Folk agricultural plot names and physical-social conditions in Japanese vilages

2014 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 23520952
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Human geography
• Research Institution: Kyushu University (2012-2014); Osaka Kyoiku University (2011)
• Principal Investigator: IMAZATO Satoshi 九州大学, 人文科学研究科(研究院), 准教授 (90324730)
• Project Period (FY): 2011-04-28 – 2015-03-31
• Keywords: 小地名 / 村落空間 / 空間認知 / 認知言語学 / 文化的景観 / 宗教分布 / 社会構造

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Although some geographers, folklorists, and social linguists have studied minor place names within Japanese rural villages, few have focused on the individual plot names of the areas characterized by rice paddies and dry fields surrounded by ridges. These plot names, which account for the smallest unit of place names within a Japanese village, are mainly used within a single household. This study showed the key findings on the naming methods of such folk plot names, based on case studies of Japanese villages in Shiga and Nagasaki Prefectures. It argued that the villagers name each plot using four cognitive linguistic methods: simplified attributes, part-whole relationships, spatial adjacency, and temporal adjacency. Based on the physical conditions, the frequencies of using such principles differ among villages. In addition, this study examined social and historical conditions as contexts of such naming methods of the case-study villages.

Free Research Field

人文地理学