A study on how to translate Japanese "de" nominals into English

2019 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 16K02917
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Foreign language education
• Research Institution: Shinshu University
• Principal Investigator: KATO Kozo 信州大学, 学術研究院総合人間科学系, 教授 (20169501)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): 花崎 一夫 信州大学, 学術研究院総合人間科学系, 准教授 (40319009) ; Mehmet Sean 松本大学, 教育学部, 准教授 (90751628)
• Project Period (FY): 2016-04-01 – 2020-03-31
• Keywords: 格助詞 / 前置詞 / デ格

Outline of Final Research Achievements

We have studied how Japanese "de" nominals are translated in the English edition of a newspaper's editorials. We have found the following. (1) If there is a "de" nominal but no agentive subject in a Japanese sentence, then the "de" nominal is converted to the subject in the English sentence. This comes from the fact that adverbials (like "de" nominals) are more often and more easily used in Japanese than in English. (2) Event nominals like "kaigi" (meeting) with "de" are translated using "during" if the event is regarded as a time period, using "in" when the event has some time length, and using "at" otherwise. (3) "de" is a last-resort Case marker; "de" is used when other Case makers are unavailable.

Free Research Field

英語学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

英語には少なからぬ数の前置詞があるが，日本語で格助詞は限られており，特にデはニ・カラ・マデに比べて非常に守備範囲が広く，デはニ・カラ・マデがカバーしない意味関係を一手に引き受けている。従って，日本語を英語にする時には，デに対してどういう英語表現を当てるのかが難しい。そのため，日本語社説文に現れる名詞＋デをその英語版でどう訳しているかを調査した本研究の成果は，英語教育現場や日本語をベースとして英文を作っていく作業において役立つことが期待できる。