Explorations in Japanese sociolinguistics

✍ Scribed by Leo Loveday

• Publisher: John Benjamins
• Year: 1986
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 166
• Series: Pragmatics & beyond VII:1.
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Explorations in Japanese Sociolinguistics provides a treasure of information on the Japanese language and the social and cultural system it has developed and is embedded in. To the non-specialist, it opens an unknown world. To the specialist it offers theoretical and methodological perspectives aimed at avoiding the interference of myth and musing with accurate characterizations. A general introduction on Japanese sociolinguistics is followed by two case studies, one on the ethnography of ritual and address at a Japanese wedding reception, and one on the pragmatics of Japanese donatory verbs. The final chapter discusses cross-cultural contrasts and the danger of semiotic schism in Japanese-Western interaction.

✦ Table of Contents

1. 1. Japanese Sociolinguistics - with Special Reference to Western Research, p1
      2. 1.1. Japanese language and society, p1
      3. 1.2. Encoding social organization, p4
      4. 1.3. Social variation, p8
      5. 1.4. Language attitudes, p19
      6. 1.5. Contact between Japanese and other languages in sociolinguistic perspective, p24
      7. 1.6. Other topics in Japanese sociolinguistics, p31
      8. 1.7. Conclusion, p32
      9. 2. The Ethnography of Ritual and Address at a Japanese Wedding Reception, p33
      10. 2.1. The reception: setting, participants, activities and functions, p33
      11. 2.2. The linguistic components of ritual, p37
      12. 2.3. Hierarchical and collective signals: the contextual dynamics of designatory forms, p47
      13. 2.4. A concluding note, p55
      14. 3. Speaking of Giving: The Pragmatics of Japanese Donatory Verbs, p57
      15. 4. Cross-Cultural Contrasts, p79
      16. 4.1. Pitch, politeness and sexual role, p79
      17. 4.2. Semiotic schism in Japanese-Western interaction, p96
      18. Appendix: Background notes on Japanese concepts of family and marriage, p119
      19. Notes, p121
      20. References, p135
      21. List of Figures, Tables, Diagrams
      22. Fig.1 Simple flowchart of Japanese suffixes of address and reference, p7
      23. Fig.2 The performance and relationships of participants at the wedding reception, p36
      24. Fig.3 Corporate identification in designatory markers for the groom, p53
      25. Fig.4 Semiotic schism, p97
      26. Table 1. A comparison of speech giver's speech acts, p41
      27. Table 2. Apologetic formulae occurring at the reception, p44
      28. Table 3. Designatory markers for the groom occurring at the reception, p53
      29. Table 4. The phonational ranges of the subjects, p86
      30. Table 5. The fundamental frequency in Hz of Japanese and English politeness formulae obtained by pitch meter at the beginning and end of each utterance, p89
      31. Table 6. The fundamental frequency in Hz of Japanese and English politeness formulae obtained by spectographic analysis at the peak and end of each utterance, p89
      32. Diagram 1. Donatory forms where G is not the speaker nor belongs to the speaker's ingroup, p58
      33. Diagram 2. Donatory forms where G is the speaker or in the speaker's group, p60
      34. Diagram 3. Donatory forms where R is the speaker or in the speaker's ingroup, p63
      35. Diagram 4. Scales of implicational deference where the giver is the speaker, p76

✦ Subjects

Sociolinguistics -- Japan;Sociolinguistics;Japan