Towards TOPOS: A Place for Space in the Japanese grammar

MATELA, Jiří. Towards TOPOS: A Place for Space in the Japanese grammar. In Iaponica Brunensia 2017. 2017.

Basic information

• Original name: Towards TOPOS: A Place for Space in the Japanese grammar
• Name in Czech: K TOPOSu: Prostor pro místo v japonské gramatice
• Name (in English): Towards TOPOS: A Place for Space in the Japanese grammar
• Authors: MATELA, Jiří.
• Edition: Iaponica Brunensia 2017, 2017.

Other information

• Original language: Japanese
• Type of outcome: Presentations at conferences
• Field of Study: 60200 6.2 Languages and Literature
• Country of publisher: Czech Republic
• Confidentiality degree: is not subject to a state or trade secret
• Organization unit: Faculty of Arts
• Keywords (in Czech): japonština; lingvistika; věta; partikule wa; topos; téma
• Keywords in English: Japanese; linguistics; sentence; particle wa; topos; topic
• Tags: International impact

Abstract

The existence of the particle wa in the system of Japanese language has been a source of great number of discussions within the broad field of Japanese language studies. The function of wa has been associated with the concept of SUBJECT (at least since Ōtsuki Fumihiko), later also with the concept of TOPIC, what eventually lead to classification of Japanese as “Topic-Prominent (and Subject-Prominent) Language” (Li & Thompson, 1976). Recently, a contrasting function of wa has become rather exposed within the studies of toritate (focusing and de-focusing expressions). The double function of wa presents several problems. From the view of information structure, several other “topic markers” can be identified (e.g. tte, toieba, nante, ø etc.), which lefts the function of wa rather unclear. The relation of the “topic marker” and “toritate marker” functions is usually treated as a functional polysemy. The present paper takes the position of constructional approaches to grammar and presents a research aiming at establishing a general constructional schema for the [NP wa] construction. I call this schema TOPOS and argue for relevance of this category in the sentence structures of both Japanese and Czech language.

Abstract (in Czech)

Otázka funkce partikule wa v systému japonského jazyka je zdrojem mnoha diskusí v rámci širokého pole výzkumů japonského jazyka. Funkce této partikule byla analyzována jako vyjádření konceptu PODMĚT (přinejmenším od dob Fumihiko Ócuki-ho), později také jako vyjádření konceptu TÉMA, což také vedlo ke klasifikaci japonštiny jako jazyka "s prominencí tématu (a prominencí podmětu)" (Li a Thompson, 1976). V poslední době je funkce wa analyzována častěji v rámci výzkumu tzv. toritate (vytýkacích výrazů). Pojetí dvojí funkce partikule wa představuje několik problémů. Z hlediska informační struktury existuje řada jiných označení tématu (např. tte, toieba, nante aj.), což nechává skutečný obsahový plán partikule wa bez jednoznačného objasnění. Vztah mezi funkcemi označení tématu a označení vytčení je obvykle pojímána jako funkční polysémie. Přednesený příspěvek přistupuje k problému z perspektivy konstrukčních gramatik a představuje výzkum, jenž vede k zavední kategorie TOPOS coby jednotného obsahového schematu konstrukce [NP wa]. Rovněž je poukázáno na relevantnost této kategorie pro popis jazyků jiných (např. češtiny).

Abstract (in English)

The existence of the particle wa in the system of Japanese language has been a source of great number of discussions within the broad field of Japanese language studies. The function of wa has been associated with the concept of SUBJECT (at least since Ōtsuki Fumihiko), later also with the concept of TOPIC, what eventually lead to classification of Japanese as “Topic-Prominent (and Subject-Prominent) Language” (Li & Thompson, 1976). Recently, a contrasting function of wa has become rather exposed within the studies of toritate (focusing and de-focusing expressions). The double function of wa presents several problems. From the view of information structure, several other “topic markers” can be identified (e.g. tte, toieba, nante, ø etc.), which lefts the function of wa rather unclear. The relation of the “topic marker” and “toritate marker” functions is usually treated as a functional polysemy. The present paper takes the position of constructional approaches to grammar and presents a research aiming at establishing a general constructional schema for the [NP wa] construction. I call this schema TOPOS and argue for relevance of this category in the sentence structures of both Japanese and Czech language.