Resarch on the Ama-machi dialect in Ishikawa Prefecture

2015 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 25370514
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Japanese linguistics
• Research Institution: Kanazawa University
• Principal Investigator: Nitta Tetsuo 金沢大学, 歴史言語文化学系, 教授 (90172725)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): KIBE Nobuko 人間文化研究機構国立国語研究所, 言語変異研究領域, 教授 (30192016) ; KUBO Tomoyuki 九州大学, 人文科学研究科(研究院), 教授 (30214993)
• Project Period (FY): 2013-04-01 – 2016-03-31
• Keywords: 海士町方言 / 言語の島

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Residents of Ama-machi in Wajima City are said to immigrate from Kanezaki in northern Kyushu in the late 16th century. Their dialect is different in many ways from the dialects of the surrounding Noto area, and is attractive to linguists as a subject of studies on the relation between language changes and its settlement. This dialect shows some common characteristics to one of northern Kyushu which is the putative homeland of the residents. This survey reveals the manifestations of the ‘island of language’ of Ama-machi with regard to the issue on their homeland, the aspectual form 'yoru', the vowel coalescences, the accent system, and the pronoun of this dialect.

Free Research Field

言語学