A typological survey on focus-marking in Ryukyuan languages

2018 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 16K16843
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (B)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Japanese linguistics
• Research Institution: Kyushu University
• Principal Investigator: Shimoji Michinori 九州大学, 人文科学研究院, 准教授 (80570621)
• Project Period (FY): 2016-04-01 – 2019-03-31
• Keywords: 言語学 / 日本語学 / 方言学 / 情報構造 / 言語類型論 / 琉球諸語

Outline of Final Research Achievements

The present study is a cross-dialectal survey of the relationship between various kinds of foci and their formal encodings in Ryukyuan languages. On the one hand, the present study is descriptive, dealing with a hitherto untouched issue of dialectal variation among Ryukyuan languages with regard to the usage of morphological focus-marking such as du and ga. By examining fifteen Ryukyuan languages, it has been shown that there is a considerable dialectal variation with regard to focus-marking and that the relevant factors are focus function and focus domain (argument vs. predicate, etc.). On the other hand, the present study is typological, giving a consistent model that explains the observed variation and makes predictions about the possible language patterns and impossible ones in the form of a pair of hierarchies, Focus Type Hierarchy (Contrastive Focus > WHA Focus (the focus of the answer to a WHQ) > WHQ Focus) and Focus Domain Hierarchy (Argument > Predicate).

Free Research Field

琉球諸語の記述、言語類型論

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

これまでの琉球語学では、焦点助詞の使用に関する方言差が注目されておらず、焦点があるところには焦点助詞が使われるものと漠然と想定されてきた。しかし、経験的に、「北琉球語では焦点助詞がなかなか聞かれないが、南琉球ではよく聞かれる」という印象はどのフィールドワーカーも持っていたのも事実である。本研究は、この印象論的な方言差を初めて明確にし、かつ予測可能な形で一般化した点に大きな学術的意義がある。