Resuscitation of geolinguistics under integration of the dialectal radiation theory and the theory of division of dialects

2018 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 16K13232
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Japanese linguistics
• Research Institution: National Institute for Japanese Language and Linguistics
• Principal Investigator: Onishi Takuichiro 大学共同利用機関法人人間文化研究機構国立国語研究所, 言語変化研究領域, 教授 (30213797)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): 沢木 幹栄 信州大学, 人文学部, 名誉教授 (20110116)
• Project Period (FY): 2016-04-01 – 2019-03-31
• Keywords: 方言形成論 / 方言周圏論 / 方言区画論 / 言語地理学 / 方言分布の経年比較 / 領域形成 / 言語変化

Outline of Final Research Achievements

This study purpose to restart geolinguistics with integrating the dialect radiation theory and the theory of division of dialects; both of them have been thought as opposite theories. Both theories have common purpose in dialect formation where I put the goal in. I analyze the time span data of dialectal distributions of wide and narrow area. It has been appeared (1) it is hard to capture the radiating fact of dialects, (2) changes corresponded to dialectal division. Geolinguistics can resuscitate with adopting the view that dialects are language used by people living in geographical space.

Free Research Field

方言学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

方言分布を考察するにあたり、言語変化ならびに言語としての方言の持つ機能、方言の地域間相関の一般性と特異性に及ぼす人間の移動、方言を使う人間の社会構成や農産物を中心とした物流と空間領域のありかた等、言語はもちろんのこと、言語のみに閉じない知見からの分析を積極的に活用することで、方言周圏論と方言区画論を再考し、方言学の究極の目標である方言形成論を中核とした言語地理学の構築を進めた。