Manipulation of Honorifics in First- Encounter Conversations in Japanese

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Authors Yamaji, Harumi

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MANIPULATION OF HONORIFICS IN FIRST-ENCOUNTER CONVERSATIONS IN JAPANESE

Harumi Yamaji

______

A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of the

DEPARTMENT OF EAST ASIAN STUDIES

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

In the Graduate College

THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA

2008 2

THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA GRADUATE COLLEGE

As members of the Dissertation Committee, we certify that we have read the dissertation prepared by Harumi Yamaji entitled Manipulation of Honorifics in First-Encounter Conversations in Japanese and recommend that it be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy

______Date: 12/6/2007 Kimberly Jones

______Date: 12/6/2007 Timothy Vance

______Date: 12/6/2007 Mariko Karatsu

Final approval and acceptance of this dissertation is contingent upon the candidate’s submission of the final copies of the dissertation to the Graduate College.

I hereby certify that I have read this dissertation prepared under my direction and recommend that it be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement.

______Date: 12/6/2007 Dissertation Director: Kimberly Jones

STATEMENT BY AUTHOR

This dissertation has been submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements for an advanced degree at the University of Arizona and is deposited in the University Library to be made available to borrowers under rules of the Library.

Brief quotations from this dissertation are allowable without special permission, provided that accurate acknowledgment of source is made. Requests for permission for extended quotation from or reproduction of this manuscript in whole or in part may be granted by the head of the major department or the Dean of the Graduate College when in his or her judgment the proposed use of the material is in the interests of scholarship. In all other instances, however, permission must be obtained from the author.

SIGNED: Harumi Yamaji 4

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First of all, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Drs. Kimberly Jones,

Timothy Vance, and Mariko Karatsu for their valuable support and feedback on my work as the members of my committee. I am especially indebted to Dr. Jones for the continuous encouragement and patience that she extended to me throughout this project.

I could not have completed this dissertation without her willingness to help me through.

Dr. Tsuyoshi Ono offered me critical insight and advice in the initial stages of this project, which I deeply appreciate. I am also extremely grateful to the participants of the study, without whom my research would have been impossible.

There were a number of people in Tucson whose support was invaluable though indirect. Janet Kania and Brenda Fraker, our department secretaries, kindly served as my liaisons with the Graduate College for registration and paperwork after I returned to

Japan. For their friendship and particularly for opening their home to me at the time of my final oral examination, Chieko Nakano, Rodd Lancaster, and Brad Lancaster deserve special thanks. The late Mark Thielen treated me as his adopted daughter during my time in Tucson, for which I will always fondly remember him.

I am thankful for the encouragement and support of my family: Nobue and

Takashi Yamaji, Wanda and Paul Elmegreen, and Jennifer and Thomas Funk. My best friend and life-time partner, James, is always there for me. Lastly, I would like to thank my son, Shouma, who suffered my considerably divided attention with few complaints as

I completed this project. Now, it's time to play, Shouma.

TABLE OF CONENTS

LIST OF TABLES········································································································· 7

ABSTRACT··················································································································· 9

1. INTRODUCTION ····································································································· 11

1.1. Previous Studies of Honorifics ··········································································· 12 1.2. Research Questions····························································································· 19 1.3. Procedure & Hypotheses····················································································· 20

2. DATA ························································································································ 25

2.1. Participants·········································································································· 25 2.2. Data Collection ··································································································· 27

3. OVERVIEW OF THE DATA ··················································································· 29

3.1. What do Japanese People Talk about in First-Encounter Conversations?·········· 29 3.2. Participants’ Impression about Their Partners & Conversations– Seen from the Results of the Follow-Up Questionnaire ·························································· 32

4. RESULTS & DISCUSSION······················································································ 40

4.1. Addressee Honorifics·························································································· 40 4.2. Referent Honorifics - Sonkee-go ········································································· 50 4.2.1. Sonkee-go in Reference to the Addressee···················································· 51 4.2.2. Sonkee-go in Reference to a Third Person··················································· 58 4.2.3. Sonkee-go of Verbs······················································································ 63 4.3. Referent Honorifics - Kenjoo-go ········································································ 71 4.4. Gender Differences in the Use of Referent Honorifics······································· 76 4.5. Speech Style Shifts between Addressee Honorifics and Plain Forms ················ 79 4.5.1. Self-Directed Questions··············································································· 80 4.5.2. Expression of Feelings, Thoughts, & Opinions··········································· 87 4.5.3. Comments of Realization············································································· 94 4.5.4. Repetition····································································································· 100 4.5.5. Confirmation Check····················································································· 106 4.5.6. Answers········································································································ 109 4.5.7. Elaboration··································································································· 111 4.5.8. Co-Construction··························································································· 114 4.5.9. Quantitative Analysis & Discussion ···························································· 118 4.6. Speech Style Shifts between Referent Honorifics and Non-Honorific Forms ··· 120

TABLE OF CONTENTS - Continued

5. CONCLUSION·········································································································· 127

5.1. Findings··············································································································· 127 5.2. Pedagogical Implications···················································································· 130

APPENDIX A: TRANSCRIPTION CONVENTIONS················································· 134

APPENDIX B: FOLLOW-UP QUESTIONNAIRE (JAPANESE) ······························ 135

APPENDIX C: FOLLOW-UP QUESTIONNAIRE (ENGLISH TRANSLATION)···· 140

REFERENCES ·············································································································· 143

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1. Participants’ Backgrounds ··············································································· 26

Table 2. Conversation Topics ························································································ 30

Table 3. Impression of the Partner’s Age ······································································ 32

Table 4. Accuracy of the Judgment of the Partner’s Age·············································· 33

Table 5. Clues to Guess the Partner’s Age ···································································· 33

Table 6. Impression of the Partner’s Social Status ························································ 34

Table 7. Clues to Guess the Partner’s Social Status ······················································ 34

Table 8. Ease/Difficulty of Talking ··············································································· 35

Table 9. Naturalness of Speech······················································································ 37

Table 10. Consciousness of Being Recorded································································· 38

Table 11. Influence of the First Conversation on the Second Conversation ················· 39

Table 12. Overall Frequencies of Addressee Honorifics and Plain Forms···················· 42

Table 13. Frequencies of Addressee Honorific and Plain Forms by Each Speaker in Each Conversation ···································································································· 43

Table 14. Overall Frequencies of Addressee Honorifics & Plain Forms Based on Gender ·························································································································· 46

Table 15. Overall Frequencies of Addressee Honorifics & Plain Forms Based on Gender & Partner Mixing····························································································· 47

Table 16. The Use or Non-Use of Sonkee-go in Reference to the Addressee ··············· 54

Table 17. Frequencies of Verbal Sonk ee -go and Plain Verbs by Each Speaker in Each Conversation···································································································· 56

Table 18. The Use or Non-Use of Sonkee-go in Reference to a Third Person ·············· 62

Table 19. Classification of Verbal Sonk ee -go into Sonk ee -go Types ····························· 64

LIST OF TABLES - Continued

Table 20. The Verbs in the Verb-(r)areru Form···························································· 69

Table 21. The Use or Non-Use of Kenjoo-go (1) ·························································· 71

Table 22. The Use or Non-Use of Kenjoo-go (2) ·························································· 73

Table 23. Verbal Sonk ee -go in Reference to the Addressee & Gender·························· 77

Table 24. Overall Frequencies of Verbal Sonk ee -go & Plain Verbs in Reference to the Addressee Based on Gender & Partner Mixing········································· 78

Table 25. Classification of Speech Style Shift Instances into the Context Categories·· 118

Table 26. Verbal Sonkee-go & Plain Verbs According to the Utterance Type ············· 121

ABSTRACT

This study quantitatively and qualitatively examines honorific usage in casual first-

encounter conversations between two relatively young people from similar backgrounds.

The issues of concern are the frequency of use of addressee and referent honorifics,

different types and forms of referent honorifics, reasons behind speech style shifts

between honorific and non-honorific forms, and gender differences in honorific usage.

Overall, addressee honorifics were predominantly used compared to plain forms, while the use of referent honorifics was limited in the data. The rate of honorific usage ranged greatly depending on the speaker and the conversation. Using too few addressee honorifics, however, has a possibility of offending the addressee in this speech context.

Additionally, it was found that female speakers did not necessarily speak more politely (i.e., use more honorifics) than male speakers. The addressee’s gender seemed to influence the rate of use of honorifics. Female speakers’ use of addressee honorifics was higher in mixed-sex conversations than in single-sex conversations while the opposite was true with male speakers. As for referent honorifics, both genders tended to use more of them in single-sex conversations.

As for speech style shifts between honorific forms and non-honorific forms, several

contexts in which these were observed are reported. Self-directed questions and

expression of feelings, thoughts, and opinions were the two most likely contexts for

speech style shifts between addressee honorifics and plain forms. It appears that such

style shifts occur to separate the utterances from the main course of conversation to signal

that the utterance is not deliberately addressed to the addressee, that the focus is on

10 meaning, or that the utterance constitutes a subspace embedded in the main floor rather than the main floor itself. Additionally, utterance type, increased familiarity with the addressee, speech style adjustment, and the introduction of new topics are suggested as possible contexts for speech style shifts between referent honorifics and non-honorific forms.

1. INTRODUCTION

It is often suggested that the use of honorific forms is a manifestation of politeness or formalness which arises from social distance between the conversation participants (e.g.,

Brown & Levinson 1987; Hill et al. 1986; Hinds 1976; Ide 1982; Makino & Tsutsui

1986; Mizutani & Mizutani 1987; Niyekawa 1991; Shibatani 1990; Sukle 1994;

Tsujimura 1996). Thus, it is assumed that honorific forms are used toward people of higher social status or those of no or little previous acquaintanceship. Another commonly suggested observation about honorifics is that female speakers tend to speak more politely than male speakers (e.g., Hori 1986; Ide 1982, 1989, 1990; Ide et al. 1986; Ide &

McGloin 1990; Jorden & Noda 1987; Mizutani & Mizutani 1987; Niyekawa 1991; Ogino et al. 1985; Shibamoto Smith 2003; Shibatani 1990). These may sound as though speakers select an honorific or non-honorific speech style for the whole conversation based on their judgment regarding social distance between themselves and their interlocutor, with women choosing a more polite style than men.

Recent studies of honorifics in actual discourse, however, demonstrate that speakers mix honorific and non-honorific forms in addressing the same interlocutor within the course of a single conversation, where the social relationship between the interlocutors remains constant (e.g., Chen 2003; Cook 1996a, 1996b, 1998, 2002, 2006; Dunn 1999,

2005; Ikuta 1983, 2002; Matsumoto 1999b, 2002, 2004; Maynard 1991a, 1991b, 1993;

Okamoto 1997; Okamoto 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999; SturtzSreetharan 2006; Sukle 1994;

Usami 1995, 2002; Yamaji 1999, 2002; Yoshida & Sakurai 2005). Some of these studies also show that women do not necessarily speak politely or more politely than men.

Nevertheless, many of these studies are qualitative, with no or only a limited amount of

quantitative information. Additionally, they tend to focus only on one aspect of Japanese

honorifics, namely, speech style shifts between the use and non-use of addressee

honorifics (i.e., honorifics used for the addressee), or to treat addressee honorifics and

referent honorifics (i.e., honorifics used in reference to the referent) together without

going into the details of either. While these studies are valuable, the addition of

quantitative data and more detailed analyses of the two types of honorifics would help

deepen our understanding of honorific usage in actual discourse. With the present study,

I hope to contribute to the large body of research on Japanese honorifics by providing both quantitative and qualitative analyses of conversational data involving honorific usage, examining addressee and referent honorifics separately in detail.

More specifically, this study will look at one particular speech context, namely, first- encounter conversations in Japanese, where it is often assumed that honorific forms are used based on the lack of previous acquaintanceship (e.g., Makino & Tsutsui 1986;

Mizutani & Mizutani 1987; Niyekawa 1991). Both quantitative and qualitative data will be provided regarding the use of addressee and referent honorifics, along with any possible observations about gender differences.

1.1. Previous Studies of Honorifics

As one of the most salient means of expressing politeness in Japanese, the honorific system has attracted the interest of many researchers studying politeness. Among politeness theories proposed in the past (Brown & Levinson 1978, 1987; Lakoff 1973;

Leech 1983), Brown and Levinson’s theory has probably been the most influential and has inspired many studies of politeness strategies in various languages. A brief summary of their theory is as follows. Every person has basic human desires called “face.” There are two kinds of face called positive face and negative face. Positive face refers to the desire that their “wants be desirable to at least some others” while negative face refers to the desire that their action be “umimpeded by others” (62). Strategies used to satisfy these faces are called positive politeness and negative politeness, respectively. Brown and Levinson’s politeness theory considers honorifics as a negative politeness strategy of giving deference in order to redress face-threatening speech acts.

This theory has received a number of criticisms, especially from scholars of Asian languages with honorific systems (e.g., Ide 1989, 2005; Matsumoto 1988, 1989, 1993)1.

For those readers who are not familiar with the Japanese honorific system, I will briefly review its prescriptive use. The Japanese honorific system is often divided into addressee honorifics and referent honorifics, which are commonly regarded as markers of social distance between speakers and addressees, and between speakers and referents, respectively (e.g., Kuno 1973; Makino & Tsutsui 1986; Niyekawa 1991; Nomoto 1987;

Shibatani 1990). The assumption here is that honorific forms are used in addressing or referring to someone of higher social status or someone of no or little previous acquaintanceship. The use of the two types of honorifics is typically described as follows. Addressee honorifics, also known as teenee-go 'polite language', are used to

1 For counterarguments to these criticisms, please see Pizziconi (2003) and Fukuda and Asato (2004) among others.

show the speaker's deference toward the addressee and are characterized by the predicate

endings -des /mas 2. Referent honorifics are further divided into sonkee-go 'respect language' and kenjoo-go 'humbling language', both expressing the speaker's deference toward the referent, who may be the addressee or a third party absent from the conversation. Sonkee-go is used to indicate respect for others’ actions or events and is characterized by such grammatical constructions as o-Verb-ni naru and Verb-(r)areru

(e.g., okaerininaru ; kaerareru ‘will return’). Kenjoo-go is generally used when speakers

humbly discuss their own or their in-group members’ actions or events that are related to

a person with higher social status in some way (e.g., doing something for a superior

person’s sake) and is characterized by o-Verb-suru (e.g., oyobisuru ‘summon someone

(for a superior)’). Besides these grammatically derived referent honorifics, there are

lexical substitutes (Niyekawa 1991) or irregular forms for some verbs.

As seen here, a prescriptive account of Japanese honorifics indicates the importance

of the recognition of social distance in their use. While the use of honorifics is

considered a negative politeness strategy for redressing face-threatening speech acts in

Brown and Levinson’s politeness theory, researchers of languages with honorifics such as

Japanese argue that their treatment of honorifics as a strategy used in face-threatening

situations is inaccurate, as speakers must choose between honorifics and non-honorifics

regardless of the situation, based on social factors such as age, social status, and

2 Although desu/masu may be more commonly used than des/mas in reference to the Japanese addressee honorific, des/mas is used in this paper and includes such forms as the negative form, the past tense form, the gerund form, the volitional form, etc. of desu/masu (e.g., masen (negative), mashita (past), masendeshita (past negative), mashite (gerund), mashou (volitional) etc.).

15 relationship between the interlocutors (e.g., Ide 1989; Matsumoto 1988, 1989, 1993).

Similarly, Hill et al. (1986) and Ide (1989) emphasize that since social factors determine the use of honorifics, there is very little will involved in their use on the part of the speaker. They call such a view ‘discernment’ as opposed to ‘volition’, which refers to

“the almost automatic observation of socially-agreed-upon rules” (Hill et al. 1986: 348).

In this view, speakers are portrayed as relatively passive beings simply reflecting social factors in language use. However, these earlier studies of Japanese honorifics which underestimate the speaker’s will in language use are based on sentence-level analyses and are not concerned with discourse-level analyses. Furthermore, the claims derive from researchers’ intuitions, constructed data, and the results of questionnaires, interviews, and discourse completion tests, and may not reflect actual language use.

In contrast, recent studies of Japanese honorifics have revealed that social factors alone cannot explain their actual usage (e.g., Chen 2003; Cook 1996a, 1996b, 1998,

2002, 2006; Dunn 1999, 2005; Ikuta 1983, 2002; Matsumoto 1999b, 2002, 2004;

Maynard 1991a, 1991b, 1993; Okamoto 1997; Okamoto 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999;

SturtzSreetharan 2006; Sukle 1994; Usami 1995, 2002; Yamaji 1999, 2002; Yoshida &

Sakurai 2005). These studies have demonstrated that within a single speech context, where social factors between the interlocutors remain constant, speakers shift between honorific and non-honorific forms. Let us first review some of the major studies of speech style shifts between addressee honorifics and non-honorific forms (i.e., plain forms) that claim such shifts tend to indicate attitudinal (i.e., interpersonal), intrapersonal, or discoursal distance.

As for attitudinal (i.e., interpersonal) effects, Ikuta (1983) examines speech style shifts between addressee honorifics and non-honorific forms (i.e., plain forms) observed in TV talk shows and interviews and claims that shifts to non-honorific forms can represent speakers’ attitudinal closeness (i.e., empathy) to their interlocutor whereas shifts to addressee honorifics denote their attitudinal distance from the interlocutor.

Similarly, Usami (1995) indicates that speech style shifts to plain forms are observed in first-encounter conversations when the speaker intends to show attitudinal closeness and empathy, such as when joking or when accommodating to the other’s speech style.

Cook (1996a, 1996b,1998, 2002), using classroom discourse, conversations, and TV interviews as data, proposes that addressee honorifics index intrapersonal distance (i.e., the distance between the speaker’s innate self and his/her social role/persona) and observes that speakers tend to use addressee honorifics when they want to show the authoritative, cultivated or mannered side of their persona. Okamoto N. (1997) offers similar results based on classroom discourse. Similarly, SturtzSreetharan (2006) reports on how a Japanese man switches between honorific and non-honorific forms depending on identities he assumes at the moment of speech.

Several studies have shown that speech style shifts are sometimes motivated by discourse structure. Ikuta (1983) asserts that a shift to addressee honorifics tends to occur in an utterance contextually separate from preceding utterances. In a more recent study,

Ikuta (2002) shows that in interview situations where addressee honorifics are predominantly used, the interviewer tends to use plain forms in non-floor-holding subspaces embedded in the interviewee’s floor, as a strategy to collaboratively construct

17 a discourse. Such shifts are observed in co-construction; backchannel responses in the form of repetition or paraphrase, often for the purpose of clarification or acknowledgment; or other utterances used to ask for confirmation or to get further details of the story. As these utterances show involvement without threatening the other’s floor,

Ikuta argues that this is a kind of politeness strategy.

Maynard (1991a, 1991b, 1993) also examines speech style shifts in conversations and written prose, and concludes that plain forms tend to appear when speakers’ awareness of the addressee is low, or when utterances are not deliberately addressed to the addressee. Such instances can be found in exclamations, sudden remembrances, vivid recollections of events, self-reflections often found in self-directed utterances and monologues, co-construction, and backgrounded information. Maynard’s claim is partially similar to Makino’s (1983) study of written data, in which he reports that shifts to plain forms tend to occur when the speaker makes subjective comments, in such instances as immediate reaction to an interlocutor’s comment, expressions of significant personal memories, or expressions of long-held personal beliefs or opinions. Similarly,

Usami (1995) observes that speech style shifts to plain forms occur in self-directed speech or in asking and/or answering confirmation questions. She further notes that shifts to addressee honorifics are observed in the introduction of new topics or in the answers to the questions asked at the time of the introduction of a new topic.

Chen (2003), examining first-encounter conversations, reveals that speech style shifts to plain forms are observed in receiving and organizing information, and in expressing emotions. More specifically, he claims that speech style shifts tend to occur

in repetition, finishing the other’s utterance, adding to one’s own speech, self-correction,

recalling, searching for appropriate expressions, showing admiration, and expressing

one’s own feelings.

There are also studies that claim that speakers manipulate speech styles not only based on social factors but also based on their linguistic ideology, or beliefs and attitudes concerning language use (Matsumoto 1996, 1999a, 1999b, 2002, 2004; Okamoto 1996,

1997, 1998, 1999, 2002, 2004). These studies demonstrate how speech styles reflect each speaker’s desired degree of formality based on his/her linguistic ideology and how women, depending on their linguistic ideology, may not speak as politely as is often assumed.

These recent studies of actual discourse indicate that honorific usage is not a mere reflection of social factors and is much more complex than was previously thought. They have revealed that speakers strategically manipulate honorifics and non-honorific forms to bring about certain effects such as showing interpersonal, intrapersonal, or discoursal distance, or linguistic ideology. Many of these studies, however, are qualitative, with no or only limited quantitative information (with the exception of Usami (2002), which consists mainly of quantitative analyses). Additionally, they rarely examine addressee and referent honorifics separately in detail.

The present study will attempt to contribute to the study of Japanese honorifics by providing both quantitatative and qualitative analyses of addressee and referent honorifics used in actual discourse. It is expected that honorific usage differs depending on the speech context and the interlocutor. For this reason, this study will pick a speech context,

namely, first-encounter conversations, where it is often assumed that honorific forms are

used based on the lack of previous acquaintanceship (e.g., Makino & Tsutsui 1986;

Mizutani & Mizutani 1987; Niyekawa 1991). The participants are from similar

backgrounds, in order to control social distance among the participants in terms of

intimacy, age, social status, education, and dialect, which previous studies report affect

honorific usage (e.g., Hill et al. 1986; Hori 1986; Ide et al. 1986; Ogino 1986, 1989).

More specifically, this study will examine dyadic first-encounter conversations between

native speakers of Japanese who are college graduates and employed middle-class people

in their late 20s to 30s and who speak the standard dialect, and will attempt to investigate

how this particular group of participants manipulates honorific and non-honorific forms.

1.2. Research Questions

This study will attempt to contribute to the body of studies on Japanese honorifics by investigating the following issues that have not been adequately covered by previous studies:

1. It is generally believed that honorific forms are used to address or refer to people

of no or little previous acquaintanceship. How frequently do the participants use

addressee and referent honorifics in first-encounter conversations with those from

similar backgrounds?

2. Among referent honorifics, sonkee-go ‘respect language’ is used in reference to

the addressee or to absent third parties. Do the participants differentiate these two

uses? In other words, do they use sonkee-go to the addressee and to absent third

parties in similar frequencies and in similar ways?

3. Referent honorifics can be divided into several groups as explained above, such as

sonkee-go and kenjoo-go ‘humbling language’, and into different forms within

each category. When referent honorifics are used, what forms are employed?

Are there any differential uses among these various forms?

4. If there are speech style shifts between honorific and non-honorific forms, what

reasons may account for these instances? Are there different motivations based

on different honorific forms (e.g., addressee vs. referent honorifics)?

5. Are there any gender differences in the above issues?

1.3. Procedure & Hypotheses

This section provides my general data analysis procedure and hypotheses regarding the research questions raised above:

Question 1: Frequencies of addressee and referent honorifics

To find some answers to this question, I will look at the frequencies of predicates with and without addressee honorifics and referent honorifics. As for addressee honorifics, only finite predicates in main clauses will be considered. Backchannel responses such as soo desu ka ‘Really?’ and soo desu ne ‘That’s right’ will be excluded from the analysis.

As mentioned above, previous studies have reported speech style shifts between honorific and non-honorific forms in various situations (e.g., Chen 2003; Cook 1996a,

1996b, 1998, 2002, 2006; Dunn 1999, 2005; Ikuta 1983, 2002; Matsumoto 1999b, 2002,

2004; Maynard 1991a, 1991b, 1993; Okamoto 1997; Okamoto 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999;

SturtzSreetharan 2006; Sukle 1994; Usami 1995, 2002; Yamaji 1999, 2002, Yoshida &

Sakurai 2005). Among these studies, Chen (2003) and Usami (1995, 2002) examined first-encounter conversations involving participants in their late 20s and participants from their 20s to their 40s, respectively, and found that the honorific forms were the

“unmarked” style. Based on these previous findings, it can be hypothesized that even in first-encounter conversations, where it is generally believed that speakers use honorifics, speakers do not invariably use honorifics. Rather, they will switch between honorific and non-honorific forms. Additionally, the frequency of honorific forms is expected to be greater than that of non-honorific forms in this speech context.

Question 2: Sonkee-go in reference to the addressee vs. sonkee-go in reference to third parties

This issue will be examined by comparing the frequencies of use of sonkee-go in reference to the addressee and its use in reference to absent third parties. My pilot study

(Yamaji 2002) examined the frequency of sonkee-go in reference to absent third parties and found that the more addressee honorifics are used toward the addressee, the more sonkee-go is used in reference to third parties. This finding led to the hypothesis that the use of Japanese honorifics is addressee-oriented. While I did not conduct a formal investigation regarding the frequency of sonkee-go in reference to the addressee in that study, my impression was that it also seems to increase accordingly to the frequency of addressee honorifics. In the present study, the context is rather formal; two people are meeting each other for the first time. In such a context, as addressee honorifics are expected to be used in great frequency, it can be hypothesized that both types of referent

honorifics will be used similarly.

Question 3: Various forms of referent honorifics

Referent honorifics will first be divided into sonkee-go ‘respect language’ and

kenjoo-go ‘humbling language’, and their frequencies and any differential uses between

them will be considered. Although based on a limited amount of data, Yamaji (2002)

found that sonkee-go and kenjoo-go were used with similar frequencies. From this

finding, it can be hypothesized that these two types of honorific forms will be used with

similar frequencies in the present study.

It was mentioned above that referent honorifics could be either grammatically- derived forms or lexical substitutes (i.e., irregular forms). Grammatically-derived sonkee-go generally takes the forms of o-Verb-ni naru or Verb-(r)areru . In an attempt to find any differential uses between these two forms, the grammatically-derived sonkee-go instances in the data will be divided into these two forms, and any differential uses will be reported. It is often said that Verb-(r)areru is less formal and is coming to be used more frequently than o-Verb-ni naru nowadays (e.g., Makino & Tsutsui 1986, 37;

Maynard 1990, 278; Tohsaku 1995, 353). It can be hypothesized from these observations that these two forms of sonkee-go will be used differently and that Verb-(r)areru forms will be used more frequently than o-Verb-ni naru forms.

Question 4: Reasons behind speech style shifts

Past studies of addressee honorifics indicate that speakers switch between addressee honorifics and plain forms to bring about certain effects such as showing interpersonal,

23 intrapersonal, or discourse distance as mentioned above (e.g., Chen 2003; Cook 1996a,

1996b, 1998, 2002; Dunn 1999; Ikuta 1983, 2002; Maynard 1991a, 1991b, 1993;

Okamoto 1997; SturtzSreetharan 2006; Usami 1995). It can be hypothesized that speakers do not switch speech styles randomly and that interpersonal, intrapersonal, or discoursal distance may account for speech style shift instances of addressee honorifics. I will examine speech style shifts of addressee honorifics in the data from these viewpoints.

Although speech style shift instances of referent honorifics have not been extensively examined, my pilot study (Yamaji 2002) found instances of such style shifts to show interpersonal distance between the speaker and the referent and to accommodate to the style of the addressee. Additionally, Dunn (2005) claims that style shifts between kenjoo-go ‘humbling language’ and non-honorific forms index the social persona the speaker presents to the audience (i.e., intrapersonal distance). I hypothesize that there should be reasons behind speech style shifts of referent honorifics, and instances found in this study will be examined in terms of interpersonal, intrapersonal and discoursal distance, which past studies claim account for speech style shifts of addressee honorifics.

Question 5: Gender differences

While many previous studies, mostly based on the researchers’ intuitions and survey results, indicate that women speak more politely, or use more honorific forms, than men

(e.g., Hori 1986; Ide 1982, 1989, 1990; Ide et al. 1986; Ide & McGloin 1990; Jorden &

Noda 1987; Mizutani & Mizutani 1987; Niyekawa 1991; Ogino et al. 1985; Shibamoto

Smith 2003; Shibatani 1990), more recent studies of actual discourse show that women

24 do not necessarily speak politely (Matsumoto 1996, 1999a, 1999b, 2002, 2004; Okamoto

1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2002, 2004). These recent studies, however, do not compare women’s and men’s speech; rather, they report how varied women’s speech is, sometimes involving linguistic features typically associated with men. Nevertheless,

Chen (2003), though from a limited amount of data, found that overall, female speakers used addressee honorifics less frequently than male speakers in first-encounter conversations. Following these recent studies of actual discourse, it can be hypothesized that female speakers do not necessarily use more honorific forms than male speakers, whether they are addressee honorifics or referent honorifics. In examining the issues raised in Questions 1 through 4, any gender differences will be reported.

After all the above issues are considered, namely the frequencies of addressee and referent honorifics, different types and forms of referent honorifics, reasons behind speech style shifts, and gender differences, I hope to find some answers to the question of how native speakers of Japanese manipulate honorific and non-honorific forms in first- encounter conversations with interlocutors from similar social backgrounds. I hope that this study will not only contribute to the body of research of Japanese honorifics but also be helpful to learners of Japanese.

2. DATA

2.1. Participants

I had 10 female and 10 male native speakers of Japanese participate in this research.

In order to control education, occupation, age, and regional dialects, I selected speakers who are college-educated, employed middle-class people, who are in their late 20s to mid-30s, and who speak the standard dialect. The participants were found through personal connections and through classified ads.

Table 1 summarizes the gender, age, highest level of education completed, occupation, and overseas experience of each participant. The names listed are pseudonyms.

Table 1: Participants’ Backgrounds

Name Gender Age Degree 3 Occupation Overseas Experience Ichi M 29 B.A. Public Service Travel Kyoko F 31 A.A. Service Industry Travel Aki F 31 B.A. Computer 1 Year Masa M 30 B.A. Office Worker Travel Eri F 32 M.A. Teacher 3 Years Sumi F 33 A.A. Office Worker 2 Years Jun M 31 B.A. Teacher None Kazu M 31 M.A. Consultant 7 Years Taku M 30 M.A. Service Industry 2.5 Months Fumi F 29 B.A. Office Worker 4.5 Months Zen M 30 B.A. Driver None Yuki F 30 A.A. Service Industry Travel Reiko F 34 M.A. Teacher 4 Years Hiro M 34 B.A. Teacher 5 Years Uta F 35 B.A. Office Worker 5.5 Years Wataru M 34 B.A. Office Worker 3 Years Naoko F 29 B.A. College Staff 4 Years Dai M 29 B.A. Office Worker Travel Miki F 29 A.A. Office Worker 1 Year Satoshi M 30 B.A. PR 6 Months

While five of the participants (Aki, Eri, Sumi, Reiko, and Miki) are originally from outside of the Tokyo area, where standard Japanese ‘hyoojungo ’ is spoken, all of them

3 A.A.= Associate’s degree, B.A.= Bachelor’s degree, M.A.= Master’s degree

have been living in the Tokyo area for over 10 years and speak standard Japanese.

Additionally, all participants have received higher education. Four of the participants

graduated from a junior college (Associate’s Degree), and four participants have a

Master’s degree. The rest of the participants are college graduates. All of the

participants are employed people in various fields. The age of the participants ranges

from 29 to 35. Most of the participants have traveled, studied, or worked abroad.

2.2. Data Collection

The data were collected in Tokyo, Japan. Each participant had a dyadic first- encounter conversation with a same-sex partner and another with an opposite-sex partner,

producing five female single-sex conversations, five male single-sex conversations, and

ten mixed-sex conversations. Each pair was matched so that they were basically the

same age.

Here are the details of the data collection procedure. Four participants, two female

speakers and two male speakers, were gathered at a time in an office in downtown Tokyo.

They received a brief explanation about the purpose of the meeting and the procedure.

The purpose of the meeting was explained to be a data collection session for my

dissertation research on communication. The participants were asked to have two 20-

minute conversations and to fill out a follow-up questionnaire at the end. Since the

participants were busy employed people, the meeting was planned so that it would

require only one hour of their time.

The participants were asked to talk for 20 minutes with their first partner. No particular topics were given to the participants; they were instructed to talk about anything they wanted, such as work and interests. They were, however, discouraged from discussing the research itself (e.g., guessing what I was trying to look at) for fear that doing so might cause them to be self-conscious about their speech and prevent them from talking naturally. Two rooms were used, one for each pair. Only the two participants were there during the recording. After the 20 minutes was over, I came back to prompt the participants to talk with another partner. While I planned the first conversation to be between the same-sex partners and the second to be between the opposite-sex partners, I did not mention this to the participants in order to avoid any guessing on their part regarding the social factors that I was interested in investigating.

After the two conversations were recorded, the participants were asked to fill out a follow-up questionnaire to check the validity of the data collected for the present study, evaluating such issues as whether speakers found their interlocutors to be more or less their equal in terms of age and social status as planned, whether they were able to talk naturally, and whether the conversations were representative of this type of speech context. The questionnaire was also useful to gain insights into the participants’ impressions of their interlocutors and of their own speech. I found Usami’s (2002) questionnaire to be useful to meet these purposes, as she used it to check the validity of her data of first-encounter conversations. For this reason, I adapted her questionnaire.

The questionnaire and its English translation are given in the Appendices B and C.

3. OVERVIEW OF THE DATA

Before discussing the results of the study, I will give an overview of the current data.

As mentioned above, no particular conversation topics were given to the participants, so

Section 3.1 reports what the participants talked about in their conversation with someone

they met for the first time. Section 3.2 gives the results of the follow-up questionnaire to

examine the validity of this study.

3.1. What do Japanese People Talk about in First-Encounter Conversations?

All participants started their conversation by saying their name, and in many cases

(in 13 out of 20 conversations), they talked about how they came to participate in the meeting (e.g., how they knew me, etc.). This topic was discouraged in Usami’s study

(2002), as she learned in her pilot study that her participants tended to spend a lot of time talking about it. However, I discovered during my pilot study that conversations started rather awkwardly when this topic was discouraged. Participants seemed curious to find out how their partners ended up at the meeting but had been discouraged from talking about it, and this seemed to have caused the awkwardness. I wanted participants to have a “natural” conversation under the circumstances without worrying about what they should or should not talk about. Additionally, while Usami’s study looked at only the first three minutes of the conversations, I was going to look at the whole twenty minutes.

Therefore, I decided that it did not matter as much whether participants spent a few minutes talking about this topic if they wanted to. And in fact, participants talked about it only briefly at the beginning of the conversation.

Table 2 shows the topics that came up most frequently during the 20 conversations.

Most topics are self-explanatory. ‘Circumstances’ indicates the topic of the

circumstances under which the participants ended up cooperating with this research (e.g.,

how they knew me, the researcher, etc.). ‘Outing’ is any topic related to going out for

fun, such as eating out and drinking.

Table 2: Conversation Topics

Topics Out of 20 Conversations Percentage Work 18 90% Overseas Experience 14 70% Circumstances 13 65% Residence 9 45% Interests 8 40% Hometown 7 35% English 7 35% Living Arrangements 6 30% Age 5 25% Outing 5 25%

The three most common topics in the data were work (which came up in 18 out of 20 conversations), experience studying, working, or traveling overseas (14 out of 20), and

‘circumstances’ (13 out of 20). Many of the participants have studied or worked overseas

and speak English fluently, while others had experience traveling overseas and were

studying or wanted to study English. Therefore, it seems that it was not difficult for them

to find common ground on the topic of their overseas experience. Other topics that

appeared in some frequency were residence (9 out of 20 conversations), interests (8 out

of 20), hometown (7 out of 20), English (7 out of 20), living arrangements (6 out of 20),

age (5 out of 20), and outing (5 out of 20).

Age of the interlocutor is often listed as one of the major factors determining an appropriate speech style. A mutual disclosure of ages was accomplished in 5 out of 20 conversations (i.e. 25% of the time). This seems to suggest that while age may be a major factor in determining an appropriate speech style, speakers tended not to discuss it explicitly. If it is indeed an important factor, speakers must have relied on their intuition about their partner’s age to decide on the speech style that they felt comfortable with.

Generally speaking, according to the current data, it was not common to talk about

personal information such as marital status or love life with someone they met for the

first time. There was only one married participant in the group, and he talked about his

wife. Another male participant asked his female partner about her marital status, and she

in return asked him the same question.

There was one conversation, however, where the participants discussed relatively

deep or personal matters, namely, their thoughts about cheating (in a relationship) and

disinterest in marriage due to their parents’ unhappy marriages. These topics were

triggered by talk about a TV drama that dealt with a relationship between a married

woman and a high school student.

In summary, in the current data, the participants tended to discuss work, overseas

experiences, and how they came to participate in the study. They were not likely to ask

for or disclose rather personal information about such things as age, marital status, and

love life.

3.2. Participants’ Impressions about Their Partners & Conversations– Seen from the

Results of the Follow-Up Questionnaire

I tried to match participants by age as much as possible, though a one-year or two- year difference was allowed in some of the conversations. In order to determine whether

participants judged their partners to be about the same age, as I hoped they would,

participants were asked to judge their partners’ ages in the follow-up questionnaire.

Since each of the 20 participants rated their two partners, there were 40 answers

regarding impression of the partner’s age. No one thought their partner was significantly

younger or older. Almost all the people considered their partner to be either the same age

or a little younger.

Table 3: Impression of the Partner’s Age

Age Out of 40 Answers Percentage Same 24 60% A Little Younger 15 37.5% A Little Older 1 2.5% Significantly Younger 0 0% Significantly Older 0 0% Total 40 100%

How accurate were their judgments? Speakers judged their partner’s age correctly

approximately half the time (52.5%) and tended to think their partners were younger than

they actually were (37.5%). Table 4 presents these results.

Table 4: Accuracy of the Judgment of the Partner’s Age

Age Out of 40 Answers Percentage Age Judged Correctly 21 52.5% Age Judged Downward 15 37.5% Age Judged Upward 4 10% Total 40 100%

Participants were also asked what clues they used to guess the partner’s age.

Multiple answers were possible for this question.

Table 5: Clues to Guess the Partner’s Age

Clues Number Percentage Appearance 29 72.5% Content of Conversation 18 45% The Way the Partner Spoke 17 42.5% Other 5 12.5%

Table 5 shows that speakers tended to rely on the partner’s appearance to guess his/her

age compared to other factors available to them (72.5%). Those who marked ‘Other’

indicated in the questionnaire that they chose this option because the partner’s age was

mentioned during the conversation. Other participants who heard the partner's age in the

conversation might have selected ‘Content of Conversation’.

Participants were selected from employed middle-class people. According to the

answers to the follow-up questionnaire, participants tended to judge their partner’s social

34 status as equal to their own more than half the time (62.5%) and to base their judgment on the content of the conversation (75%). Participants' responses here might well be influenced by the "we are all middle class" or "we are a relatively classless society" ideology that is so prevalent in Japan.

Table 6: Impression of the Partner’s Social Status

Social Status Out of 40 Answers Percentage Same 25 62.5% A Little Higher 8 20% A Little Lower 7 17.5% Significantly Higher 0 0% Significantly Lower 0 0% Total 40 100%

Table 7: Clues to Guess the Partner’s Social Status

Clues Number Percentage Appearance 8 20% Content of Conversation 30 75% The Way the Partner Spoke 11 27.5% Other 8 20%

Among the participants, several people had changed jobs or were considering that option.

The people who listed ‘Other’ as a reason for their judgment of the partner’s social status indicated that they considered their partner’s social status to be lower than their own because they heard during the conversation that he/she changed jobs relatively recently or to be higher than their own because they themselves changed jobs recently. It appears

35 that these participants thought that a recent change in jobs probably means that the person has not secured a very important position in a company yet. Since these people and their partners talked about their work situations during the conversation, the eight instances listed as ‘Other’ may better be included in the ‘Content of Conversation’ category.

So far, we have seen that participants’ impressions about each partner’s age and social status were more or less as the research was planned. In other words, the participants were selected from similar age and social groups, and the participants viewed their partners as such, although they did not necessarily see each other as being from exactly the same age or social groups. This suggests that the age and social status matching was successful.

After the questions regarding age and social status, participants were asked how easy or difficult it was to talk to the partner. No one thought their partner was very or rather difficult to talk to, and most people had a positive impression of their partner (72.5%).

Table 8: Ease/Difficulty of Talking

Ease/Difficulty of Talking Out of 40 Answers Percentage Very Easy 5 12.5% Rather Easy 8 20% Easy 16 40% Neither Difficult nor Easy 9 22.5% A Little Difficult 2 5% Rather Difficult 0 0% Very Difficult 0 0% Total 40 100%

Two male speakers indicated that they felt their partner was a little difficult to talk to.

One of them felt this way toward his female partner because she was of the opposite sex

and seemed a little quiet. He also noted difficulty in finding conversation topics. The

other male speaker found his male partner a little difficult to talk to because he seemed

shy, and the speaker had to provide topics in order to get the conversation going. He also

experienced difficulty in finding topics of common interest.

Judging by the participants’ comments regarding the reasons for their evaluation of their partner as an interlocutor, it appears that whether they find their partners to be easy to talk to or not depends on several factors such as the following:

• whether they were able to find topics of common interest

• whether both speakers provided topics

• whether the partner was eager to talk and listen

• whether the partner was cheerful

No one found their partner’s speech to be impolite or unpleasant, but one male participant, Taku, commented that he found his female partner, Yuki, to be narenareshii

‘overly friendly or too casual’, considering this was their first encounter. I will discuss

their conversation further in Section 4.

In most cases, participants claimed that they were able to talk naturally (90%), as

shown in Table 9.

Table 9: Naturalness of Speech

Naturalness of Speech Out of 40 Answers Percentage Very Natural 7 17.5% Quite Natural 6 15% Natural 23 57.5% Not Very Natural 4 10% Not Natural at All 0 0% Total 40 100%

There were four times when participants marked that they could not talk very naturally.

Two were marked by the same individual, Zen, who added that he is a man of few words, suggesting that he probably could not talk as smoothly as other people. His male partner rated his talk with Zen not very natural because it did not go very smoothly due to Zen being a passive talker. The other person, Ichi, evaluated his talk with his male partner as not very natural since he rarely speaks to people outside of a work context and found it difficult to relax. While there were three conversations of which one or both of the participants wrote that they could not talk very naturally, the reason was not because of the research setting itself; rather the reason was said to be the participant’s personality, the partner’s personality, or the conversation topic.

Additionally, in most cases (82.5%), participants responded that they were not at all, or not very, conscious of being recorded (Table 10). Considering this and the fact that most of the participants claimed that they were able to talk naturally, we can assume that participants were for the most part able to talk naturally under the circumstances.

Table 10: Consciousness of Being Recorded

Consciousness of Being Recorded Out of 40 Answers Percentage Not Conscious at All 16 40% Not Very Conscious 17 42.5% A Little Conscious 7 17.5% Quite Conscious 0 0% Very Conscious 0 0% Total 40 100%

There were three conversations in which one of the participants was a little conscious about being recorded and two conversations in which both participants were a little conscious about being recorded. Three participants rated both conversations in which they participanted as such (3 x 2), and one other participant rated his first conversation as such. All of these people claimed that their consciousness of being recorded did not affect their speech very much.

As mentioned above, in this study, each participant was asked to talk with two partners one after the other. I wanted more than one speech sample from each speaker to see any consistencies or differences depending on the conversation. This procedure, however, can be considered problematic as the fact that participants had a similar conversation previously may affect how they talk in the second conversation. In fact, half the participants noted that the fact that they had a similar conversation before affected the way they spoke and/or the content of the conversation in their second conversation.

Table 11: Influence of the First Conversation on the Second Conversation

Effect of the 1 st Conversation Out of 20 Answers Percentage No Effect at All 3 15% Not Much Effect 7 35% A Little Effect 7 35% Effect 3 15% Strong Effect 0 0% Total 20 100%

Several of those who chose ‘A Little Effect’ or ‘Effect’ mentioned that they were more

relaxed during the second conversation as they had had a similar experience once before.

This is understandable since for almost all participants, if not all, this was the first

experience of data collection of this sort, which may have made them feel somewhat

nervous during the first conversation. Additionally, a few of the participants who chose

these answers acknowledged that they were able to “recycle” some of the topics that

came up during the first conversation in the second conversation.

In summary, the answers to the follow-up questionnaire revealed that the current data can be considered representative of the situation intended, namely, first-encounter

conversations between people from similar backgrounds. The participants rated their

partners to be more or less similar to them in age and social status. Furthermore, most of

them stated that they were able to talk naturally and that they either were not conscious of

being recorded or were not affected by the recording very much.

4. RESULTS & DISCUSSION

In this section, I will examine the results for each of the research questions raised above regarding manipulation of honorifics in first-encounter conversations between relatively young people from similar backgrounds. First, the frequencies of use of addressee honorifics and referent honorifics will be reported. Second, referent honorifics will be examined in detail. Then, I will discuss speech style shifts between honorific and non-honorific forms.

4.1. Addressee Honorifics

Addressee honorifics, also called distal or des/mas forms, are often regarded as markers of social distance and are considered to be used toward addressees of higher social status or of little or no acquaintanceship. The conversations collected for this study are between two people of no acquaintanceship, and therefore, the use of addressee honorifics is expected according to a prescriptive account. The question is how much they are used.

For this analysis, the numbers of finite predicates with and without addressee honorifics in main clauses were counted. Using excerpt (1), I will demonstrate how I counted them. In the examples below, underlined segments are honorific forms, while italics indicate non-honorific forms 4. As is well known, Japanese allows zero-anaphors, but their referents are provided in the English translations.

(1)

1 U: nanigo o oshieterassharu [n desu ka]? {+RH, +AH} “What language do you teach ?”

2 R: [eego desu ]. {+AH} “English .”

3 moo sore shika, “That’s the only (thing I can teach),”

4 U: he=. “I see.”

5 R: n=. “Yes.”

6 U: sugo=i . {-AH} “Wonderful .”

After learning that Reiko (female) is a language teacher, Uta (female) asks what language she teaches. Oshiete(i)rassharu is the referent-honorific progressive form of oshieru ‘to teach’, and the utterance ends with an addressee honorific –desu . Therefore, this utterance is marked as {+RH (Referent Honorific), +AH (Addressee Honorific)}.

Reiko’s answer in line 2 also contains an addressee honorific –desu , and therefore, it is marked as {+AH}. Uta’s reaction in line 6, expressing admiration, is in the plain form

(i.e., non-addressee-honorific form), and is marked as {-AH}. In short, excerpt (1) contains two addressee honorifics and one plain form.

4 Please see Appendix A for other transcription conventions.

Overall, there were 3983 finite predicates, 2660 (66.8%) of which were addressee

honorifics while 1323 (33.2%) of which were plain forms. In other words, two-thirds of

the predicates were addressee honorifics, and therefore, we can conclude that in the

speech context of the present study, overall, addressee honorifics were the unmarked

speech style, which is consistent with previous studies of first-encounter conversations

(e.g., Chen 2003; Usami 1995, 2002).

Table 12: Overall Frequencies of Addressee Honorifics and Plain Forms

Form Number Percentage Addressee Honorifics 2660 66.8% Plain Forms 1323 33.2% Total 3983 100%

There was, however, a great range of variations in the frequency of use depending on the speaker or the conversation. The percentage of the use of addressee honorifics ranged

from 0.8% to 100%. Table 13 summarizes the frequencies of use of addressee honorifics

and plain forms by each speaker in each of the 20 conversations.

Table 13: Frequencies of Addressee Honorific and Plain Forms by Each Speaker in Each Conversation

Name Gender Addressee Honorifics Plain Forms Total Zen M 71 (72.4%) 27 (27.6%) 98 Fumi F 98 (80.3%) 24 (19.7%) 122 Taku M 98 (64.5%) 54 (35.5%) 152 Zen M 79 (94%) 5 (6%) 84 Yuki F 4 (2.6%) 147 (97.4%) 151 Fumi F 82 (62.6%) 49 (37.4%) 131 Taku M 10 (7.6%) 122 (92.4%) 132 Yuki F 1 (0.8%) 129 (99.2%) 130 Hiro M 73 (82%) 16 (18%) 89 Uta F 76 (85.4%) 13 (14.6%) 89 Uta F 71 (71%) 29 (29%) 100 Reiko F 57 (64%) 32 (36%) 89 Wataru M 71 (92.2%) 6 (7.8%) 77 Reiko F 53 (65.4%) 28 (34.6%) 81 Hiro M 72 (87.8%) 10 (12.2%) 82 Wataru M 80 (90.9%) 8 (9.1%) 88 Masa M 106 (94.6%) 6 (5.4%) 112 Aki F 117 (92.9%) 9 (7.1%) 126 Masa M 93 (93.9%) 6 (6.1%) 99 Ichi M 94 (95.9%) 4 (4.1%) 98 Ichi M 75 (97.4%) 2 (2.6%) 77 Kyoko F 40 (41.2%) 57 (58.8%) 97 Kyoko F 17 (12.3%) 121 (87.7%) 138 Aki F 87 (88.8%) 11 (11.2%) 98

Satoshi M 73 (80.2%) 18 (19.8%) 91 Naoko F 27 (41.5%) 38 (58.5%) 65 Miki F 64 (47.1%) 72 (52.9%) 136 Naoko F 10 (14.3%) 60 (85.7%) 70 Dai M 99 (78%) 28 (22%) 127 Miki F 141 (75.8%) 45 (24.2%) 186 Satoshi M 69 (74.2%) 24 (25.8%) 93 Dai M 64 (87.7%) 9 (12.3%) 73 Jun M 56 (91.8%) 5 (8.2%) 61 Sumi F 37 (80.4%) 9 (19.6%) 46 Eri F 70 (68.6%) 32 (31.4%) 102 Sumi F 46 (75.4%) 15 (24.6%) 61 Jun M 51 (100%) 0 51 Kazu M 56 (94.9%) 3 (5.1%) 59 Kazu M 72 (76.6%) 22 (23.4%) 94 Eri F 100 (78.1%) 28 (21.9%) 128 Total 2660 (66.8%) 1323 (33.2%) 3983 (100%)

Yuki (female) used the least percentage of addressee honorifics amongst all the speakers. She used them 2.6% of the time in single-sex conversation and 0.8% of the time in mixed-sex conversation. Her male addressee, Taku, however, expressed in the follow-up questionnaire that he found her speech too casual and therefore impolite for a first-encounter conversation. This was the only instance where a participant thought his/her partner’s speech was in any way inappropriate. Yuki and Taku were exactly the same age, and Yuki judged Taku’s age correctly. Taku, however, judged her age to be a little younger than him. It is possible that he found Yuki’s speech too casual because he

thought she was a little younger than him, but it is also possible that it could have been

the case regardless of her age as he specifically wrote that her speech was too casual for a

first-encounter conversation. In this particular conversation, Yuki used addressee

honorifics 0.8% of the time while Taku used them 7.6% of the time. Considering that his

speech started with addressee honorifics in this conversation and that he used addressee

honorifics 64.5% of the time in the other conversation that he participated in, it is likely

that he adjusted his speech style to match Yuki’s despite the fact that he felt that using

mostly plain forms was inappropriate for the speech context of the present study. From

the conversation itself, we cannot tell that he was feeling this way. They had a seemingly

friendly and lively conversation with lots of laughter. I was able to overhear their

conversation from another room while it was being recorded and thought perhaps they

might have known each other prior to the meeting.

This was not the only conversation where addressee honorifics were less frequent than plain forms. Kyoko (female) was another speaker whose use of addressee honorifics was less frequent than that of plain forms in both conversations that she participated in.

Her use of addressee honorifics was 12.3% in single-sex conversation and 41.2% in mixed-sex conversation. Her interlocutors used them 88.8% and 97.4%, respectively. In these two conversations there did not seem to be any speech style adjustment on the part of her interlocutors. According to the follow-up questionnaire, her interlocutors did not find anything wrong with Kyoko’s speech style. The questionnaire also indicates that, although speakers were matched by age, Kyoko judged her interlocutors to be younger than she, while her two interlocutors judged her to be the same age. This may explain

46 why Kyoko’s speech was rather casual, especially with her female interlocutor. In reality,

Kyoko’s male interlocutor was two years younger than she, while her female interlocutor was the same age as she.

There was yet another speaker who used addressee honorifics less frequently than plain forms. Naoko (female) used addressee honorifics 14.3% of the time in single-sex conversation and 41.5% in mixed-sex conversation. She guessed both of her interlocutors to be the same age as she. It appears that her female interlocutor, Miki, adjusted her speech style toward Naoko’s somewhat, as her use of addressee honorifics was 47.1% with Naoko and 75.8% with her male interlocutor.

It is interesting to note that Yuki, Kyoko, and Naoko, whose uses of addressee honorifics are less than those of plain forms in each of the two conversations they participated in, are all female speakers. It is often said that female speakers speak more politely (i.e. use more honorific forms) than male speakers, but this study shows that this is not always the case. Let us look at the overall frequencies of addressee honorifics and plain forms based on gender.

Table 14: Overall Frequencies of Addressee Honorifics & Plain Forms Based on Gender

Form Female Male Total Addressee Honorifics 1198 (55.8%) 1462 (79.6%) 2660 (66.8%) Plain Forms 948 (44.2%) 375 (20.4%) 1323 (33.2%) Total 2146 (100%) 1837 (100%) 3983 (100%)

Table 14 indicates that overall, female speakers used addressee honorifics 55.8% of the time while male speakers used them 79.6% of the time. Of course, this comparison

may not be appropriate as the data include such extreme cases as Yuki’s conversations.

If we omit her speech data out of the calculation, the percentage will change to 63.8% for

female speakers. Even then, there is almost 16% difference in use between the two

genders. From these observations, we can safely conclude that female speakers do not

necessarily speak more politely than male speakers in first-encounter conversations

between two relatively young people of similar age. This result is consistent with Chen’s

(2003) study and may provide support to the claim made by recent studies of gender

differences in Japanese that female speakers do not necessarily speak politely

(Matsumoto 1996, 1999a, 1999b, 2002, 2004; Okamoto 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2002,

2004).

If we examine the frequency of use of addressee honorifics based on gender and partner mixing (i.e., single-sex and mixed-sex conversations), we can see that male

speakers tended to speak more politely (i.e., use more addressee honorifics) than female

speakers in both single-sex and mixed-sex conversations, as shown in Table 15.

Table 15: Overall Frequencies of Addressee Honorifics & Plain Forms Based on Gender & Partner Mixing

Gender & Mixing Addressee Honorifics Plain Forms Total Female Single-Sex 508 (47.2%) 568 (52.8%) 1076 (100%) Female Mixed-Sex 690 (64.5%) 380 (35.5%) 1070 (100%) Male Single-Sex 756 (86%) 123 (14%) 879 (100%) Male Mixed-Sex 706 (73.7%) 252 (26.3%) 958 (100%) Total 2660 (66.8%) 1323 (33.2%) 3983 (100%)

Additionally, female speakers’ use of addressee honorifics was higher in mixed-sex

conversations than in single-sex conversations while the opposite was true with male

speakers. In other words, female speakers tended to speak more politely with male

speakers than with their own gender while male speakers tended to speak more politely

with their own gender than with female speakers.

In fact, a few people mentioned either during the conversation or in the follow-up

questionnaire their awareness of possible influence of the partner’s gender on their

comfort level during the conversation. As an example, please see the following excerpt

from Kyoko (female) and Ichi’s (male) conversation.

(2)

1 K: nanka yappari, ima josee to hanashiteta n de, josee to hanasu no to dansee to hanasu no tte, bimyoo ni yappa, chigaimasu [ne]. {+AH} “I was just talking to a woman, and talking with women is subtly different from talking with men as expected.”

2 I: [a]= soo [[yuwaretemireba]], “Oh, now that you mentioned,”

3 K: [[kinchoo no doai]] ga, [mattaku], “The degree of nervousness (I feel) is absolutely (different).”

4 I: [soo= iwa]rereba soo desu ne. “That may be the case now that you mentioned it.”

5 K: arimasu yo ne=. {+AH} “There is (such a difference), isn’t there?”

Kyoko’s speech was more polite with the male speaker than with her female partner, making her use of addressee honorifics 41.2% with the male speaker and 12.3% with the female speaker despite the fact that she judged both speakers to be younger than she.

Kyoko’s male partner mentioned in his follow-up questionnaire that he finds women easier to talk to as they always have something to talk about, which seems to make the conversation flow smoothly. Unlike Kyoko, however, his speech style did not differ depending on the gender of the partner. His rates of use of addressee honorifics were

95.9% with the same-sex partner and 97.4% with the opposite-sex partner.

Another male speaker commented in his follow-up questionnaire that he found the same-sex partner easy to talk to and his opposite-sex partner a little difficult to talk to partly because of their genders. Nevertheless, his speech style did not differ depending on the gender of the partner. His rates of use of addressee honorifics were 90.9% with the same-sex partner and 92.2% with the opposite-sex partner.

In summary, Table 15 shows that overall, the partner’s gender seems to influence the rate of use of addressee honorifics. Some of the speakers are in fact aware that gender may influence their comfort level during the conversation. However, this awareness does not necessarily change the rate of use of addressee honorifics. More research is necessary to investigate this issue further.

To conclude this section, the findings regarding addressee honorifics in the current data of first-encounter conversations between two relatively young people of similar age are as follows:

• Overall, addressee honorifics are the unmarked form. The rate of use, however,

ranges greatly depending on the speaker and the conversation. Using too few

addressee honorifics could offend an addressee in this speech context (as seen in

Taku’s comment regarding his conversation with Yuki).

• Contrary to stereotypes, female speakers do not necessarily speak more politely

(i.e., use addressee honorifics more frequently) than male speakers.

• Overall, the addressee’s gender seems to influence the rate of use of addressee

honorifics. Both genders tend to speak more politely to male interlocutors.

4.2. Referent Honorifics – Sonkee-go

As mentioned earlier, referent honorifics in Japanese consist of sonkee-go ‘respect

language’ and kenjoo-go ‘humbling language’. This section focuses on sonkee-go , which

is used in reference to the actions or state of a referent worthy of respect. The forms of

sonkee-go depend on the predicate type. Verbs take either o-Verb-ni naru , Verb-

(r)areru, or lexical substitutes (irregular forms) when available. For instance, taberu ‘to

eat’ becomes otabeninaru , taberareru, or meshiagaru . Adjectives (i.e., i-adjectives) and nominal adjectives (i.e., na -adjectives) take honorific prefixes, o or go . For instance,

wakai ‘young’ becomes owakai , and genki ‘healthy’ becomes ogenki . The copula da ‘to

be’ becomes deirassharu .

The referent of the sonkee-go can be the addressee or a third person who is not

present in the conversation. In the current data, however, there were not many instances

of sonkee-go used in reference to a third person. This is probably due to the nature of the

speech context of the data. Two people with no prior acquaintance are talking, and they

are getting to know each other by talking about themselves. In this type of context, it

seems that discussion of a third person is less likely than in other contexts. We will

discuss these two types of referents separately below.

4.2.1. Sonkee-go in Reference to the Addressee

This section compares the frequencies of the use and non-use of sonkee-go in

reference to the addressee. Let us first look at examples with or without sonkee-go .

Excerpt (1) above contained one verbal sonkee-go in reference to the addressee in line 1,

namely, oshiete(i)rassharu , which is the referent-honorific progressive form of oshieru

‘to teach’. Excerpt (3) contains a non-use of verbal sonkee-go .

(3)

1 I: do- doko desu ka? kootoo[ku]. {+AH} “Where is it, (in) Koto Ward?”

2 M: [ko]otooku no= ano= sengoku tte wakari masu ? {-RH, +AH} “Do you know Sengoku in Koto-ku?”

3 I: kootooku ni sengoku tte arimashita k[ke]. {+AH} “Was there Sengoku in Koto-ku?”

4 M: [ha]i. “Yes.”

Ichi (male) asks Masa (male) where in Koto Ward he works in line 1. Masa’s answer in line 2 includes the non-use of verbal sonkee-go . Wakarimasu is a combination of the

non-referent-honorific form of wakaru ‘to understand’ and an addressee honorific –masu .

In this utterance, it would be possible to use a referent honorific owakari ni naru ( o-Verb-

ni naru ) instead of a plain verb wakaru , as in owakari ni narimasu . For this reason, the

verb in question is considered {-RH}.

The following excerpt includes one example of an adjectival sonkee-go and one

example of nominal adjective without sonkee-go . Wataru (male) belongs to a hiking club

and is recalling the time when he went hiking in snow with other members of the club in

the area where Hiro (male) lives. Hiro is impressed about how youthful and energetic

Wataru is in lines 5 and 6. @ marks stand for laughter.

(4)

1 W: demo daibu futtemashita yo ne. {+AH} “But it was snowing quite a bit.”

2 haikingu shiteta toki zu=tto honto ni san yo jikan wa, “The whole time when we were hiking, really, for 2, 3, 4 hours,”

3 H: hai. “Yes.”

4 W: futtete, “It was snowing, and,”

5 H: ha= nanka sugoi ow- owakai desu ne. @@@ {+RH, +AH} “Wow, you are young .”

6 genki desu yo ne. {-RH, +AH} “You are energetic , aren’t you?”

7 W: <@iya= wakakunai desu yo@>. {+AH} “No, I am not young.”

8 boku moo sanjuuyon desu ka[ra]. “Because I am already 34 years old.”

9 H: [a] soo desu ka. “I see.”

In expressing his impression, Hiro uses both sonkee-go and non -sonkee-go in reference to the addressee. Owakai is the sonkee-go of the adjective wakai ‘youthful’, but genki

‘energetic’ is a plain nominal adjective, not sonkee-go .

The current data did not have any instance of the sonkee-go of the copula, deirassharu . The following excerpt includes a couple of instances of its non-use. Kazu

(male) and Eri (female) are introducing each other, and Kazu asks if Eri is a teacher and what subject she teaches. The copula, na (> da ), in lines 1 and 3 is a plain form, not the sonkee-go form, deirassharu .

(5)

1 K: sensee na n desu ka? {-RH, +AH} “Are (you) a teacher?”

2 E: hai, hai. “Yes, yes.”

3 K: <@a@>, nan no sensee <@ na n@> desu ka? {-RH, +AH} “What subject do you teach? (lit. What are you a teacher of?)”

4 E: eego= desu [ne]. {+AH} “English .”

5 K: [a]= soo na n desu ka? “Oh, really?”

The data included 501 predicates that referred to the addressee. Table 16 classifies

these predicates based on their predicate type (verbs, adjectives, nominal adjectives, or

copula) and whether sonkee-go was used or not.

Table 16: The Use or Non-Use of Sonkee-go in Reference to the Addressee

Predicate Type Sonkee-go Non-Sonkee-go Total Verbs 78 (17.9%) 357 (82.1%) 435 (100%) Adjectives 2 (14.3%) 12 (85.7%) 14 (100%) Nominal Adjectives 0 18 (100%) 18 (100%) Copula 0 34 (100%) 34 (100%) Total 80 (16%) 421 (84%) 501 (100%)

Table 16 shows that most of the predicates used in reference to the addressee were verbs

and that the data did not include many instances of adjectives, nominal adjectives, or

copula forms in reference to the addressee. Overall, only 16% of the predicates in

reference to the addressee were sonkee-go while 84% were not. The ratio was very similar with the verbs (i.e., 17.9% vs. 82.1%), which comprise over 85% of the relevant predicates. The numbers of relevant adjectives, nominal adjectives, and copulas are too small to make any claim. At least concerning verbs, the data show that the use of sonkee- go is rather limited in the current study. While the number of relevant adjective and nominal adjective instances is small in the present study, more data may make it possible to examine how frequently sonkee-go is used with these predicates and whether the use

depends on some characteristic of the predicates themselves, such as the meaning or type

(i.e., adjectives or nominal adjectives). Additionally, regarding the copula, it can be

hypothesized that at least in a speech context such as the current one, the copula tends to

appear in its plain form rather than its sonkee-go form. More data will enable further investigation of this matter.

Although the number of relevant instances is small, let us discuss the frequency of use of verbal sonkee-go for each speaker. While Table 16 shows that overall, 17.9% of the verbs in reference to the addressee were realized with sonkee-go , there was quite a range of variations on the frequency of use of verbal sonkee-go depending on the speaker

or the conversation, as was the case with addressee honorifics. Table 17 reveals this fact.

Percentages are included simply to be consistent with other tables.

Table 17: Frequencies of Verbal Sonkee-go and Plain Verbs by Each Speaker in Each Conversation

Name Gender Verbal Sonkee-go Plain Verbs Total Zen M 1 (12.5%) 7 (87.5%) 8 Fumi F 0 (0%) 18 (100%) 18 Taku M 0 (0%) 19 (100%) 19 Zen M 0 (0%) 5 (100%) 5 Yuki F 0 (0%) 19 (100%) 19 Fumi F 0 (0%) 19 (100%) 19 Taku M 0 (0%) 16(100%) 16 Yuki F 0 (0%) 23 (100%) 23 Hiro M 6 (60%) 4 (40%) 10 Uta F 5 (71.4%) 2 (28.6%) 7 Uta F 10 (66.7%) 5 (33.3%) 15 Reiko F 5 (100%) 0 (0%) 5 Wataru M 4 (80%) 1 (20%) 5 Reiko F 0 0 0 Hiro M 5 (71.4%) 2 (28.6%) 7 Wataru M 2 (66.7%) 1 (33.3%) 3 Masa M 1 (11.1%) 8 (88.9%) 9 Aki F 6 (28.6%) 15 (71.4%) 21 Masa M 4 (44.4%) 5 (55.6%) 9 Ichi M 2 (100%) 0 (0%) 2 Ichi M 0 0 0 Kyoko F 0 (0%) 12 (100%) 12 Kyoko F 1 (8.3%) 11 (91.7%) 12 Aki F 0 (0%) 4 (100%) 4

Satoshi M 2 (14.3%) 12 (85.7%) 14 Naoko F 0 (0%) 12 (100%) 12 Miki F 0 (0%) 14 (100%) 14 Naoko F 0 (0%) 9 (100%) 9 Dai M 1 (12.5%) 7 (87.5%) 8 Miki F 0 (0%) 37 (100%) 37 Satoshi M 4 (30.8%) 9 (69.2%) 13 Dai M 3 (23.1%) 10 (76.9%) 13 Jun M 1 (12.5%) 7 (87.5%) 8 Sumi F 2 (33.3%) 4 (66.7%) 6 Eri F 1 (11.1%) 8 (88.9%) 9 Sumi F 7 (50%) 7 (50%) 14 Jun M 3 (33.3%) 6 (66.7%) 9 Kazu M 0 (0%) 2 (100%) 2 Kazu M 1 (6.7%) 14 (93.3%) 15 Eri F 1 (25%) 3 (75%) 4 Total 78 (17.9%) 357 (82.1%) 435 (100%)

The data included five speakers who did not use verbal sonkee-go at all in either of the two conversations (Fumi, Yuki, Taku, Naoko, and Miki), ten speakers whose use of verbal sonkee-go was less frequent than that of plain verbs (Zen, Masa, Aki, Kyoko,

Satoshi, Dai, Jun, Sumi, Eri, and Kazu), three speakers whose use of verbal sonkee-go

was more frequent than that of plain verbs (Uta, Wataru, Hiro) and two speakers who

used only verbal sonkee-go (Reiko and Ichi). One thing to note is that of the five

speakers who did not use verbal sonkee-go at all, Yuki and Naoko are the ones whose use of addressee honorifics was less than that of plain forms. Additionally, Kyoko, whose

use of addressee honorifics was less than that of plain forms just like Yuki and Naoko,

used only one verbal sonkee-go out of 24 possible instances. This may suggest that in

conversations where the use of addressee honorifics is less frequent than that of plain

forms, sonkee-go (at least verbal sonkee-go ) is likely not to be used or is only rarely used,

at least in the present speech context. It is also interesting to note that of the five

speakers who did not use verbal sonkee-go at all, four were female speakers, which may

suggest that female speakers do not necessarily use more sonkee-go than male speakers.

We will look into gender differences in the use of referent honorifics in more detail in

Section 4.4.

In summary, while we need more adjective, nominal adjective, and copula instances to get a better overall picture of the use of sonkee-go in reference to the addressee, at least regarding verbs, the use of sonkee-go was rather limited in reference to the addressee in

the current data, being used less than 20% of the time. Overall, then, in casual first-

encounter conversations between two relatively young people of similar age, non-sonkee-

go forms are more likely to be used than sonkee-go forms in reference to the addressee.

The rate of use, however, ranges greatly depending on the speaker and the conversation.

4.2.2. Sonkee-go in Reference to a Third Person

This section discusses sonkee-go used in reference to a third person. As discussed

above, due to the nature of the conversation of the current data, where two people without

previous acquaintance talked, it was unlikely for participants to talk about a third person

who was not present in the conversation. The participants mostly talked about

themselves, such as their work and interests. For this reason, the data found only a small number of instances where the use of sonkee-go in reference to a third person was

possible. Third parties referred to during the conversation for whom sonkee-go could

have been used are mostly the addressee’s in-group members such as his/her family,

friends, and colleagues.

Excerpt (6) includes an instance of verbal sonkee-go in reference to a third person.

Prior to this excerpt, Jun (male) finds out that Sumi (female) works in the same industry

as most of his family and relatives. Jun mentions that most of his family and relatives

work for one particular company, as this company tends to employ people through

personal connections. Sumi is familiar with this company, so she asks whether anyone

Jun is related to works at the Hibiya office of the company.

(6)

1 J: hai, chichioya mo soo desu <@kedo=@> mochiron. “Yes, my father also (works for T Electric Co.), of course, but,”

2 T denryoku darake de, T denryoku igai no hito to @@ denryokugaisha no hito to hanashita no hajimete desu . {+AH} “(There are) many (people working for) T Electric Co. (around me), so this is the first time to talk to a person from the same industry outside of T Electric Co.”

3 S: @@@[@@...]

4 J: [@@@@=], he=. “I see.”

5 S: e jaa, donata ka wa ano, hibiya no ofisu toka ni irassharu n desu ka? {+RH, +AH} “Is someone at the Hibiya office or some place?”

6 J: hibiya wa inai desu ne. {+AH} “No one is at Hibiya.”

7 m- moo minna, shiten toka soo yuu toko ni imasu ne. {+AH} “Everyone is in such places as branch offices.”

In line 5, Sumi asks whether anyone Jun is related to works (lit. exists) at the office in

Hibiya or some place. Sumi uses a sonkee-go form of iru 'to exist', irassharu , in reference to Jun’s family and relatives.

Excerpt (7) includes the non-use of both verbal sonkee-go and copula sonkee-go in reference to a third person. Ichi (male) and Kyoko (female) are talking about Ichi’s wife, and Kyoko asks questions about her but does not use sonkee-go in reference to her, Ichi’s in-group member.

(7)

1 I: sonna ni tomodachi mo mada, “(not) so many friends yet,”

2 K: n=. “Yes.”

3 I: inai shi, mada, ichinen han na n [desu kedo], “(she) doesn’t have (many friends yet), and it has only been a year and a half, but,”

4 K: [soo], a, kotchi ni [[kite ]] desu ka? {-RH, +AH} “I see. (You mean ) since she has come here?”

5 I: [[ee]]. “Yes.”

6 K: a= soo na n da. “Oh, I see.”

7 doko no kuni no kata na n desu ka? {-RH, +AH} “What’ s her nationality?”

In line 4, Kyoko asks whether Ichi meant it has been a year and a half since his wife came

to Japan. Kite , the gerund form of kuru ‘to come’, in reference to Ichi’s wife is not sonkee-go . The verb would be irasshatte (> irassharu , lexical substitute), oideninatte (> oideninaru , o-Verb-ni naru form), or korarete (> korareru , V-(r)areru form ) if sonkee-go were used. Kyoko then asks where Ichi’s wife is from in line 7. The copula na (> da ) is

not sonkee-go . The sonkee-go of copula would be deirassharu , but the copula never

appears in this form in the data.

Here is an example of the non-use of adjectival sonkee-go . Dai (male) and Miki

(female) are discussing Dai’s two younger brothers. One of the brothers is withdrawn and does not communicate well with Dai and the other brother, so Dai is trying to understand him better in order to improve the situation.

(8)

1 D: iroiro, kore kara, kyoodai toka nakayoku yattekanakya ikenai noni, “Though we siblings have to get along from now on,”

2 M: n=. “Yeah.”

3 D: seekaku chanto haaku shinakya na tte, “(I think that) I must understand his personality,”

4 M: [datte mada wakai desu yo ne sanjuu XXXX] {-RH, +AH} “He is still young , isn’t he? 30 [inaudible]”

5 [(D is coughing)]

6 D: wakai desu . {+AH} “He is young.”

Dai and Miki learned earlier in the conversation that they were both 29 years old, and the brother in question is Dai’s younger brother. Therefore, in line 4, Miki asks for Dai’s confirmation about the brother’s age being young. Wakai ‘young’ is a plain adjective.

Its sonkee-go form, owakai , is not used here. There was no instance of adjectival sonkee-

go or nominal adjectives in reference to a third person in the data.

Table 18 classifies predicates used in reference to a third person based on the

predicate type (verbs, adjectives, or copulas) and whether sonkee-go was used or not.

Table 18: The Use or Non-Use of Sonkee-go in Reference to a Third Person

Predicate Type Sonkee-go Non- Sonkee-go Total Verbs 11 (42.3%) 15 (57.7%) 26 (100%) Adjectives 0 4 (100%) 4 (100%) Copula 0 8 (100%) 8 (100%) Total 11 (28.9%) 27 (71.1%) 38 (100%)

As stated above, due to the nature of the conversation of the current data, where two

people without previous acquaintance talked, it was unlikely for participants to talk about

a third person who was not present in the conversation, and therefore, the data found only

a small number of relevant instances. There were 26 instances where verbal sonkee-go could have been used in reference to a third person, and 11 of them were realized with sonkee-go . The data found only four adjectives and eight copulas used in reference to a third person, but none of them were sonkee-go .

While the relevant instances are too few to be conclusive, we can make some observations regarding the sonkee-go of the copula. Including the copula in reference to the addressee, there were 42 instances of the copula in reference to people worthy of respect (e.g., the addressee, the addressee’s in-group members): 34 instances in reference to the addressee and eight instances in reference to a third person. None of them, however, took the sonkee-go form. While the number of instances is small, it can be hypothesized that, compared to the sonkee-go of verbs, the sonkee-go of copula is less likely to be used, at least in the speech context of the current data.

Further research is required to find out more about the use or non-use of sonkee-go in reference to a third person. This study suggests that free (i.e. no particular topic was given) first-encounter conversations are not a good data source for this particular use of sonkee-go . The provision of topics or other conversation contexts may trigger more instances of sonkee-go in reference to a third person.

4.2.3. Sonkee-go of Verbs

The data included a total of 89 verbal sonkee-go , 78 of which refer to the addressee and 11 of which refer to a third person. Table 19 classifies the 89 instances into the three forms of verbal sonkee-go , namely, Verb-(r)areru , lexical substitute, and o-Verb-ni naru .

Table 19: Classification of Verbal Sonkee-go into Sonkee-go Types

Form Number Percentage Verb-(r)areru 66 74.2% Lexical Substitute 18 21.3% O-Verb-ni naru 2 2.2% Other 3 2.2% Total 89 100%

Among the 89 sonkee-go , 66 (74.2%) took the Verb-(r)areru form while the rest took other honorific forms. Let us look at examples of each category.

In Excerpt (9), Sumi (female) and Eri (female) are talking about their study-abroad experiences. Sumi asks questions using the Verb-(r)areru form.

(9)

1 S: ryuugaku wa doko ikareta n desu ka? {+RH, +AH} “Where did you go for study abroad?”

2 E: ryugaku wa nyuuyooku no hoo ni, “My study abroad was in New York,”

3 S: ha, “Oh,”

4 E: n=. “Yes.”

5 S: nyuuyooku, no daigaku ni hairareta n desu [ka]? {+RH, +AH} “Did you enter a college in New York?”

6 E: [ha]i. “Yes.”

Ikareta in line 1 and hairareta in line 5 are the past tenses of the Verb-(r)areru forms of

iku ‘to go’ and hairu ‘to enter’, respectively.

The following excerpt includes an example of a lexical substitute. Wataru (male)

and Reiko (female) are talking about Reiko’s teaching job, and Wataru asks whether

there are quite a few foreign teachers at her workplace.

(10)

1 W: ano shokuba de wa= ano=, gaikokujin no sensee toka mo [kana]ri irassharu n [[desu ka]]? {+RH, +AH} “At your workplace, are there quite a few foreign teachers?”

2 R: [a=]. “I see.”

3 [[ee]], neetibu no hoo ga ooi desu . {+AH} “Yes, there are more native English teachers (than Japanese teachers).”

In line 1, in asking the question, Wataru uses irassharu , the lexical substitute of iru ‘to

exist’. While irassharu is the verb meaning ‘to exist’ in this excerpt, it also acts as an

auxiliary verb attached to the gerund form of the verb to make the sonkee-go of the progressive form te (i)ru ‘be ~ ing’. Here is an example. Jun (male) is telling Sumi

(female) about his previous conversation partner, Kazu (male).

(11)

1 J: ato sakki kazusan 5 tte yuu hito mo, hanashi shita n desu kedo=, kazusan, konsarutingu gaisha o yarareteru soo de, {+RH} “And I talked to a person named Kazu just a bit ago, but I heard that he is doing a consulting company, and,”

2 S: a=. “I see.”

3 J: de, hataraiterassharu soo de, {+RH} “working at (a consulting company), I heard, and,”

4 S: sugoi na= . {-AH} “Wonderful .”

5 [nanka minna soo yuu] sekinin no aru, “Everyone (has a job) with responsibilities like that,”

6 J: [a= sugoi na= tte], “Wow, that’s great, (I thought)”

In line 1, Jun uses yararete (i)ru , the progressive form of the Verb-(r)areru form of yaru

‘to do’. With the use of the verb ‘to do’, his utterance sounds like Kazu is managing the consulting firm. Kazu, however, does not manage the company but simply works there, so in line 3, Jun corrects himself by saying Kazu is working at the company.

Hataraite (i)rassharu is the sonkee-go of hataraite (i)ru , the progressive form of the verb hataraku ‘to work’. (I)rassharu in this case is an auxiliary verb.

The following excerpt includes an example of the o-Verb-ni naru form. Hiro (male) and Uta (female) are talking about a city they are both familiar with. Uta grew up there,

5 Kazu’s last name plus –san ‘Mr./Ms.’ was used in the actual conversation.

and Hiro currently lives there. Uta asks whether Hiro grew up there, too.

(12)

1 H: tte koto de, fujisawa mo sugoku s- ki ni ittemasu ne. {+AH} “So, I really like Fujisawa, too.”

2 U: aa soo desu ka. “I see.”

3 H: ha=i. “Yes.”

4 U: fujisawashi de oso- osodachi ni natta n desu ka? {+RH, +AH} “Did you grow up in Fujisawa?”

5 H: a chigaimasu yo. {+AH} “No (lit. wrong ).”

6 ano kamakura no hoo na n desu kedo, ha=i. “(I grew up) in Kamakura, but, yes.”

Osodachi ni natta in line 4 is the past tense of the o-Verb-ni naru form of the verb sodatsu ‘to grow up’.

The three instances classified as ‘Other’ involve yet another honorific structure. The o-Verb-copula form is sometimes used to describe the continuous state of verbs. For instance, omachida (o + the stem of matsu ‘to wait’ + da ) means someone is waiting.

The following excerpt from the data includes the same structure.

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1 R: dochira ni osumai na n desu ka? {+RH, +AH} “Where do you live ?”

2 U: e=tto=, ima wa toshimaku no=, “Um, right now, Toshima Ward,”

3 R: a=a=. “I see.”

4 U: ikebukuro kara=, “From Ikebukuro,”

5 R: [ee]. “Yes.”

6 U: [kaku]eki, no seebu [[ikebukurosen]] hitotsume na n desu kedo=, “It is the first (station) on the local Seibu Ikebukuro Line, but,”

7 R: [[a=a=]]. “I see.”

Reiko (female) asks Uta (female) where she lives. Osumai na is derived from osumaida ,

o plus the stem of the verb sumau ‘to live’ plus the copula da .

Let us go back to the discussion of the frequency of different verbal sonkee-go structures. Out of 89 sonkee-go , 66 (74.2%) were the Verb-(r)areru form. This seems to

suggest that the Verb-(r)areru form is more commonly used than other honorific forms in

the current data and may bring about a hypothesis that the Verb-(r)areru form is a

preferred honorific form in rather casual first-encounter conversations between two

relatively young people of similar age. The situation is more complicated, however,

because not all verbs allow all the honorific forms listed above. Let us look at the

sonkee-go instances in more detail.

First, Table 20 classifies the 66 Verb-(r)areru instances based on the verb.

Table 20: The Verbs in the Verb-(r)areru Form

Verb Number Percentage sareru (> suru ‘to do’) 38 57.6% ikareru (> iku ‘to go’) 8 12.1% korareru (> kuru ‘to come’) 3 4.5% yarareru (> yaru ‘to do’) 3 4.5% Other 14 21.2% Total 66 100%

Amongst the 66 Verb-(r)areru forms, 38 (57.6%) were versions (present tense, past tense, progressive form, etc.) of sareru , the Verb-(r)areru form of the verb suru ‘to do’. While the lexical substitute nasaru is available for this verb, it was only used once in the data.

The o-Verb-ni naru form is not possible for the verb suru . Although the number of relevant instances is small, at least regarding the verb suru , it can be hypothesized that the Verb-(r)areru form is more likely used than the lexical substitute in casual first- encounter conversations between two relatively young people of similar age.

Ikareru and korareru are the Verb-(r)areru form of iku ‘to go’ and kuru ‘to come’, respectively. These two verbs have the same lexical substitute, irassharu , but it is not used with these meanings in the data. Although the number of relevant instances is very small, this phenomenon is similar to the Verb-(r)areru form of suru being more likely used than its lexical substitute, nasaru . Additionally, each of the 14 instances classified as ‘Other’ involved 14 different verbs without lexical substitutes available.

There were 18 instances of lexical substitutes in the data (See Table 19), 17 of which involved irassharu as the verb meaning ‘to exist’ or as the auxiliary verb used in the progressive form of the verb (i.e., the gerund form of the verb + irassharu ). Irassharu comes from iru , and for this particular verb or auxiliary verb, the o-verb-ni naru form or the Verb-(r)areru form are not possible. In other words, speakers had no other choice but to use irassharu in these 17 cases.

In short, in the current data, whether lexical substitutes exist or not, if they were not the only possibility, the Verb-(r)areru form was used in almost all the cases. From this observation, it can be hypothesized that in casual first-encounter conversations between two relatively young people of similar age, unless the lexical substitute is the only possibility, honorific verbs are more likely to take the Verb-(r)areru form than other forms. More data involving sonkee-go would make it possible to test this hypothesis.

In concluding our discussion of sonkee-go , the findings are as follows:

• The use of sonkee-go in reference to the addressee is rather limited in first-

encounter conversations between two relatively young people of similar age.

• This type of speech context is not a good data source for sonkee-go used in

reference to a third person.

• Regarding verbal sonkee-go , unless the lexical substitute is the only possibility, it

is more likely to take the Verb-(r)areru form than other honorific forms.

4.3. Referent Honorifics - Kenjoo-go

Kenjoo-go is generally used when speakers humbly discuss their own or their in-

group members’ actions or events that are related to a person of higher social status in

some way (e.g., doing something for a superior person’s sake). Kenjoo-go is characterized by the o-Verb-suru form (e.g., oyobisuru ‘summon someone (for a superior)’) or lexical substitutes. In the data, there were only 45 instances where kenjoo- go could have been used. This suggests that opportunities to use kenjoo-go are rather limited in first-encounter conversations such as the ones collected for the present study.

This is probably because participants with no prior knowledge of each other spend time finding out about each other by talking about themselves or asking questions of their interlocutors, and they do not seem to have opportunities to relate to each other in such a way that requires the use of kenjoo-go , which is often used when the speaker humbly describes some action or event that has something to do with the interlocutor, such as doing something for the benefit of, or asking favors from, the interlocutor. In any case, out of 45 instances where the use of kenjoo-go was possible, 34 (75.6%) were realized with kenjoo-go .

Table 21: The Use or Non-Use of Kenjoo-go (1)

Form Number Percentage Kenjoo-go 34 75.6% Non -Kenjoo-go 11 24.4% Total 45 100%

This ratio seems to suggest that the use of kenjoo-go was high. However, 31 out of the

34 instances (91.2%) were the same expression ‘(yoroshiku ) onegaishimasu ’, which is a

set greeting frequently used at the beginning of a first-encounter conversation. This is a

unique expression that is difficult to translate into English, but it is often translated as

‘Nice to meet you’. Here is an example:

(14)

1 Z: [doomo]. “Hello.”

2 F: [konni]chiwa=. “Hello.”

3 Z: hajimemashite. “How do you do?”

4 F: hajimemashite. “How do you do?”

5 Z: etto, oo, zen 6 desu . {+AH} “I am Zen.”

6 F: a, fumi 7 de=su . {+AH} “I am Fumi.”

7 yoroshiku onegaishima=su . {+RH, +AH} “Nice to meet you .”

8 Z: yoroshiku onegaishima=su . {+RH, +AH} “Nice to meet you .”

6 Zen introduced himself by his full name in the actual conversation. 7 Fumi used her last name in the actual conversation.

This is the beginning of the conversation between Zen (male) and Fumi (female).

Technically speaking, onegaishimasu is the kenjoo-go of negau ‘wish, ask for a favor,

etc.’, and yoroshiku onegaishimasu is used by the speaker to ask the addressee a favor to keep a good relationship with him/her. It is, however, a set phrase where changing the kenjoo-go (onegaishimasu ) to the original verb ( negau or negaimasu ) is not possible, and therefore, it is unclear whether it is recognized by the speakers as kenjoo-go . For this reason, it may not be appropriate to treat it as such in the current study or any other similar studies. If the 31 instances of onegaishimasu are omitted from the calculation of kenjoo-go , the current data include only 14 cases where the use of kenjoo-go was possible, and only three of them were actually realized with kenjoo-go .

Table 22: The Use or Non-Use of Kenjoo-go (2)

Form Number Percentage Kenjoo-go 3 21.4% Non -Kenjoo-go 11 78.6% Total 14 100%

The number of relevant instances is too small to draw any conclusion. The percentage is

included simply to be consistent with other tables in this study. As stated above, it

appears that opportunities to use kenjoo-go are rather limited in casual first-encounter conversations between two relatively young people of similar age.

As the number of relevant instances was small, kenjoo-go will not be examined any

further, but I will present some examples of the use and non-use of kenjoo-go . Before

excerpt (15), Jun (male) and Sumi (female) were talking about each other’s work. In line

1, Jun expresses that when he hears Sumi’s life stories, he thinks she is cool.

(15)

1 J: demo ka-, kiite te a, kakkoii na tte omoimasu yo ne. {-RH} {+AH} “Listening (to what you say), I think you are cool.”

2 sumisan 8 no hanashi wa. “Your story.”

3 ato sakki kazusan 9 tte yuu hito mo, hanashi shita n desu kedo=, kazusan, konsarutingu gaisha o yarareteru soo de, {+RH} “Also, I talked to a person named Kazu just a bit ago, and I heard he is doing a consulting firm, and,”

4 S: a=. “I see.”

5 J: de, hataraiterassharu soo de, {+RH} “working (at a consulting firm), I heard, and,”

6 S: sugoi na= . {-AH} “Wonderful .”

7 [nanka minna soo yuu] sekinin no aru, “Everyone (has work) with responsibilities,”

8 J: [a= sugoi na= tte], “That’s great, (I thought),”

9 S: demo ima hanashi o, ohanashi o ukagattete , soo yuu ningen no seechoo katee ni, {+RH} “But listening to your story now, in the process of human growth like that,”

8 Jun used Sumi’s last name plus -san (Mr./Ms.) in the actual conversation. 9 Kazu’s last name plus -san was used in this utterance.

10 J: n=[=]. “Yeah.”

11 S: [kaka]watte=, iru=, = tte, sono, sono, seetotachi no, jiga o kakutoku shiteiku saichuu ni, demo, jaa kakawatteru n desu yo ne=. {-RH, +AH} “You are involved in the middle of your students’ acquiring their ego, right?”

In line 1, ‘listening’ involves both Jun and Sumi in that Jun listened to Sumi, someone who he does not know well and for whom honorific language could be used, and therefore, the verb kiite (> kiku ‘to listen’) can be kenjoo-go . It can be either okikishite (> okikisuru , o-Verb-suru form) or ukagatte (> ukagau , lexical substitute), the kenjoo-go for

‘to listen’, ‘to ask’, or ‘to visit’. In fact, Sumi uses ukagatte (> ukagau ) in line 9 to refer

to listening to what Jun says. This is an instance of the use of kenjoo-go . Jun, however,

does not use kenjoo-go in line 1 referring to listening to what Sumi says.

Here are the other two instances of the use of kenjoo-go . Kazu (male) is talking about his work.

(16)

1 K: a, ya, kojin ja nai desu kedo, ma zokushitemasu kedo, soko de konsaru yattemasu . {+AH} “It is not my business, but I belong (to a company), and I am (doing ) a consultant there.”

2 J: a= soo desu ka. “I see.”

3 he= sugoi desu ne=. {+AH} “Wow, that’s great.”

4 K: ma demo, iroiro taihen na n de an<@mari@>, osusumesuru <@shigoto ja nai desu ne@>. {+RH} {+AH} “But it is a lot of work, so it is not job that I recommend to you (or others).”

*A little later*

5 J: watashi no hoo wa, moo zenzen, kyooin na n de, moo toku ni ohanashi <@suru yoo na koto naku@>, {+RH} “I am just a teacher, so there is nothing special to talk to you about, and,”

In line 4, Kazu comments that his work is not a kind of job that he recommends to Jun (or others). Osusumesuru is the kenjoo-go of susumeru ‘to recommend’. A little later, Jun states that there is really nothing to tell Kazu about as he is just a teacher. Ohanashisuru

is the kenjoo-go of hanasu ‘to tell’. In these two cases, kenjoo-go is used as both

recommending and telling involve the interlocutor whom the speaker does not know well

and for whom honorific language could be used.

As mentioned above, the number of instances where kenjoo-go could be used is very

limited in the current data. In order to investigate the use or non-use of kenjoo-go further,

data from other speech contexts would be needed. Suitable data for the research on

kenjoo-go may be found in conversations between two people who already know each

other or in more formal contexts (e.g., business meetings).

4.4. Gender Differences in the Use of Referent Honorifics

In this section, we will discuss gender differences observed in verbal sonkee-go used

in reference to the addressee. We will not deal with adjectival, nominal adjectival, or

77 copula sonkee-go in reference to the addressee, sonkee-go in reference to a third person, or kenjoo-go , simply because the number of relevant instances is small.

Table 23 shows the numbers of the use and non-use of verbal sonkee-go in reference to the addressee depending on the gender.

Table 23: Verbal Sonkee-go in Reference to the Addressee & Gender

Form Female Male Total Sonkee-go 38 (14.6%) 40 (22.9%) 78 (17.9%) Non- Sonkee-go 222 (85.4%) 135 (77.1%) 357 (82.1%) Total 260 (100%) 175 (100%) 435 (100%)

It is often claimed that female speakers speak more politely, or use more honorific language, than male speakers (e.g., Hori 1986; Ide 1982, 1989, 1990; Ide et al. 1986; Ide

& McGloin 1990; Jorden & Noda 1987; Mizutani & Mizutani 1987; Niyekawa 1991;

Ogino et al. 1985; Shibamoto Smith 2003; Shibatani 1990). Table 23, however, reveals that this may not be the case, which is consistent with the finding mentioned above about addressee honorifics not necessarily being used more frequently by female speakers than male speakers (See Section 4.1). Although the difference is not great, female speakers used sonkee-go 14.6% of the time, while male speakers did so 22.9% of the time. In other words, the ratio of the use of sonkee-go is higher with male speakers than with female speakers. Thus, the findings of this study once again suggest that female speakers do not necessarily speak more politely (i.e., use more honorific language) than male speakers in casual first-encounter conversations between two relatively young people of similar age.

There were two types of conversations in the current data, namely, single-sex

conversations and mixed-sex conversations. Let us look at the ratios of the use and non-

use of verbal sonkee-go in reference to the addressee based on these two conversation types.

Table 24: Overall Frequencies of Verbal Sonkee-go & Plain Verbs in Reference to the Addressee Based on Gender & Partner Mixing

Gender & Mixing Verbal Sonkee-go Plain Verbs Total Female Single-Sex 24 (20%) 96 (80%) 120 (100%) Female Mixed-Sex 14 (10%) 126 (90%) 140 (100%) Male Single-Sex 23 (28%) 59 (72%) 82 (100%) Male Mixed-Sex 17 (18.3%) 76 (81.7%) 93 (100%) Total 78 (17.9%) 357 (82.1%) 435 (100%)

Table 24 suggests that female speakers used sonkee-go slightly more frequently when

talking with female speakers than did male speakers when talking with women. It was

discussed earlier that both genders tended to use addressee honorifics more frequently

with male speakers, and it appears that a different phenomenon is observed regarding

verbal sonkee-go ; men are more "polite" to men, while women are less “polite” to men,

and women are more “polite” to women than men are. More data will make it possible to

test whether or not this observation is accurate.

Table 24 also reveals that both genders tended to use sonkee-go more frequently in

single-sex conversations than in mixed-sex conversations. This may be true, but it is

possible that the single-sex conversations were more formal than the mixed-sex

conversations in this study simply because the former was the first conversation that the

participants have participated in. In other words, it is possible that speakers spoke more

formally in the first conversation, which happened to be the single-sex conversation, as

they were nervous.

In summary, this section discussed the fact that female speakers did not necessarily

use verbal sonkee-go more frequently than male speakers in this study. This finding is consistent with the earlier finding that the same is true with addressee honorifics. From these observations, we can conclude that female speakers do not necessarily speak more politely (i.e., use more honorific language) than male speakers in casual first-encounter conversations between two relatively young people of similar age. The data also suggest that gender mixing may have some effect on the use of sonkee-go (i.e., both genders may use sonkee-go more frequently to their own gender). More data are necessary in order to determine the effect of gender mixing on the use of sonkee-go .

4.5. Speech Style Shifts between Addressee Honorifics and Plain Forms

We have discussed the fact that addressee honorifics are the unmarked speech style in most of the conversations in the current data, but speakers sometimes switch to plain forms. We will now examine such speech style shifts. From this analysis, the data of the speakers who predominantly used plain forms (i.e., more than 50% of the time) were omitted, as the plain form was the unmarked form for these speakers unlike for the other speakers in the study. The speakers not considered for this analysis are Yuki, Kyoko,

Naoko, Taku when talking with Yuki, and Miki when talking with Naoko.

This omission resulted in 577 instances of speech style shift to the plain form by the

speakers whose unmarked style was addressee honorific. As mentioned above, previous

studies of speech style shifts between addressee honorifics and plain forms suggested

interpersonal (i.e., attitudinal), intrapersonal, and discoursal factors as reasons behind this

phenomenon (e.g., Chen 2003; Cook 1996a, 1996b, 1998, 2002; Dunn 1999; Ikuta 1983,

2002; Maynard 1991a, 1991b, 1993; Okamoto 1997; SturtzSreetharan 2006; Usami 1995,

2002). Most of the speech style shifts to plain forms found in the present study seem to

be motivated by discoursal contexts. In this section, we will discuss only those contexts

that had more than ten instances of speech style shift. There were eight such contexts: 1)

self-directed questions, 2) expression of feelings, thoughts, and opinions, 3) comments of realization, 4) repetition, 5) confirmation checks, 6) answers to questions, 7) elaboration, and 8) co-construction. First, let us look at examples of each of these categories.

4.5.1. Self-Directed Questions

Self-directed questions are produced when speakers are trying to think of an answer,

when they are trying to recall something, or when they are searching for an appropriate

expression for what they want to say. Such questions tend to be in plain forms. This

finding is consistent with Maynard (1991a, 1991b, 1993) and Usami (1995), who report

that self-directed utterances tend to be in plain forms, and with Chen (2003), who claims

that speech style shifts to plain forms occur in recalling and in searching for an

appropriate expression. Let us look at a few examples. Kazu (male) and Eri (female) are

talking about the school that Eri works for. This school has both a boys’ school and a

girls’ school, and Eri works at the girls’ school. Kazu is curious to know about the

number of students attending the school, including the boys’ school.

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1 E: chuugakkoo wa sugoku chiisai n= desu . {+AH} “The junior high school is very small.”

2 K: a zen-, nanka danshikoo to joshikoo mo ire[te sanjuu]-- “Including the boys’ school and the girls’ school, 30 …”

3 E: [a= dan]shikoo ireru to=, nannin daroo . {-AH} “Oh, including the boys’ school, I wonder how many.”

4 se=nni=sanbyaku ka na . {-AH} “I wonder if it’s 1200 to 1300.”

5 ya yoku wakaranai desu ke[do, ha=i] “Well, I don’t know well, but, yes.”

6 K: [a, soo desu ka]. “Oh, I see.”

7 E: n=, ma danshikoo wa maamaa, iru n deshoo kedo joshikoo mo chotto ima, sukunai= desu . {+AH} “There are probably quite a few students in the boys’ school, but there are not many students in the girls’ school now.”

In lines 3 to 4, Eri tries to think of the number of students attending the school but

eventually tells Kazu that she does not really know. Although Eri’s speech style prior to

this segment is that of addressee honorific, when trying to come up with an answer, Eri

asks herself questions in plain forms. Such self-directed questions tend to be in plain

forms.

Here is another example of speech style shift likely motivated by self-directed questioning, which occurred when the speaker was trying to recall what happened in the past. Satoshi (male) spent several months in England, and he feels that making friends with native speakers of English in Japan provides more chances to speak English than spending time in England. He does not remember communicating with people other than those he met through his hobby and those at the language school he was attending.

(18)

1 S: demo nanka boku ga omou ni wa=, nihon de= gaikokujin no tomodachi tsukutteru hoo ga[=], “I think that making foreign friends in Japan,”

2 N: [n]=. “Yes.”

3 S: neetibu no hito to hanasu kikai ga ooi na= [tte yuu no wa=], kanjimasu ne. {+AH} “I feel that we have more opportunities to speak with native speakers.”

4 N: [a=]. “I see.”

5 N: n=[[=]]. “Yes.”

6 S: [[ro]]ndon itteta toki toka moo, hotondo, kayokosan= no=, mawari no hito to wa naka yokatta n desu kedo= sore igai de anmari hanashita kioku tte nai desu kara ne. “When I was in England, I was close friends with people who were close to Kayoko, but other than that, I don’t recall speaking (with others).”

7 gakkoo, to=, “The school, and,”

8 N: n=. “Yes.”

9 S: gakkoo gurai ka na . {-AH} “Maybe just the school.”

10 N: kekkoo jimoto no hito tte majiwaranai yo ne. {-AH} “We don’t really associate with the local people.”

11 S: soo desu ne=. “That’s right.”

Satoshi is trying to recall where else he had opportunities to communicate in English but can not think of anywhere other than the school. The self-directed question as he tries to recall past events is in the plain form.

A similar phenomenon occurs when speakers search for an appropriate expression for what they want to say. This is also a form of self-directed question as the speaker wants to say something and asks him/herself what the appropriate expression is to describe it. Masa (male), who works for a paper factory, is trying to explain his impression of some customers of his who run a printing business.

(19)

1 M: kekkoo wagamama na okyaku ga ooi desu yo insatsuyasan te. {+AH} “There are quite a few selfish customers of print shops.”

2 I: XXXX nanka ooi n ja nai desu ka soo yuu <@no@>@[@] {+AH} “Aren’t there many XXXX (inaudible)?”

3 M: [so]o desu ne. “Yes.”

4 maa minna ga minna ja nai desu kedo, wagamama tte yuu no wa, kekkoo, “Not everyone is like that, but what I mean by selfishness is,”

5 nan ttsuttara ii no ka na . {-AH} “I wonder how I should put it.”

6 koo, “like,”

7 I: oohee ja nai n desu ka? {+AH} “Are n’t they ‘arrogant’?”

8 M: oohee desu ne. {+AH} “They are arrogant.”

Masa comments that his customers are selfish and wants to add what he means by it.

However, he seems to have difficulty finding an appropriate expression to do so, judging by nan tsuttara ii no ka na “I wonder how I should put it.” This utterance indicating that he is searching for an appropriate expression is marked by the plain form. Ichi (male), then, supplies the word oohee ‘arrogant’ as a possible description of Masa’s customers, with which Masa agrees.

Sometimes, speakers differentiate self-directed utterances and other utterances not only by speech style shift but also by speech volume. The following excerpt includes two speech style shifts in low volume. One seems motivated by the speaker's self-directed question as he tries to come up with an answer, and the other by his self-directed question as he searches for an appropriate expression. Jun (male) and Sumi (female) are talking about what it is like to be a teacher. Jun is an experienced teacher, while Sumi is seriously thinking about starting a new career as a teacher and started teaching Japanese as a volunteer recently.

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1 S: sensee tte doo desu ka? {+AH} “How is it to be a teacher?”

2 watashi demo, atashi mo kyooshi ni naritai na tte, “(Thinking that) I want to become a teacher,”

3 J: fu=n. “I see.”

4 S: sugoi, akogareru n desu kedo. “I have a strong admiration (for the occupation), but,”

5 <@ima wa nanka ano@>, henachoko bo<@ran[tia]@>, nihongo kyooshi desu kedo. “Right now, I am just a petty volunteer Japanese teacher, but,”

6 J: [@@]

7 iya iya iya. “No, no, no.”

8 doo na n daroo na. {-AH} “I wonder .”

9 shigoto to shite wa omoshiroi to omoimasu kedo ne=, n=. “I think it is interesting as a job, but,”

10 kekkoo, n=, kandoo mo aru shi=, “There are quite a few touching moments, and,”

11 S: n=. “Yes.”

12 J: n=. “Yes.”

13 maa, kekkoo, shigoto tte kihonteki ni tantan to nagareteiku, [tte yuu, kanji=] desu kedo, “Work seems to flow without much excitement, but,”

14 S: [n=]. “Yes.”

15 J: kekkoo mainichi, fushigi na kanji ga arimasu yo ne. {+AH} “Everyday seems quite mysterious.”

16 e=!, tte yuu koto= dattari toka, “(There are) occasions when I go ‘What???’”

17 S: e? “Pardon me?”

18 [@@]@@@[[@]]

19 J: [@=], [[e]], koo yuu koto shichau no? toka ato nanka soo yuu, “‘Do you do something like this?’ or something like,”

20 nan te yuu n daroo . {-AH} “I wonder how I should put it.”

21 omoshiroi, igai na me-, koto ga attari toka, suru kara omoshiroi ka na tte yuu, “Interesting, unexpected things happen, so it may be interesting (I feel),”

22 S: n= sore wa=, e seeto tte yuu, “(Do you mean with) students?”

23 J: soo desu ne=, n=. “That’s right.”

Jun reflects on his work and asks himself what it is like to be a teacher in line 8. He later searches for an appropriate expression for what he would like to say in line 20. Both of these sentences are directed to himself as suggested by the tone of his voice. He seems to clearly distinguish self-directed speech and addressee-directed speech by the volume of his voice as well as by speech style shift to the plain form.

In summary, self-directed questions asked in such instances as when trying to think of an answer, trying to recall something, or searching for an appropriate expression, tend to be in plain forms. They are sometimes spoken more quietly than the surrounding utterances.

4.5.2. Expression of Feelings, Thoughts, & Opinions

An immediate reaction to what the addressee has said, expressing the speaker’s feeling or impression, also seems to trigger speech style shift. Makino (1983, 2002) and

Chen (2003) offered similar findings. Let us look at an example. Sumi (female) and Eri

(female) both speak English, and Sumi asks Eri if she has studied any other languages.

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1 S: hoka no gengo toka=, ano benkyoo shita koto, arimasu ? {-RH, +AH} “Have you studied other languages (than English)?”

2 E: benkyoo shita koto wa aru n desu kedo [<@ne@>, mi ni wa zenzen tsuitenai desu ne=]. {+AH} “I have studied, but I have n’t acquired (them).”

3 S: [@@@.... sore] wa= ano=, tatoeba daigaku de daini, gaiko[[kugo o toka soo yuu koto desu ka]]. {+AH} “Do you mean you (have studied another language) as the second foreign language at a college, for example?”

4 E: [[a= soo desu ne. “Yes, that’s right.”

5 ichinen toka ninen toka]] ee [soo yuu], tan’i desu kedo ne=, “For a year or two, or the length like that, but,”

6 S: [fu=n]. “I see.”

7 E: nani yatta ka na . {-AH} “I wonder what I studied.”

8 furansugo=, kankokugo=, chuugokugo=, “French, Korean, Chinese,”

9 S: sugoi= . {-AH} “That’s impressive .”

10 E: supeingo, [@@@@@@] “Spanish, [laughter]”

11 S: [@@@@@@]

12 E: ano benkyoo shita no wa shita n desu kedo zenzen oboetenai n desu . {+AH} “I did study them, but I do n’t remember them at all.”

Eri asks herself what languages she has studied before in line 7. This self-directed

question trying to recall the past is marked with the plain form, which is consistent with

what we discussed above regarding the tendency for self-directed questions to be

produced in the plain form. After Eri started listing languages that she has studied before,

Sumi utters sugoi ‘terrific, impressive, great, etc.’. This immediate reaction by Sumi is

marked with the plain form. This seems to add an effect of sincerity to the comment. Eri

was not just studying one other language but several languages, and it gives the

impression that Sumi is truly impressed.

Here is another instance of speech style shift at the time of a seemingly sincere,

immediate reaction. Miki (female) and Dai (male) are talking about studying English.

Miki is learning English from a private tutor while Dai is studying at a major language

school.

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1 M: doko itteru n [desu ka]? {-RH, +AH} “Where (=which school) are you attending ?”

2 D: [beruri]ttsu de gozaima[[su ]]. {+AH} “It’s Berlitz.”

3 M: [[a]], takasoo . {-AH} “Oh, sounds expensive .”

4 D: takai desu ne=. {+AH} “It is expensive.”

5 M: kojin, kojin de, e=tto=, [guru]— “Private, or um, (group lesson),”

6 D: [semi]puraibeeto desu ne. {+AH} “It’s semi-private.”

7 [[futari]], dake de, “Only two people,”

8 M: [[fu=n]]. “Really?”

9 he=. “I see.”

10 e, ikura gurai suru n desu ka? berurittsu tte. {+AH} “How much does it cost at Berlitz?”

11 D: tabun yonjuuman gurai ne, harattemasu . {+AH} “I am probably paying about 400,000 yen.”

12 M: e @@@[@] “What?”

13 D: [sa]njuuman, sanjuuman ka na , n=. {-AH} “I wonder if it was 300,000 yen, yes.”

As soon as she finds out the name of the school Dai studies at, Miki gives an immediate response in line 3, expressing her impression that the school is expensive. As it is a prestigious language school, tuition is expected to be high. This immediate reaction is marked by the plain form. Dai confirms that Miki’s impression is correct and explains he pays approximately 4,000 dollars in tuition. He then reflects on the amount and asks himself whether it was 3,000 dollars instead. This self-directed question is also marked by the plain form.

Related to these uses of speech style shift at the time of immediate reaction to what the addressee has said, some speakers are also generally inclined to express their feelings, thoughts, or opinions in the plain form. This tendency is also reported by Maynard

(1991a, 1991b, 1993), Makino (1983, 2002), and Chen (2003). Here is an example. Hiro

(male), an English teacher, and Uta (female) are talking about the English used in the

TOEIC listening comprehension section.

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1 H: fudan tooikku toka oshietemasu kedo tooikku tte iwayuru hyoojun beego desu kara, “I usually teach TOEIC etc., but as standard American English is used in TOEIC,”

2 U: ha=i. “Yes.”

3 H: shikamo koo zatsuon toka mo nai desu shi, “Also, there is no noise or (other distracting elements),”

4 U: a=. “I see.”

5 H: soo itta imi de sugoi, koo, risooteki na? “In that sense, in a very ideal,”

6 U: ha=i. “Yes.”

7 H: ano=, kankyoo de, “Um, environment,”

8 U: n=. “Yes.”

9 H: kiiteru wake desu kara, soo itta imi de wa yasashii eego desu yo ne. {+AH} “(people) are listening (to the listening test), so in that sense, it’s easy English, isn’t it?”

10 sore ni kuraberu to genba no ne, eego [wa motto] muzukashii to omou . {-AH} “Compared to that, I think actual English is more difficult.”

11 U: [a=]. “I see.”

12 kuse arimasu yo ne=. {+AH} “(The English used in the listening comprehension test) is peculiar, isn’t it?”

Hiro analyzes the English used in TOEIC listening comprehension tests and comments that he thinks actual English is more difficult than the carefully recorded English for the test. Hiro’s speech style has been addressee honorific but changes to plain when he expresses his opinion in line 10.

Here is another example. Fumi (female) and Zen (male) are talking about their thoughts on marriage. Prior to this segment, they discussed their problematic family situations. Fumi’s parents do not get along at all, and Zen’s parents are divorced. They then start talking about their thoughts on marriage.

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1 F: e= demo, sore de akogare ga nakunatchattari toka tte arimasu ka=? {+AH} “Have you lost your longing (for marriage) because of it?”

2 Z: a, yappa=, arimashita ne. {+AH} “Yes, that happened .”

3 F: soo yuu jiki wa= tte yuu koto, soretomo ima to shite mo tte [koto desu ka]? {+AH} “Do you mean back then (when your parents were not getting along) or even now?”

4 Z: [a, ima mo] betsu ni kekkon ni akogare [[nai desu ne]]. {+AH} “I do n’t have any longing for marriage even now.”

5 F: [[n=]]=. “I see.”

6 soo desu ne. “Let’s see.”

7 ano, betsu ni akogare ga nakatta ka-, nai kara tte=, sono=, akogare ga nai bun tabun konki wa okureru n daroo kedo=, “As I don’t have longing (for marriage), my marriage will probably be late, but,”

8 Z: hai. “Yes.”

9 F: demo akogare ga nai kara= tte betsu ni sore wa so-, sore mitai na ki ga suru . {-AH} “I feel that the fact that I don’t have longing (for marriage) is irrelevant.”

10 Z: a=. “I see.”

11 ma sore nari no hito ga, arawarereba=, “So if a suitable person shows up,”

12 F: n=. “Yes.”

Both Fumi and Zen have lost longing for marriage because of their problematic family situations. While Zen seems disinterested in marriage even now, Fumi mentions that she feels that having lost longing for marriage does not mean that she will not get married. In other words, she will marry if the right person comes into her life. Speech style shift to the plain form is observed when Fumi expresses her feeling in line 9.

In summary, we have observed speech style shifts to the plain form when the speaker provides an immediate reaction to what the partner has said and when the speaker expresses his/her feelings, thoughts, or opinions. Both contexts involve expressing the speaker’s feelings or thoughts, and it appears that speech style shift to the plain form adds the impression of sincerity to the comment.

4.5.3. Comments of Realization

Another type of context that seems to bring about speech style shifts is when the speaker receives new information, which causes realization on his/her part. A comment of realization uttered in such a context is a kind of self-directed utterance, and in this sense, this finding supports Maynard’s (1991a, 1991b, 1993) and Usami’s (1995) studies.

Let us look at an example. Aki (female) and Masa (male) have been comparing different parts of downtown Tokyo. Aki is originally from the southern part of Japan and moved to Tokyo when she was 18, while Masa is a native of Tokyo. Aki explains that she has an impression that one side of the Yamanote Line (train line) is like a ghost town. Masa then supplies the word shitamachi ‘traditional working-class neighborhood’ to describe the area.

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1 A: doomo kono yamanotesen no migigawa tte, sabireteru imeeji ga arimasu yo ne. {+AH} “For some reason, the right side of the Yamanote Line seems deserted, doesn’t it?”

2 M: a, shitamachi desu ne. {+AH} “Oh, it is Shitamachi (= a traditional working-class neighborhood).”

3 A: @[@@]@@

4 M: [hai]. “Yes.”

5 A: sokka, shitamachi tte yuu no ka. {-AH} “Oh, it is called Shitamachi.”

6 M: hai. “Yes.”

7 A: [n=]. “Yes.”

8 M: [hidari]gawa no hoo ga nanka sharetemasu yo ne, [[tashika ni]]. {+AH} “The left side is somehow more stylish , indeed.”

9 A: [[desu yo ne]]. “Isn’t it?”

10 asobu tokoro mo ippai aru shi, n=. “As there are many places to have fun, yes.”

11 M: tashika ni. “Indeed.”

After Masa supplied the word shitamachi , Aki realizes in line 5 that that is the name for the area she was talking about. Her comment of realization includes the repetition of what seems to be a new word for her, and it is in the plain form.

Here is another example. Dai (male) is explaining that he always has to work overtime and takes the last train home. Satoshi (male) is a contract worker and never works overtime, so he is surprised to hear about Dai’s long work hours.

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1 D: kanarazu juuniji yonpun no shuuden ja nai to kaerenai tte [yuu yoo na kanji de], “It is like I can never go home until the last train home at 12:04 a.m., and,”

2 S: [sonna ni hataraite ]ru n desu ka=? {-RH, +AH} “You are working that much?”

3 D: oni no yoo, nibasha no yoo ni hatarai [[@@]] “Working like a fiend, like a cart horse,”

4 S: [[he=]]. “I see.”

sore zangyoodai tsuku n desu ka[=]? {+AH} “Is overtime pay added?”

5 D: [tsu]kimasu ne=. {+AH} “It’s added .”

6 S: a tsuku n da zenbu. {-AH} “Oh, everything is added.”

7 a jaa ii desu ne. {+AH} “That’s good, then.”

8 mada yaru dake= yatta dake ai-, [kane]-- “money for what you do or did.”

9 D: [demo], gyaku ni=, kane harau n da kara yare yo, tte yuu no mo kekkoo shindoi mon desu yo. {+AH} “But, on the contrary, it is quite tiresome to be expected to work (overtime) just because the boss pays us (for it).”

Satoshi is not expected to work overtime at his work, and even if he does, he will not receive any compensation for it. Satoshi asks Dai if he gets compensated for his overtime work, and Dai answers affirmatively. This is new information, and Satoshi’s comment of realization in line 6, with the repetition of the verb uttered by Dai in the previous line, is marked with the plain form.

Comments of realization do not always include repetition of the word or phrase

uttered by the other party. In the following, Zen (male) is talking about a circle of friends

that he met on a particular internet site to look for local friends.

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1 T: sono atsumari tte yuu no wa=, betsu ni nanka, saakuru, sakenomi saakuru, na n desu ka? {+AH} “Is the gathering a group, group of drinkers?”

2 Z: u=n, “Well,”

3 T: binjoohan de, osake suki na hito issho ni nomi ni ikimashoo mitai na no ni, “Taking advantage of the opportunity, like “Those who like alcohol, let’s go for a drink together.”

4 Z: maa, sonna kanji ja nai desu ka ne. {+AH} “I guess it is like that.”

5 [konaida wa] nanka, jibun sanka shinakatta [[n desu kedo=]], sukii ryokoo itta n desu yo. {+AH} “The other day, I didn’t participate, but they went on a ski trip.”

6 T: [fu=n], [[un, u=n]] “I see.” “Yes, yes.”

7 he=, a, sonna koto made, suru n da . {-AH} “Wow, they even do something like that.”

8 [minna]. “Everyone.”

9 Z: [hai]. “Yes.”

10 T: fu=n. “I see.”

11 ja, kekkoo honto ni=, ki ga=, au, hito ga mitsukareba=, honto ni tanoshiku narimasu yo ne. {+AH} “Then, really, if you can find people you get along with well, it will really be fun.”

Taku (male) thought that Zen and the people he met on the internet just hold drinking parties called off-kai ‘off-line meeting’, but Zen explains that while he did not participate, some people in the group went on a ski trip. This is new and surprising information to

Taku, as he probably did not think that the relationship of people who met on the internet would extend as far as taking a trip together. His comment of realization in line 7, which does not involve the repetition of a previously uttered word or phrase, is marked with the plain form.

Here is another example of speech style shift to the plain form at the time of a comment of realization without repetition. Dai (male) is talking about his experience traveling to various parts of the world. He takes ten days off or so from work to travel, and Satoshi (male) comments that it is nice for him to be able to do that.

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1 D: demo shakaijin ni natte kara, yarihajimetemasu kara ne, “But I started (traveling) after I started working, so,”

2 S: e= jaa nishuukan gurai de iku n desu ka? {-RH, +AH} “Oh, then, do you go for about two weeks?”

3 D: tookakan gurai ittsumo yasumi [o moratte=, iku n desu kedomo soko de furafura tto], “I always get about ten days off and go, but aimlessly,”

4 S: [he=. “I see.”

a], a, demo sorede yareru ttara ii desu yo [[ne=]]. {+AH} “But it is nice if you can do that, isn’t it?”

5 D: [[moo sono tame]] ni= shinimonogurui de, fu- fudan wa hatarakanai to, “I usually have to work really desperately for that,”

6 S: a=[=]. “I see.”

7 D: [soko-] kondake hataraita n da kara kyuuka kureru yo ne, [[tte yuu= kanji de]], “It is like ‘since I worked this much, you will give me a vacation, right?’ and,”

8 S: [[n= a= naru]]hodo=. “Yes, oh, I see.”

9 a= soo yuu sakusen mo aru n [da =]. {-AH} “There is such a strategy.”

10 D: [n=]. “Yes.”

After Dai explains that he works hard enough to entitle himself to a vacation, Satoshi realizes that one possible strategy for getting a vacation is to do something impressive in advance so that the boss cannot complain about your taking a vacation. This comment of realization is in the plain form.

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In summary, speech style shifts to plain forms are also observed in comments of realization, either with or without a repetition of the new information that caused the realization.

4.5.4. Repetition

We have seen examples of comments of realization containing a repetition of a previously uttered word or phrase. Repetition is observed in other contexts as well. It is frequently used when communication trouble occurs. When this happens, speakers tend to focus on the problematic language item in order to solve the problem most effectively.

Let us look at a few examples.

Wataru’s (male) previous conversation partner was Reiko’s (female) colleague, Hiro

(male). The recording session was held on a Sunday, but Hiro showed up in a business suit. Soon after Reiko and Wataru introduced each other, they started talking about Hiro.

In explaining why Hiro was wearing a suit, Reiko used a coined word that Wataru was not familiar with.

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1 R: ano=, nanka, kare honto wa kyoo yasumi na n desu yo. {+AH} “It is his day-off today.”

2 W: soo mitai desu ne. “It sounds like it.”

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3 R: nande suutsu kiteru n desu ka tte yuttara ya=, asagaeri ja nai kedo kinoo zutto nondete toka tte yuttete, de kaputta soo desu . {+AH} “I asked ‘Why are you wearing a suit?’, and he said that it wasn’t that he stayed out all night but that he was drinking for a long time yesterday, and he said he ‘kapputta.’”

4 W: e, kaputta . {-AH} “What? Kaputta ?”

5 R: u=n. “Yes.”

6 W: kaputta tte yuu n desu ne. {+AH} “It’s called ‘kaputta.’”

7 R: ka- kapuseru hoteru . {-AH} “Capsule hotel .”

8 W: kapuseru hoteru . {-AH} “Capsule hotel .”

9 ano, jaa, donichi mo=, kinmu nasareru tte koto wa aru n desu ka? {+RH} {+AH} “Well, then, do you sometimes work on weekends?”

10 R: aa atashi wa doyoobi desu kedo=, ee nichi getsu ka= yasumi morattemasu. {+AH} “I (work) on Saturdays, but I get my days-off on Sundays, Mondays, and Tuesdays.”

The word in question is kaputta , the past tense of kapuru , that stands for staying at a capsule hotel. It is a coinage of kapu of kapuseru hoteru ‘capsule hotel’ and the verb ending ru . Capsule hotels are inexpensive lodgings in Japan offering small “capsule” berths with a bed and a TV. They are often used by businessmen who missed the last

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train or who just need a cheap place to stay for the night. After Reiko used the word

kaputta , Wataru repeats the word. His use of “ e”, an expression of surprise, prior to the repetition suggests that this word was probably unfamiliar to him. The next line by

Wataru confirms this guess. He realizes having stayed at a capsule hotel is called kaputta .

Probably because Reiko learned that Wataru was unfamiliar with the word, she explains what she was talking about by saying kapuseru hoteru ‘capsule hotel’, which Wataru repeats for confirmation of understanding. Interestingly, Wataru’s initial repetition of the word in question, Reiko’s explaining the word, and Wataru’s repetition of it are all done in plain forms. Speech style shifts to plain forms at the time of repetition for the purpose of clarification or acknowledgment were pointed out by Ikuta (2002) and Chen (2003), and the present study provides further evidence to their claims. It appears that when communication trouble such as this occurs, the speakers’ attention moves away from the interpersonal distance between them to trying to solve the problem. The most efficient way to solve the problem is to highlight only the word that is causing the trouble, which is exactly what Reiko and Wataru do.

Here is another instance of speech style shift motivated by repetition at the time of communication trouble. Prior to this segment, Masa (male) and Ichi (male) were talking with addressee honorifics. After Masa explains what he does for a living, he asks Ichi about his work. Ichi tries to tell him that he is a firefighter, but before he finishes his utterance, Masa displays his lack of understanding by saying hai? “Pardon me?” and repeating the word that he thought he had heard.

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1 M: ma i-, okyaku ga insatsuya de, kekkoo saikin isogashii desu kedo [ne], “Our customers are print shops, and we have been rather busy lately, but,”

2 I: [a]=. “Oh”

3 M: are, oshigoto nani sareteru n desu ka? {+RH, +AH} “What do you do for work?”

4 I: boku wa shoobooshi=, “I’m a firefighter,”

5 M: hai? “Pardon me?”

6 shoobushi . {-AH} “Gambler .”

7 I: hai. “Yes.”

8 M: a, gyanburu=[=], “Oh, gamble=,”

9 I: [ya] shoobooshi . {-AH} “No, firefighter .”

10 M: a, shoo <@ boo [shi ]@>. {+AH} “Oh, firefighter .”

11 I: [@]@[[@]]

12 M: <@[[go]]mennasai@>. {+AH} “I’m sorry.”

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Ichi says that he is a shoobooshi ‘firefighter’, but Masa heard it as shoobushi ‘gambler’, which is a rather unusual occupation. Masa seems unsure about what he heard, judging by hai ? “Pardon me?” and the repetition of the word he thought he had heard. Ichi thinks that Masa said shoobooshi , the correct word, and confirms it. However, as Masa mentions gambling, Ichi realizes that he misheard the word and corrects it, which Masa repeats to confirm understanding. Once again, the repetition of the word in question, the correction, and the repetition of the correction involve only the word in question without addressee honorifics. This excerpt is another example of prioritizing solving a communication problem over expressing interpersonal distance.

We have so far discussed repetition in plain form used at the time of communication trouble, to express a lack of understanding or to confirm understanding. This is not the only context where repetition is observed. Speakers sometimes repeat the word, phrase, or sentence that they thought was funny or that made some type of impression on them.

In the following example, Fumi (female) and Zen (male) are talking about how some people cheat on their partners, and Fumi mentions that she heard that people can only be faithful to their partners for three years maximum.

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1 F: ningen mo doobutsu ja nai desu ka. {+AH} “Humans are animals, too, aren’t they?”

2 Z: hai. “Yes.”

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3 F: soo yuu to shite, shuuki to shite, sannen ga gendo na n desu tte. {+AH} “Assuming that is the case, as a cycle, three years is the limit, I hear.”

4 Z: [sannen ga <@ gendo @>]. {-AH} “Three years is the limit .”

5 F: [(quiet laugh)]

6 rashii desu . {+AH} “Apparently .”

After Fumi mentions that three years is the maximum animals, including human beings,

can be faithful to their partners, Zen repeats with a laugh the part he found funny, which

is sannen ga gendo “Three years is the limit.” Judging by the laugh, this repetition was not caused by non-understanding.

In summary, speech style shift to the plain form is sometimes observed in the exact

repetition of a previously uttered word, phrase, or sentence. Such repetition tends to

occur at the time of communication trouble, to express lack of understanding or to

confirm understanding. It also occurs when speakers repeat a previous utterance that

made some sort of impression on them. In both cases, attention is paid to the item that is

causing the communication trouble or to the item that made an impression on the speaker,

and attention to interpersonal distance between interlocutors seems low. This may

explain a lack of addressee honorifics in these cases.

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4.5.5. Confirmation Check

Confirmation checks refer to those utterances made by the speaker to be sure his/her understanding is correct. In English, they may take the form “Do you mean …?”

According to the data, confirmation checks seem to motivate speech style shift. Ikuta

(2002) and Usami (1995) make similar observations. Let us look at an example. In the following excerpt, having learned that Wataru (male) belongs to a hiking club, Hiro

(male) comments on how young and energetic Wataru is.

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1 H: ha= nanka sugoi ow- owakai desu ne. @@@ {+RH, +AH} “You are very young .”

2 genki desu yo ne. {-RH, +AH} “You are energetic , aren’t you?”

3 W: <@iya= wakakunai desu yo@>. {+AH} “No, I am not young.”

4 boku moo sanjuuyon desu ka[ra]. “Because I am already 34 (years old).”

5 H: [a] soo desu ka. “Really?”

6 he=. “I see.”

7 ano ima, sanjuuyon de su ka? {-RH, +AH} “Are you 34 now?”

8 W: hai. “Yes.”

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9 H: kotoshi wa sanjuugo . {-AH} “You will be 35 this year.”

10 W: kotoshi sanjuugo desu ne. {+AH} “I will be 35 this year.”

11 H: ja mattaku onaidoshi desu ne. {+AH} “Then we are exactly the same age.”

After Wataru reveals that he is 34 years old, Hiro asks if he is 34 now, which Wataru

responds to affirmatively. Hiro happens to be the same age, so he asks if Wataru is going

to be 35 this year in line 9. Although it does not have a question intonation, the meaning

of the sentence is “You mean you will be 35 this year. Right?” This can be considered a

confirmation check, and it is in the plain form. Hiro presumably wanted to make sure

Wataru did not just turn 34, as that would mean that Wataru is a year younger than he.

Here is another example of speech style shift at the time of confirmation check. Zen

(male) and Satoshi (male) are talking about meeting people over the internet, and they are discussing one website that Zen uses to look for friends. Zen looks at people’s profiles on the website and sends emails to those that he is interested in.

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1 S: sore wa kekkoo akusesu shiteru, hito, oo- ooi desu ka ne. {+AH} “Are there a lot of people accessing that (website)?”

2 Z: ooi desu ne. {+AH} “There are many.”

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3 S: oosoo deshita ? {+AH} “Did it look like there are many?”

4 nanmanken toka, [desu ka]. {+AH} “Is it like thousands of accesses?”

5 Z: [hai]. “Yes.”

6 da, kotchi kara meeru yatte mo=, “Even if I send an email,’

7 S: n=. “Yes.”

8 Z: henji kaettekonai koto mo ooi desu ne. {+AH} “There are many times when no reply comes back.”

9 S: a=. “I see.”

10 tada miteru=, dake, toka moo, dashippanashi toka, [soo] yuu hito mo iru . {-AH} “(You mean) there are people who are just surfing or who just post (their ad) without following it up.”

11 Z: [hai]. “Yes.”

12 S: fu=n. “I see.”

13 S: e, hoka ni wa nanka ari- arimashita ? {+AH} “Were there any other (websites)?”

Zen explains that even if he writes emails to people he is interested in, he does not always

receive a reply. From that comment, Satoshi gathers that some people may register their

109 profiles on the website just to surf other people’s profiles or just for the sake of doing it.

He asks for Zen’s confirmation regarding this guess in line 10, which is marked by the plain form.

In confirmation checks, speakers check whether their understanding of the meaning of previously given information is correct. Therefore, the focus is on the meaning of such information, and attention to interpersonal distance is low. This may explain why speech style shift to the plain form is observed in confirmation checks. Or, as Ikuta

(2002) claims, speakers may tend to use plain forms in non-floor-holding subspaces embedded in the addressee’s floor.

4.5.6. Answers

Speakers sometimes answer questions in the plain form. This applies to both yes-no questions and wh-questions. Here is an example of answering a yes-no question in the plain form. Wataru (male) is talking about his long-term trip to Australia.

(34)

1 W: hoshi wa suggoi kiree datta shi=, “Stars were very beautiful, and,”

2 H: a=. “I see.”

3 H: de sankagetsu no zutto hitoritabi desu ka? {+AH} “And were you traveling alone for the whole three months?”

4 W: hitoritabi . {-AH} “Traveling alone .”

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5 H: [a=]. “I see.”

6 W: [de moo] ya ni natchaimasu ne saigo no hoo. {+AH} “You get tired of it toward the end.”

After Hiro (male) asks if he was traveling alone, Wataru confirms in the plain form that he was. Since Wataru is confirming what Hiro is asking, his answer involves repetition of the word hitoritabi ‘traveling alone’ from Hiro’s question.

Here is an example of answering a wh-question in the plain form. Dai (male) is talking about having gone dancing with Naoko (female), his friend who is also a participant in the study. He refers to her here by her nickname Becky.

(35)

1 D: de= konaida, u= bekkii to wa, u=, nikagetsu mae tanjoobi datta n desu keredomo, “And the other day, with Becky, my birthday was two months ago, but,”

2 M: hai. “Yes.”

3 D: ano=, sono, nikagetsu= u= mae no tanjoobi no hi ni bekkii to kurabu de issho ni asondeta n desu yo. {+AH} “Um, I had a fun time with Becky at a (dance) club on my birthday two months ago.”

4 M: he=. “I see.”

dochira no kurabu de, chinami ni, “The club of where, by the way,”

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5 D: roppongi . {-AH} “Roppongi .”

6 M: rop [pon ]gi . {-AH} “Roppongi .”

7 D: [@@]

Miki (female) is curious to know where the club Dai and Naoko went to is located and starts her question. Dai answers the location in the plain form, which Miki repeats.

Though the number of instances of speech style shifts in answering questions was low in the data as shown below in 4.5.9., it was interesting to find them, nevertheless, as it appears that awareness of the addressee (e.g., social distance between the speaker and the addressee) seems high in this context. More data of speech style shifts in this context may reveal what motivations are at work here.

4.5.7. Elaboration

Another context where speech style shift to the plain form is observed is when the speaker elaborates on his/her previous comment. This context may be similar to what

Chen (2003) calls “adding to own speech.” In the following, Eri (female) and Sumi

(female) both take dance lessons, and Eri explains that she uses “ordinary” high heels instead of proper dance shoes as she does not know whether or not she will continue taking lessons for a while.

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(36)

1 E: n=, dakara watashi mo mada tsuzukeru ka doo ka wakaranai to omotte, kutsu toka mo honto wa suggoi takai, te, kichitto shita no arimasu yo ne. {+AH} “Thinking that I don’t know whether I will continue (the dance lesson), there are (dance) shoes that are really expensive and proper, aren’t there?”

2 demo watashi futsuu no hiiru na n desu yo ne. {+AH} “But mine are ordinary high heels.”

3 @@[@@@]

4 S: [n=]. “I see.”

5 e, [[ura ni koo=]], “What? On the sole, like,”

6 E: [[honto wa tsukatcha ikenai]] kamo shi--, “Maybe I should not use them, and,”

7 [nan- nani mo XX mo, nani mo nai], kanagu tsuitenai yatsu . {-AH} “Those without anything like XX, without metal fittings.”

8 S: [ano= ato kanagu=, toka], “Um, metal fittings and so on,”

9 fu=n. “I see.”

From line 5, we can see that Sumi does not quite understand what Eri meant by

“ordinary” high heels. After realizing Sumi needs further explanation, Eri explains that those are the shoes without anything, more specifically, without metal fittings. In other words, in line 7, Eri elaborates on what “ordinary” high heels are, and this elaboration is done in the plain form.

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Here is another example. Reiko (female) is an English teacher, while Wataru (male) is an office worker. Wataru asks Reiko what her work hours are like. He is surprised to learn that she works only for seven hours, probably because office workers, including himself, usually are tied to work for nine hours including lunch time.

(37)

1 W: ichinichi jaa kinmu jikan tte kekkoo nagai n desu ka? {+AH} “Are your daily working hours fairly long?”

2 R: etto=, nanajikan desu koosoku sareru no ga. {+AH} “Um, I am tied to work for seven hours .”

3 W: tatta no nanajikan, “Only seven hours,”

4 R: n= tatoeba, [atashi wa ittsumo], kyoo wa chigau n desu [[kedo]], “For example, I always (work), today is different, but,”

5 W: [a=], [[hai]]. “I see.” “Yes.”

6 R: sanji juuji de=, “3 to 10, and,”

7 W: hai. “Yes.”

8 R: sanji= kara juuji, made de, “From 3 to 10, and,”

9 W: hai. “Yes.”

10 R: de kyoo, donichi wa hayai node, etto= juuichiji kara rokuji made desu kedo, “and today, on Saturdays and Sundays, it’s early, so um, from 11 to 6, but,”

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11 W: hai. “Yes.”

12 R: ranchi mo haitte=, “Including lunch,”

13 W: hai. “Yes.”

14 R: sonnaka no ichijikan wa ranchi [de, ji]ssai ni zutto, koosakusareteru no wa rokujikan . {-AH} “One hour within that (seven hours) is lunch, and the time I really have to work is six hours .”

15 W: [a=]. “I see.”

16 aa soo desu ka=. “Oh, I see.”

17 R: kekkoo ii desu yo. {+AH} “It is quite good.”

As Wataru is surprised about her work hours, Reiko explains at length what her work hours are like. This elaboration ends in the plain form.

In summary, when speakers elaborate on their own previous comments, these elaborations tend to take the plain form. As shown by the two examples, elaboration seems to follow the addressees’ reactions which imply that further explanation is needed.

4.5.8. Co-Construction

Co-construction refers to an instance when a speaker completes a sentence that his/her conversation partner has started. The speaker may be able to guess what their

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partner is going to say from the earlier conversation context, shared knowledge, common knowledge, and so forth. Speech style shift is sometimes observed in this speech context.

Ikuta (2002), Maynard (1991a, 1991b, 1993), and Chen (2003) report similar findings.

Let us look at an example. Uta (female) and Hiro (male) are talking about Uta’s

apartment. She explains that cleaning is easy since it is a small apartment. She further

notes that she uses a broom, not a vacuum cleaner, to clean. She then starts her statement

saying “if I sweep a little with the broom.”

(38)

1 U: ma=, heya wa semai shi, sooji suru toko mo sonna ni nai shi, “My apartment is small, and there aren’t many places to clean, so,”

2 H: a jaa sooji raku desu [yo ne demo]. {+AH} “Then cleaning is easy, isn’t it?”

3 U: [raku desu ] yo=. {+AH} “It is easy.”

4 H: moo atto yuu ma ni owarimasu yo ne. {+AH} “Cleaning is done in an instant, isn’t it?”

5 U: soojiki atashi ima nai n desu yo=. {+AH} “I do n’t have a vacuum cleaner now.”

6 H: a=. “I see.”

7 U: de nanka, hooki ga atte[=], “I have a broom, and,”

8 H: [ha]i. “Yes”

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9 U: hooki de chotto haku to=, “If I sweep a little with the broom,”

10 H: hai. “Yes”

11 U: moo [owatchau n desu kedo], “(cleaning) is done, but,”

12 H: [moo kiree ni natchau ]. {-AH} “It will be clean.”

13 ano= fujisawa no jikka ni wa tokidoki kaerareru n desu ka? … {+RH, +AH} “Do you sometimes go back to your parents’ home in Fujisawa?...”

Having learned that Uta’s apartment is small and does not require much time to clean,

Hiro guesses what Uta is going to say and completes her sentence with her. This co-

construction by Hiro is done in the plain form, although his speech style has been that of addressee honorific.

Here is another example of speech style shift occurring at the time of co-construction.

Jun (male) teaches at a girls’ school, and Kazu (male) is curious to know what female students are like these days.

(39)

1 K: a=, doo na n desu ka? {+AH} “How is it?”

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2 nanka ima no joshikoosee tte boku wa, kookoo no toki to, zenzen chigatte nanka, sugoi, nanka sabasaba <@shiteru@>, tte yuu ka, nanka daibu kawatta [na tte ki ga shimasu ]. {+AH} “It seems to me that students who go to a girls’ school nowadays, unlike those from my high school days, are quite frank, or have become quite different.”

3 J: [n=], kihonteki ni, bokyaburarii <@ga nakute@>, “Basically, they lack vocabulary, and,”

4 K: @@@[[@]]

5 J: [[a]]no, darui, uzai, nemui tte yuu, kono mittsu de tabun kaiwa ga seeritsu [shichau], [[ka=n ]]ji desu yo ne=. {+AH} “It seems like they conduct their conversations with just these three words: ‘sluggish’, ‘bothersome’, and ‘sleepy’.”

6 K: [ shichau ]. {-AH} “Is held .”

7 [[a=]]. “I see.”

In line 5, Jun explains that he has the impression that students can have their conversations using just three words. Before he finishes his utterance, Kazu guesses what he is going to say and completes the utterance with him. This co-construction is done in the plain form.

As we saw with repetition and confirmation checks, the reason behind speech style shift occurring in co-construction may be that the focus is on the meaning rather than social distance between the speaker and the addressee, as Maynard suggests (1991a,

1991b, 1993). Or, as Ikuta (2002) claims, speakers may have a tendency to use plain

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forms in non-floor-holding subspaces embedded in the addressee’s floor, as a strategy to

collaboratively construct a discourse.

4.5.9. Quantitative Analysis & Discussion

We have observed various contexts likely to motivate speech style shift to the plain form. Table 25 classifies the 577 instances of speech style shift into the eight context categories above.

Table 25: Classification of Speech Style Shift Instances into the Context Categories

Context Number Percentage Self-Directed Questions 158 27.4% Feelings, Thoughts, or Opinions 144 25% Comment of Realization 46 7.9% Repetition 46 7.9% Confirmation Checks 40 6.9% Answers 33 5.7% Elaboration 19 3.3% Co-Construction 15 2.6% Other 76 13.2% Total 577 100%

Table 25 reveals that over 50% of speech style shifts to the plain form are observed either

in self-directed questions or in expressions of feelings, thoughts, or opinions. Among the

eight categories, not only self-directed questions but also comments of realization seem

self-directed. Expression of feelings, thoughts, or opinions is rather subjective and

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personal. It appears that speech style shifts to plain forms tend to occur in these instances

because the utterances are not deliberately addressed to the addressee (Maynard 1991a,

1991b, 1993).

One of the common features among repetition, confirmation checks, co-construction, and elaboration seems to be that the focus is on meaning, which may imply the speaker’s lowered attention to social distance between him/herself and the addressee (cf. Maynard

1991a, 1991b, 1993). This may be one of the reasons why speech style shifts to plain forms occur in these four contexts. Another common feature is that these four contexts constitute subspaces embedded in the main floor rather than the main floor itself (cf.

Ikuta 2002). For instance, repetition, confirmation checks, and co-construction are inserted into the conversation partner’s flow of talk to clarify, confirm, or express understanding. Elaboration has a function of supplementing information in the main flow of one’s own speech to promote understanding. It is possible that speech style shifts to plain forms occur in these four contexts to separate these utterances from the main stream of talk.

As mentioned above, it was surprising to find speech style shifts to plain forms in answering questions, as those are deliberately addressed to the addressee and do not seem to constitute subspaces embedded in the main floor. In other words, the two reasons suggested for the other seven categories of speech style shifts cannot account for their use in this category. More data may make it possible to thoroughly investigate this issue.

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4.6. Speech Style Shifts between Referent Honorifics and Non-Honorific Forms

In this section, we will focus on speech style shifts between verbal sonkee-go

‘respect language’ and plain verbs used in reference to the addressee. We will not deal with adjectival or copula sonkee-go in reference to the addressee, sonkee-go in reference to a third person, or kenjoo-go , simply because the number of relevant instances is too small. As mentioned in Section 4.2.1, there was a great range in the frequency of use of verbal sonkee-go depending on the speaker and the conversation. According to Table 17, seven people used either verbal sonkee-go or plain verbs exclusively, which means that speech style shifts between verbal sonkee-go and plain verbs did not occur with these speakers. If we exclude the data of these speakers, this study found 71 verbal sonkee-go and 147 plain verbs.

Of the 13 speakers who used both verbal sonkee-go and plain verbs, ten used verbal sonkee-go less frequently than plain verbs, while the opposite was true with the other three. This means that there were two types of speech style shifts: from plain verbs to verbal sonkee-go in the context where plain verbs were predominantly used and from verbal sonkee-go to plain verbs in the context where sonkee-go was predominantly used.

Of the 71 verbal sonkee-go instances, 39 belong to the first type while 32 to the latter type. Since the number of speech style shifts between verbal sonkee-go and plain verbs is

small, I will only present some observations from the data.

In the present study, most of the verbal sonkee-go instances occurred at the time of questions or confirmation questions asked of the addressee. This may be due to the speech context of the present study. When talking with someone you meet for the first

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time in a casual setting, questions or confirmation questions seem to be more likely types

of utterances directed to the addressee, rather than other types such as statements, advice,

requests, and so on. Additionally, in questions and confirmation questions, the awareness

of the addressee is high in Maynard’s terms (1993), and the speaker may be reminded of

such things as social distance between him/herself and the addressee. Table 26 shows the use and non-use of verbal sonkee-go depending on the utterance type.

Table 26: Verbal Sonkee-go & Plain Verbs According to the Utterance Type

Form Qs/Confirmation Qs Other Total Verbal Sonkee-go 63 (38.9%) 8 (14.3%) 71 (32.6%) Plain Verbs 99 (61.1%) 48 (85.7%) 147 (67.4%) Total 162 (100%) 56 (100%) 218 (100%)

From Table 26, we can hypothesize that utterance type may be related to speech style

shifts between verbal sonkee-go and plain verbs.

Another observation from the data is that some people tended to start the

conversation with sonkee-go and switch to plain verbs as the conversation progressed.

This was the case with Uta, Dai, Satoshi, Jun, and Sumi. It is possible that familiarity

increased even within 20 minutes of the first meeting, which may have prompted the

speakers to lower their formality level. This type of speech style shift, however, was

found even toward the beginning of the conversation, when familiarity had probably not

been established yet. This was the case with Kyoko and Eri, who used sonkee-go for the

first verb in reference to the addressee and switched to plain verbs. An excerpt from

Kyoko’s (female) conversation may reveal why this type of speech style shift may occur.

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Before excerpt (40), Kyoko was talking about how alcohol would help her loosen up and

communicate with people she does not know well.

(40)

1 A: tashika ni. “Indeed.”

2 [osake wa idai] desu yo. {+AH} “Alcohol is great.”

3 K: [n=]. “Yes.”

4 soo desu yo [ne. “Isn’t that right?”

5 A: [n=] “Yes.”

6 K: osa]ke wa nomareru hoo [[desu ka]]? {+RH} {+AH} “Do you drink often/a lot?”

7 A: [[sake wa]] suki desu ne=. {+AH} “I like alcohol.”

8 K: a=. “I see.”

9 A: ha[=i]. “Yes.”

10 K: [kekkoo], ryoo nomi masu ? {-RH. +AH} “Do you drink quite a bit?”

11 A: hitobanjuu nomi[[masu yo ne=]]. {+AH} “I drink all night long.”

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12 K: [[<@ sugoi ]] ne=@>. {-AH} “Impressive .”

Kyoko asks Aki (female) in line 6 whether she drinks often or a lot using sonkee-go and an addressee honorific. Aki replies that she likes alcohol in line 7. In this reply, Aki uses a bare noun sake ‘alcohol’ instead of osake , sake with a beautification prefix o. The bare noun makes the utterance sound more casual than otherwise. Then, in line 9, Aki backchannels with ha=i “Yes.” This elongated version of hai also adds a tone of casualness. In line 10, in asking the second question, Kyoko does not use sonkee-go .

After finding out Aki drinks all night long, Kyoko gives her reaction laughing in plain form. The speech style shift between sonkee-go and plain verb may be coincidental, but it appears that Kyoko may have adjusted her speech style, taking into consideration that

Aki was talking rather casually. More data would make it possible to examine whether speakers adjust their speech style in regards to referent honorifics based on how their addressee speaks.

Some speech style shifts to verbal sonkee-go were found in the introduction of new topics. According to Usami (1995), speech style shifts to addressee honorifics are observed in the introduction of new topics or in the answers to the questions asked at the time of the introduction of new topics. The present study found a similar phenomenon with regard to referent honorifics. Let us look at excerpt (41) for an example. Before this excerpt, Aki (female) and Masa (male) were talking about areas of Tokyo they go to for drinking.

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(41)

1 A: doomo kono yamanotesen no migigawa tte, sabireteru imeeji ga arimasu yo ne. {+AH} “For some reason, the right side of the Yamanote Line seems deserted, doesn’t it?”

2 M: a, shitamachi desu ne. {+AH} “Oh, it is Shitamachi (= a traditional working-class neighborhood).”

3 A: @[@@]@@

4 M: [hai]. “Yes.”

5 A: sokka, shitamachi tte yuu no ka. {-AH} “Oh, it is called Shitamachi.”

6 M: hai. “Yes.”

7 A: [n=]. “Yes.”

8 M: [hidari]gawa no hoo ga nanka sharetemasu yo ne, [[tashika ni]]. {+AH} “The left side is somehow more stylish , indeed.”

9 A: [[desu yo ne]]. “Isn’t it?”

10 asobu tokoro mo ippai aru shi, “There are many places to have fun among other things,”

11 n=. “Yes.”

12 M: [tashika ni]. “Indeed.”

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13 A: [osake i]gai wa nan, ka, sareteru koto arimasu ka? {+RH} {+AH} “Is there anything that you are doing (for fun) besides drinking?”

14 M: ato suki na koto ttsuttara nan daroo . {-AH} “I wonder what else I like.”

15 a, ryokoo toka mo maa, suki desu ne. {+AH} “Oh, I like traveling, etc.”

16 A: kaigairyokoo [desu ka]? {+AH} “Travel abroad ?”

17 M: [ma kai]gai wa= ikkai gurai, ikkai shika itta koto [[nai desu kedo]], “I have been overseas only once, but,”

18 A: [[a, doko itta ]] n desu ka? {-RH, +AH} “Where did you go ?”

19 M: ya, demo daitai ma onsen toka ato, fuyu dattara sukii toka, “But most of the time I go to hot springs, and in winter, ski, and,”

20 A: sukii [ yaru ] n desu ka. {-RH, +AH} “You ski .”

21 M: [hai]. “Yes.”

Aki and Masa had been talking about different areas of Tokyo they go to for drinking. In line 13, Aki changes the topic by asking Masa what else he does for fun besides drinking.

She uses a verbal sonkei-go sarete (i)ru , the progressive form of the Verb-(r)areru form

of suru ‘to do’, and an addressee honorific arimasu ‘to exist; to have’ in asking the

question. In line 14, Masa switches to plain form in asking himself the question and

126 switches back to addressee honorifics in answering the question. After finding out Masa has been overseas, Aki asks in line 18 where he has been. Interestingly, she does not use a verbal sonkee-go here for the verb ‘to go’. Itta is the past tense of a plain verb iku ‘to go’. Masa does not answer her question but adds other travel destinations. Aki does not use a verbal sonkee-go in line 20, either. Yaru is a casual version of the verb suru ‘to do’.

As shown here, some speech style shifts from plain verbs to sonkee-go were observed in the introduction of new topics.

In summary, although we need more data of speech style shifts between referent honorifics and non-honorific forms to examine what may motivate such shifts, at least regarding speech style shifts between verbal sonkee-go and plain verbs, this study made some observations, which may be used as hypotheses for future studies. One is that certain utterance types may be more likely than others to bring about speech style shifts.

Another is that some speakers may tend to start the conversation with verbal sonkee-go and switch to plain verbs as the conversation progresses. This may be due to speakers coming to feel close to their partner or to speakers adjusting to how their partner talks. It has also been discussed that speech style shifts may occur in the introduction of new conversation topics. Since this study suggests that casual first-encounter conversations between two relatively young people of similar age may not be a good data source for referent honorifics, other types of speech context may be better suited to examine speech style shifts between referent honorifics and non-honorific forms.

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5. CONCLUSION

5.1. Findings

This section summarizes the findings of the present study. In casual first-encounter

conversations between two relatively young people of similar age, overall, addressee

honorifics were used more than plain forms (67% vs. 33%). However, the rate of use

ranged greatly depending on the speaker and the conversation (i.e., 100% to 0.8%).

Using too few addressee honorifics, however, has a possibility of offending the addressee

in this speech context, as suggested by Taku’s response in the follow-up questionnaire.

Female speakers did not necessarily speak more politely (i.e., use addressee honorifics

more frequently) than male speakers. In fact, three speakers who predominantly used

plain forms were all female, and overall, male speakers used addressee honorifics more

frequently. Partners’ genders seemed to influence the rate of use of addressee honorifics.

Female speakers’ uses of addressee honorifics were higher in mixed-sex conversations

than in single-sex conversations, while the opposite was true with male speakers. This

would seem to be in line with a gender hierarchy in which males are dominant, thus

resulting in people of either sex speaking more politely to males than to females. The

follow-up questionnaire and the content of some conversations suggest that some people

are aware that their partner’s gender may affect how comfortable they feel in

conversation.

As for referent honorifics, sonkee-go ‘respect language’ in reference to the addressee

was used only less than 20% of the time on average. Just as with addressee honorifics,

however, the rate of use varied greatly depending on the speaker and the conversation.

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The results also show that female speakers did not necessarily use sonkee-go more frequently than male speakers. This finding as well as the one regarding gender differences with respect to addressee honorifics suggest that the stereotype that female speakers are more polite is inaccurate and in fact the opposite may be true. Regarding forms of verbal sonkee-go , though based on a limited amount of data, a hypothesis was made that unless the lexical substitute is the only possibility, verbal sonkee-go is more likely to take the Verb-(r)areru form than other honorific forms at least in this speech context.

The study also found that the speech context of the present study, in which two relatively young people of similar age with no previous acquaintanceship talked freely

(i.e. with no particular topics given), may not be suited for collecting data on referent honorifics, especially sonkee-go in reference to a third party and kenjoo-go ‘humbling language’. Changing contextual features such as age, level of acquaintanceship, and provision of topics may produce more data on referent honorifics.

As for speech style shifts between honorific forms and non-honorific forms, several contexts in which these were observed were reported. Regarding speech style shifts from addressee honorifics to plain forms, self-directed questions, expressions of feelings, thoughts, and opinions, comments of realization, repetition, confirmation checks, answers, elaboration, and co-construction were suggested as likely contexts for them to occur. The two most likely contexts were self-directed questions and expressions of feelings, thoughts, and opinions. Among the eight categories, self-directed questions, expression of feelings, thoughts, or opinions, and comments of realization seem self-directed and not

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deliberately addressed to the addressee (Maynard 1991a, 1991b, 1993). In repetition,

confirmation checks, co-construction, and elaboration, the focus appears to be on

meaning, which may imply the speaker’s lowered attention to social distance between

him/herself and the addressee (cf. Maynard 1991a, 1991b, 1993). Moreover, these four

contexts constitute subspaces embedded in the main floor rather than the main floor itself

(cf. Ikuta 2002). Speech style shifts to plain forms may be occurring to separate the

utterances from the main stream of conversation for one or more of these underlying

reasons. Additionally, though detailed examination was not possible due to a lack of

relevant instances, utterance type, increased familiarity with the addressee, adjustment to

the addressee’s speech style, and the introduction of new conversation topics were

suggested as possible motivations behind speech style shifts between verbal sonkee-go and plain verbs.

I hope to have contributed to the study of Japanese honorifics by quantitatively and qualitatively analyzing actual conversation data. Further research is suggested especially regarding different types (i.e., verbal, adjectival, copula) and forms of sonkee-go in reference to the addressee, sonkee-go in reference to a third party, kenjoo-go , speech style shifts between referent honorifics and non-honorific forms, and the effects of the addressee’s gender on honorific usage. Additionally, larger scale studies and more data from diverse contexts will enable more thorough analyses of Japanese honorifics.

Moreover, the addition of statistical analyses will strengthen research findings. In the next section, I will discuss some of the pedagogical implications of this study.

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5.2. Pedagogical Implications

Japanese honorifics are often said to be one of the most difficult language features for learners of Japanese (e.g., Carroll 2005; Falsgraf et al. 1993; Neustpny 1982; Kubota

1990; Sugiyama 2003). As many studies of Japanese honorifics in actual discourse suggest, prescriptive rules that explain honorific usage in terms of social distance, formality of the situation, and so on, cannot account for the use or non-use of honorifics that learners encounter every day. For example, this study has shown that even in first- encounter conversations, speakers do not necessarily use honorifics consistently, although learners are probably taught to use honorifics in such situations. As the language level of learners progresses, they start to notice discrepancies between prescriptive rules and actual usage of honorifics. Even beginning learners are aware of such discrepancies, especially if they are learning the language in Japan, where they hear natural communication among native speakers on a daily basis.

Of course, this does not mean the instruction of prescriptive grammar/use on honorifics should be taken lightly. Prescriptive rules may be useful to get general ideas or to learn about stereotypical usages, but instructors should supply additional information on actual use of honorifics as needed. Sugiyama (2003) suggests giving

instructions about basic rules of honorifics and then going into details with examples.

Based on her survey results of learners of Japanese, which reveal misunderstandings and

difficulties that learners face regarding honorifics, Sugiyama warns that instructors

should not avoid teaching details just because learners are foreigners. Similarly, Kubota

(1990, 21) argues that although teachers should not expect learners to have the same level

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of knowledge or use as native speakers of Japanese, neither should they be satisfied with

insufficient knowledge or use of honorifics among learners. Additionally, Matsumoto

and Okamoto (2003) discourage overemphasizing one speech style or providing

oversimplied explanations based on stereotypes.

What does the present study offer for the instruction of Japanese honorifics? This study, as well as previous studies of Japanese honorifics in actual conversation (e.g.,

Chen 2003; Usami 2002), show variations in honorific usage. Some people use more, or

fewer, honorifics than others, and even in first-encounter conversations, at least relatively

young Japanese people mix honorifics and non-honorific forms when talking with others

of similar age. Some may, however, get offended if they are addressed too casually (i.e.,

with too few honorifics) from the beginning, as the survey results show. It is important

for learners to recognize variations.

I have been teaching Japanese in Japan for several years now, and learners are often

shocked by discrepancies between what they have learned so far about contexts that

require use of honorifics and how people around them actually talk or expect them to talk.

Some learners have said that none of their Japanese friends speak with addressee

honorifics in first-encounter conversations. Others have said that their homestay parents

get mad at them if they address them using honorifics. When learners bring up such

issues, we discuss variations, contexts, and so on so that students will be aware that

variations do exist and that contextual factors are important in language use 10 .

10 It might also be useful to point out that some Japanese people may apply different standards when communicating with non-native speakers. It has been noted that Japanese people often have low expectations for non-native speakers’ level of Japanese (e.g., Falsgraf et al. 1993; Siegal 1996; Siegal &

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While this instruction may be for intermediate to advanced learners of Japanese,

when learners of any level are curious to know why speech style shifts between honorific

and non-honorific forms occur, it will be useful to point out that those shifts do not seem

randomly done. As mentioned above, there are numerous studies of reasons behind

speech style shifts between addressee honorifics and plain forms, and this study also

made some observations regarding speech style shifts between referent honorifics and

non-honorific forms. Reasons may be interpersonal, intrapersonal, discoursal, or other

factors. It would be interesting to expose learners to actual discourse data of native

speakers of Japanese and have them think about what may be causing speech style shifts.

Uenaka (1997) compares speech style shifts by native speakers of Japanese and those by

non-native speakers of Japanese and reports similarities and differences between them.

In order for learners to be closer to native speakers in their language skill and to make

them aware what happens in real communication, it is necessary to analyze actual

discourse between native speakers.

Additionally, this study has revealed that speakers do not use sonkee-go frequently in

reference to the addressee and that they do not seem to have many opportunities to use

sonkee-go in reference to a third party or kenjoo-go in the types of conversations that comprised the data for this study. If more studies show similar results, giving such a speech context in class as an exercise to practice referent honorifics will not be authentic.

Okamoto 2003). For instance, Siegal once witnessed a professor telling advanced learners of Japanese that they did not need to worry about honorifics because they are foreigners (363). Falsgraf et al. report that Japanese co-workers of non-native speakers showed little concern for inappropriate use of honorifics at least within the office.

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It is important that contexts for practice are authentic so that students can apply what they

learn in class to daily communication. Instructors always need to pay attention to under

what circumstances native speakers of Japanese use the target structure and use those

contexts to practice that structure.

It would be ideal for discourse analysts, language instructors, and material developers to team up and examine authentic speech situations and authentic language use for language instruction. Jones and Ono (2005) makes a similar point and states that material developers, instructors, and learners can all benefit from discourse studies. They also recommend exposing learners to actual discourse from an early stage of their study.

Several discourse analysists offer practical suggestions as to how to incorporate authentic material into classroom instruction (e.g., Falsgraf et al. 1993; Fujii 2005; Ohara et al.

2001; Yotsukura 2005). By utilizing authentic material and encouraging learners to develop analytical skills about the target language and culture, instructors could reduce learners’ encountering discrepancies between classroom instruction and actual language use and help them acquire language skills that they can readily apply to real life situations.

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APPENDIX A:

TRANSCRIPTION CONVENTIONS

. final intonation , continuing intonation ? question intonation -- trancated/abandoned intonation [ ], [[ ]] overlapping utterances = lengthening @ laughter <@ @> utterance made laughing, while laughing - truncated word X inaudible syllable ... continuation ( ) description

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APPENDIX B:

FOLLOW-UP QUESTIONNAIRE (JAPANESE)

アンケート ankeeto

お名前： onamae 会話相手の名前と性別： kaiwa-aite no namae to seebetsu

選択肢の一つにＯをつけてください。選択肢の中に適当な答えがない場合、または付け加えたいことがある場合は、ご自由にお書きください。 sentakushi no hitotsu ni O o tsuketekudasai. sentakushi no naka ni tekitoo na kotae ga nai baai, mata wa tsukekuwaetai koto ga aru baai wa gojiyuu ni okakikudasai.

1. 相手の年齢はどのぐらいだと思いますか。 aite no nenree wa donogurai da to omoimasu ka?

1. 自分よりかなり年下 jibun yori kanari toshishita 2. 自分より少し年下 jibun yori sukoshi toshishita 3. 自分と同じぐらい jibun to onaji gurai 4. 自分より少し年上 jibun yori sukoshi toshiue 5. 自分よりかなり年上 jibun yori kanari toshiue

なぜそう思いましたか。あてはまるものすべてにＯをし、説明してください。 naze soo omoimashita ka? atehamaru mono subete ni O o shi, setsumee shitekudasai.

1. 容姿 yooshi 2. 自己紹介と会話の内容 jikoshookai to kaiwa no naiyoo 3. 話し方 hanashikata 4. その他 sono ta (setsumee shitekudasai)

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2. 相手の社会的地位はどうでしょうか。 aite no shakaiteki chii wa doo deshoo ka?

1. 自分よりかなり下 jibun yori kanari shita 2. 自分より少し下 jibun yori sukoshi shita 3. 自分と同じぐらい jibun to onaji gurai 4. 自分より少し上 jibun yori sukoshi ue 5. 自分よりかなり上 jibun yori kanari ue

なぜそう思いましたか。あてはまるものすべてにＯをし、説明してください。 naze soo omoimashita ka? atehamaru mono subete ni O o shi, setsumee shitekudasai.

1. 容姿 yooshi 2. 自己紹介と会話の内容 jikoshookai to kaiwa no naiyoo 3. 話し方 hanashikata 4. その他（説明してください） sono ta (setsumee shitekudasai)

3. 相手とは初めて会ったわけですが、話しやすさという点からみて相手のことをどう思いましたか。 aite towa hajimete atta wake desu ga, hanashiyasusa to iu ten kara mite aite no koto o doo omoimashita ka?

1. 非常に話しにくい人だった hijoo ni hanashinikui hito datta 2. かなり話しにくい人だった kanari hanashinikui hito datta 3. 少し話しにくい人だった sukoshi hanashinikui hito datta 4. 特に話しやすい人ではないが話しにくい人でもなかった tokuni hanashiyasui hito dewa nai ga hanashinikui hito demo nakatta 5. 話しやすい人だった hanashiyasui hito datta

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6. かなり話しやすい人だった kanari hanashiyasui hito datta 7. 非常に話しやすい人だった hijoo ni hanashiyasui hito datta

なぜそう思いましたか。できるだけ詳しく説明してください。 naze soo omoimashita ka? dekirudake kuwashiku setsumee shitekudasai.

4. 相手の話し方や態度で、失礼だと感じたことはありましたか。 aite no hanashikata ya taido de shitsuree da to omotta koto wa arimashita ka?

1. はい hai 2. いいえ iie

相手の話し方や態度で、不愉快に思ったことはありましたか。 aite no hanashikata ya taido de fuyukai ni omotta koto wa arimashita ka?

1. はい hai 2. いいえ iie

上で「はい」と答えた方、なぜそう思いましたか。詳しく説明してください。 ue de “hai” to kotaeta kata, naze soo omoimashita ka? kuwashiku setsumee shitekudasai.

5. 自然に話せたと思いますか。 shizen ni hanaseta to omoimasu ka?

1. 全然自然に話せなかった zenzen shizen ni hanasenakatta. 2. あまり自然に話せなかった amari shizen ni hanasenakatta. 3. 自然に話せた shizen ni hanaseta. 4. かなり自然に話せた kanari shizen ni hanaseta.

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5. 非常に自然に話せた hijoo ni shizen ni hanaseta.

上で 1 か 2 を選んだ方、なぜそう思いましたか。説明してください。 ue de 1 ka 2 o eranda kata, naze soo omoimashita ka? setsumee shitekudasai.

6. 録音されていることを意識しましたか。 rokuon sareteiru koto o ishiki shimashita ka?

1. 全然意識しなかった zenzen ishiki shinakatta 2. あまり意識しなかった amari ishiki shinakatta 3. 少し意識した sukoshi ishiki shita 4. かなり意識した kanari ishiki shita 5. 非常に意識した hijoo ni ishiki shita

上で 3 か 4 か 5 を選んだ方、そのことが話し方に影響したと思いますか。 ue de 3 ka 4 ka 5 o eranda kata, sono koto ga hanashikata ni eekyoo shita to omoimasu ka?

1. 全然影響しなかった zenzen eekyoo shinakatta 2. あまり影響しなかった amari eekyoo shinakatta 3. 少し影響した sukoshi eekyoo shita 4. かなり影響した kanari eekyoo shita 5. 非常に影響した hijoo ni eekyoo shita

上で 3 か 4 か 5 を選んだ方、どのように影響したか説明してください。 ue de 3 ka 4 ka 5 o eranda kata, dono yoo ni eekyoo shita ka setsumee shitekudasai.

7. 先ほどの会話や手順などについて、何かコメントがありましたら、ご自由にお書きください。 sakihodo no kaiwa ya tejun nado ni tsuite nani ka komento ga arimashitara gojiyuu ni okakikudasai.

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以上です。ご協力ありがとうございました！ ijoo desu. gokyooryoku arigatoogozaimashita

（2 回目の会話に関してのアンケートには下記の質問が加えられます。）

8. 今回が 2 度目の会話だったわけですが、以前同じような会話をしたことが、あなたの話し方や会話の内容などに影響したと思いますか。 konkai ga nido-me no kaiwa datta wake desu ga, izen onaji yoona kaiwa o shita koto ga anata no hanashikata ya kaiwa no naiyoo nado ni eekyoo shita to omoimasu ka?

上で 3 か 4 か 5 を選んだ方、どのように影響したか説明してください。 ue de 3 ka 4 ka 5 o eranda kata, dono yoo ni eekyoo shita ka setsumee shitekudasai.

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APPENDIX C:

FOLLOW-UP QUESTIONNAIRE (ENGLISH TRANSLATION)

Your name:

Your interlocutor’s name and gender:

Please circle one of the choices below and make comments, if any. If you cannot find your answer amongst the choices given, please add your answer.

1. What is your best guess about your partner’s age?

1. Significantly younger than mine. 2. A little younger than mine. 3. About the same as mine. 4. A little older than mine. 5. Significantly older than mine.

On what did you base your guess? Please choose all that apply and explain each choice.

1. On appearance. 2. On the introduction and content of the conversation. 3. On the manner of speaking. 4. Other.

2. What is your best guess about your partner’s social status? Please add any comments.

1. Significantly higher than mine. 2. A little higher than mine. 3. About the same as mine. 4. A little lower than mine. 5. Significantly lower than mine.

On what did you base your guess? Please choose all that apply and explain each choice.

1. On appearance. 2. On the introduction and content of the conversation. 3. On the manner of speaking. 4. Other.

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3. Considering that this is a person you have just met, how did you feel about him/her as a conversation partner from the viewpoint of the easiness of carrying on conversation?

1. He/she was very difficult to talk with. 2. He/she was quite difficult to talk with. 3. He/she was a little difficult to talk with. 4. He/she was not very easy but not very difficult to talk with. 5. He/she was easy to talk with. 6. He/she was quite easy to talk with. 7. He/she was very easy to talk with.

*** I added #3 and #5 to Usami’s five choices.

Why did you feel this way? Please explain with as many details as possible.

4. Did you feel that there was some impoliteness in your interlocutor’s manner of speaking and/or attitude?

1. No. 2. Yes.

Did you feel uncomfortable about your interlocutor’s manner of speaking and/or attitude?

1. No. 2. Yes.

If you chose “Yes” above, please explain with as many details as possible.

5. What do you think of your own manner of speaking during the conversation? Do you feel that you were able to speak naturally?

1. I could not speak naturally at all. 2. I could not speak very naturally. 3. I was able to speak somewhat naturally. 4. I was able to speak quite naturally. 5. I was able to speak very naturally.

If you choose 1 or 2, please explain why you felt that way.

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6. Were you conscious of being taped?

1. I was not conscious of being audio-taped at all. 2. I was not very conscious of being audio-taped. 3. I was a little conscious of being audio-taped. 4. I was quite conscious of being audio-taped. 5. I was very conscious of being audio-taped.

If you choose 3, 4, or 5, how much do you think the fact of being audio-taped influenced your manner of speaking?

1. It did not influence it at all. 2. It did not influence it very much. 3. It influenced it a little. 4. It influenced it. 5. It influenced it very much.

If you choose 3, 4, or 5, please describe how it influenced your manner of speaking.

7. If you have any comments about the conversation in which you were engaged, or the procedures, etc., please feel free to note them.

Thank you very much for your cooperation!

(The following question will be added to the questionnaire given regarding the second conversation.)

8. Did the fact that you repeated the similar conversation influence your way of speaking and/or the contents of the conversation?

1. It did not influence it at all. 2. It did not influence it very much. 3. It influenced it a little. 4. It influenced it. 5. It influenced it very much.

If you chose 3, 4, or 5, please explain how you think it influenced your way of speaking and/or the contents of the conversation.

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