Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, Santa Cruz, 1998. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 220-226).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--UCLA, 2009. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 466-484).

Thesis (Ph.D.) - University of Queensland, 2003. / Includes bibliography.

Thesis--Ruhr-Universität Bochum, 1976. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 239-249).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Oregon, 2005. / Typescript. Includes vita and abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 257-267). Also available for download via the World Wide Web; free to University of Oregon users.

Thesis (Ph.D.) - University of Queensland, 2007. / Includes bibliography.

Over the years, phonologists working in the generative framework have encountered a number of persistent problems in their descriptions of Japanese phonology. Several of these problems concern phonological rules that sometimes do and sometimes do not apply in seemingly identical phonological environments. Many of the proposed analyses achieve observational adequacy, but, nonetheless, are intuitively dissatisfying. The first of two such problems involves the desiderative suffix -ta and the homophonous perfective inflection -ta, both of which attach to verb roots. When the verb root is vowel-final, the derivations are straightforward. (1) (a) tabe + ta + i → tabe-ta-i 'want to eat' mi + ta + i → mi-ta-i 'want to see' (b) tabe + ta → tabe-ta 'ate' mi + ta → mi-ta 'see (past)' Derivations are not so straightforward when the verb root is consonant-final. In such cases an intervening i is inserted between the root and the desiderative suffix, but not between the root and the perfective inflection. (2) (a) tat + ta + i → tat-i-ta-i 'want to stand' kat + ta + i → kat-i-ta-i 'want to win' (b) tat + ta → tat-ta 'stood' kat + ta → kat-ta 'won' McCawley (1968) is not specific in how he accounts for this differential it appears that he favours the adoption of a morphological rule such as (3) (from Koo, 1974). (3) ∅ → i / C]v__+tai Koo (1974) has attempted to reanalyze the desiderative suffix as -ita, but, since there is no evidence of W cluster simplification in the language, he is left with the even more difficult problem of deleting the initial i of the suffix following vowel-final verb roots. (4) tabe + ita + i → tabe-ta-i 'want to eat' mi + ita + i → mi-ta-i 'want to see' Maeda (1979) has chosen a boundary solution, positing that t-initial inflections are joined to verb roots by morpheme boundaries (+), while other suffixes such as the desiderative suffix are joined by a stronger boundary (:). By making the i insertion rule sensitive to boundaries of level :, the correct outputs can be derived. This solution, though, is unsatisfactory since the assignment of boundaries is not independently motivated. A second difficulty encountered by McCawley (1968) and others involves a high vowel syncopation rule that deletes the final i or u of Sino-Japanese monomorphemes when the initial consonant of a following Sino-Japanese monomorpheme is voiceless. (5) iti + too → it-too 'first class' roku + ka → rok-ka 'sixth lesson' However, a morpheme- or word-final high vowel at the boundary between a Sino-Japanese compound and a Sino-Japanese monomorpheme does not delete under those conditions insertion of i in these phonological identical environments, but (6) zi-ryoku 'magnetism' (X-Y) zi-ryoku + kei → zi-ryoku-kei 'magnetometer' (X-Y-Z) hai-tatu 'delivery' (Y-Z) betu + hai-tatu → betu-hai-tatu 'special delivery' (X-Y-Z) McCawley accounts for this pattern by invoking internal boundaries of different strengths: + and #. (7) iti + too roku + ka zi + ryoku # kei betu # hai + tatu He claims, then, that high vowel syncopation is sensitive to boundaries of strength + and is, therefore, blocked from applying to the u of zi + ryoku # kei. His analysis is correct, but his assignment of boundary strengths is rather arbitrary. Analyses such as the two above which appeal to boundary strength hierarchies have often been intuitively dissatisfying because of a lack of independent motivation. The relatively recent theory of lexical morphology and phonology as formulated by Kiparsky (1982) is ideally suited for this type of problem. One of the theory's most compelling attributes is that phonological processes may be put into a much broader context that includes morphological processes as well. This more integrated approach is often able to fit formerly isolated facts into a network of related facts to provide compelling independent motivation for diverse processes. The purpose of this thesis, then, is to fit i insertion, high vowel syncopation, and other Japanese phonological processes into the lexical phonology network to see exactly how they are related to each other and to the morphological phenomena of the language. / Arts, Faculty of / Linguistics, Department of / Graduate

Japanese honorifics (JH) are challenging for learners of Japanese language to acquire due to their complex grammatical formulas. Textbooks tend to assume that the explanation of grammatical rules and drill exercises focusing on the rules are sufficient for learners to be competent in JH. However, functional issues related to honorifics such as how to use honorifics in socioculturally appropriate ways or how to deal with non-linguistic aspects of honorifics are likely to be ignored. The present study questioned the assumptions entailed in the traditional formoriented approach to teaching language, and examined an oral interview activity carried out by 24 students in a Japanese language course at a Canadian university. In this activity, the students interviewed Japanese professors using JH, and several types of data (i.e., the researcher observations and interviews with the participants and student written reflections on the interviews) were analyzed in order to find out students' practice (i.e., what students did) of and theory (i.e., how students perceived) about JH and oral interviews. The findings of the study present a very complex picture of students' practice and theory; they were engaged not only in the formation of the rules of JH but also in the functional areas such as non-verbal behaviour and conversation management. The data also revealed that students were very much concerned with functional areas during the interviews. From these findings, the study emphasizes the importance offunctions embedded in JH, and suggests that the Japanese teacher help learners acquire the functional competence dealing with JH as well as the linguistic competence. / Education, Faculty of / Language and Literacy Education (LLED), Department of / Graduate

No description available.

The main purpose of this study is to determine the function of no and its place in Japanese Grammar in order to resolve heretofore unsolved problems concerning no. Initiated with this purpose, this dissertation presents an analysis of Words in Japanese with the idea of linguistic analysis based on functors and arguments within the framework largely drawn from Steele (1986), (1987), and (1988). For the formation of Words, we propose a set of rules which is defined in terms of a set of syntactic features which diverges considerably from previous works. Features in our work are not associated with such terms as N or V, but with finite closed-class elements such as particles and tense, from which features it is possible to predict the semantic generalization. Further, it is demonstrated that finite closed-class elements have an important syntactic function associated with them. Case particles are now considered as occupying a position which prenominal determiners have been taking, in the sense that they are a necessary element in an NP. However, they are not considered as a Word, but as part of the morphology of a Word, like other particles. This involves the idea that a Word is determined purely on phonological grounds as a pitch unit. On the base of these fundamental assumptions, our new approach to no enables us to account for every occurrence of no simply and elegantly.