with man’yōgana 万葉仮名文 e.g. 皮(波)留久佐乃 皮斯米之刀斯（難波宮出土木簡, early in the 7c.?） 由吉能伊呂遠 有婆比弖佐家流 有米能波奈...（万葉集・巻5-850, 8c.） → Used almost exclusively in waka (和歌, Japanese verses). 7 An overview of the history of written Japanese (1) (2) Its morphographic 表語 function → Kanbun style writing 漢文 Writing Japanese by applying a kanji to a Japanese word (morpheme) e.g.
    [Show full text]
  • Premodern East Asia and the Power of Character Scripts Wiebke Denecke
    15 Worlds Without Translation: Premodern East Asia and the Power of Character Scripts Wiebke Denecke We are used to thinking that translation is indispensable. An English speaker without competence in Latin does not understand Virgil unless he is translated into English. But we forget that this is partly a function of the alphabetic script Latin and English use. Translation has not been a prerequisite for full mutual intelligibility with char- acter scripts that rely heavily on logographic writing, in which each character stands for a word (more precisely a morpheme). As we will see below, into the twentieth century an educated Japanese, for example, could read a Chinese text by pronouncing it in Japanese, without any knowledge of Chinese or any need for translation. All cultures that were arguably independent sites of script invention developed scripts with a strong logographic component: Mesopotamian cuneiform, Egyptian hiero- glyphs, Chinese characters, and Maya glyphs. Of these primary scripts only Chinese survives today, vigorously, from its already mature form in the thirteenth century bce into our digital age. It is used in the sinophone world, in Japan, and to a limited degree in Korea, and it stands as a thought-provoking exception to the alphabetic scripts that dominate much of today’s world. Some scholars have, justly, downplayed the difference between logographic systems, where the relation between sign and sound is more flexible, and syllabic or alphabetic systems, which are more prescriptive and phonographic (recording sound). I. J. Gelb’s (1963) scheme that assumes a progression from logographic to syllabic to alphabetic writing systems is questionable (Daniels and Bright 1996, 8–10).
    [Show full text]
  • Transition and Transformation: Cross-Cultural Interpretation Ofsong
    佛教大学 文学部論集 第94号（2010年３月) Transition and Transformation: Cross-Cultural Interpretation of Song Felicity Greenland 〔Abstract〕 The plethora of cross-cultural hybrid songs in Japan is not merely attribut- able to the modern, globalized music industry. Many ‘Western’songs have been fully assimilated in Japan since the late 19th century. This paper gives a brief history of Western music in Japan, followed by two sets of case studies: it analyses three Japanese hybrids each of two popular old songs, ‘Land of Hope and Glory’and ‘My Grandfather’s Clock’, and explores the relative Japanese and Western interpretations. It finds evidence of active lyrical processes such as those historically observed in the oral tradition, as well as cultural processes reflecting current social and political dialectics. The common song repertoire, previously proven valuable in cross-cultural and cross-generational relations, is here found to address social issues at both local and global scales and thus to call into question some of the entrenched ideologies behind conventional ideas of cultural identity. Keywords: song, cross-cultural, My Grandfather’s Clock, Land of Hope and Glory, Japan Introduction The relentless soundtrack to life in Japan affords much that is melodically familiar to the foreign ear.Yet this is not simply the manifestation of a ‘West to the rest’(Wang and Yeh:176) influx via globalized culture and music industries.These melodies derive from songs with distinct Japanese language incarnations and, as such, resonate lyrically in the local ear as genuinely as for the expatriate.Indeed, many young Japanese are unaware that some of these melodies, such as ‘Hotaru no Hikari’(light of the fireflies), ― 93― Transition and Transformation:Cross-Cultural Interpretation of Song（Felicity Greenland) did not originate in Japan but were adapted from Western songs, such as ‘Auld Lang Syne’.
    [Show full text]
  • Iconicity in Phonological and Semantic Development
    One form, many meanings: iconicity in phonological and semantic development Bonnie McLean May 2019 A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the degree of Bachelor of Philosophy (Asia and the Pacific Studies) (Honours) The Australian National University © Copyright by Bonnie McLean 2019 All Rights Reserved Declaration This thesis contains no material which has been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma in any university. To the best of the author’s knowledge, it contains no material previously published or written by another person, except where due reference is made in the text. Bonnie McLean May 2019 ii Acknowledgements I would like to start by thanking my supervisor, Professor Catherine Travis. If you can make any sense of this thesis then it is thanks to her. Professor Travis very generously agreed to supervise this thesis despite having no background in iconicity or ideophones, and I am afraid that the introduction I provided to her on this topic has not been smooth. Despite this, she continued to provide constructive feedback on each of my many drafts, never once complaining that each one was essentially a complete rewrite. Secondly, I would like to thank Professor Kimi Akita in Japan. Professor Akita’s continued email correspondence with me throughout the writing of this thesis has been invaluable. His generosity and patience in replying to my ridiculously long emails continues to astound me. I feel so lucky to have had this direct line of communication to his encyclopaedic knowledge of everything that has even been written relating to iconicity and ideophones, and much of the theoretical discussion in this thesis would not have been developed had Professor Akita not continually pointed me in the direction of the relevant sources.
    [Show full text]
  • Masterarbeit / Master's Thesis
    MASTERARBEIT / MASTER’S THESIS Titel der Masterarbeit / Title of the Master’s Thesis “Dating the split of the Japonic language family. The Pre-Old Japanese corpus” verfasst von / submitted by Patrick Elmer, BA MA angestrebter akademischer Grad / in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts (MA) Wien, 2019 / Vienna 2019 Studienkennzahl lt. Studienblatt / A 066 599 degree programme code as it appears on the student record sheet: Studienrichtung lt. Studienblatt / Masterstudium Indogermanistik und historische degree programme as it appears on Sprachwissenschaft UG2002 the student record sheet: Betreut von / Supervisor: Univ.-Prof. Mag. Dr. Melanie Malzahn, Privatdoz. Table of contents Part 1: Introduction ..................................................................................................... 8 1.1 The Japonic language family .............................................................................................. 9 1.2 Previous research: When did Japonic split into Japanese and Ryūkyūan .......................... 11 1.3 Research question and scope of study .............................................................................. 15 1.4 Methodology ................................................................................................................... 16 Part 2: Language data ................................................................................................ 19 2.1 Old Japanese ...................................................................................................................
    [Show full text]