Aaron P. Cooley and Dr. Masakazu Watabe, Asian and Near Eastern Languages
The main focus of this project was to highlight, explain, and reconcile differences between Japanese and English conceptualization as it pertains to verbs and adjectives. Verbs are arguably the most troublesome element of Japanese for the foreign student. Whereas most textbooks deal with the syntactic aspect of verb conjugation, or form, and leave it at that, my research illuminated some of the more subtle, yet equally important grammatical differences between the way verbs are used, or function, and more importantly, the conceptualization underlying this function. This area has been of special interest to Dr. Masakazu Watabe since he began teaching Japanese. My aim was to explore these concepts under his guidance and explain them clearly and accurately so that students can begin to conceptualize in the same way Japanese do. The eventual goal of this research is that it will be used in a beginning level textbook for Japanese learners. Surprisingly, as elementary and vital as these concepts are to Japanese speaking ability, they are generally not even discussed until very advanced stages in learning the language, and when such discussions do appear, they are found almost exclusively in linguistic journals and highly academic grammar treatises which are targeted at the expert rather than the beginning student.
The fact is that Japanese linguistics is still a young field, especially compared to the study of European languages. While most scholars agree on the problems encountered by foreigners in attempting to master Japanese, few agree on how to solve those problems. Thus, there are many different theories explaining verb behavior, none being completely accepted by the scholarly community at large. My research into the behavior of verbs resulted in easy to understand explanations of troublesome aspects of learning that delve into the essentials without getting bogged down in detail. This makes them ideal for a beginning grammar textbook as they alert students to the conceptual difference without forcing them to work through every exception.
Most of my research was done by discussion with Dr. Watabe, inventing various ways to explain these concepts clearly. Where necessary, a variety of linguistic articles and texts were consulted to compare and contrast varying explanations and theories in order to determine which points were the most applicable and useful to the elementary learner. Explanations were drafted, written, revised, and rewritten, and new ideas emerged in this process which caused us to go back and restructure the entire report several times. We finally arrived upon what has proven to be a stable structure, and proceeded from there.
Much terminology was developed, discussed, refined, and finally applied into the text of the research. Because there is no universally accepted set of terminology do describe different aspects of Japanese grammar, most of the terminology used in my report had to be created. The criteria used were that each term be accurate and unambiguous, capture the essence of what it describes, and be easy for a non-linguist to understand. For example, what Japanese call keiyoushi are variously called “adjectives,” “descriptive verbs,” and “verbal adjectives” by existing sources; I simply called them “i-adjectives” since they all end in the sound i. Terminology specific to this research includes: (a, i, u, e, o)-form, action verb, bound noun, consonant verb, i-adjective, i-adjective-like suffix, na-adjective, na-adjective-like suffix, quantifier, stative verb, time noun, verb-like suffix, vowel verb.
The meat of the work was clarifying differences between how Japanese and English speakers conceptualize verbs. For example, most textbooks explain the te iru by translating it as the progressive, or -ing form in English. In actuality, this explanation only fits one subset of te iru uses. I explained that te iru does not simply equal -ing, and broke it down into three uses, giving examples of each and explaining why certain verbs indicating a change of state never become progressive in this form. This threefold explanation will aid the student in conceptualizing these verb form the way Japanese do rather than simply translating it into English. I also explained how to translate a number of common English change-of-state verbs into Japanese, which verbs require a different Japanese conceptualization (e.g. “dying” must be translated as “will soon die,” “going” must be translated as “headed toward,” etc.) The research also clarified functional and semantic differences between verbs which describe a state and verbs which describe an action.
Another aspect of verb usage explained in this research is the variety of uses of the te form. Most textbooks describe it simply as a connective form, translating it as “and,” or “and then.” My research explained other, more subtle uses of the form including as a light command, trailing off at the end of the sentence, as an adverbial clause, and as an indicator of cause-and-effect. I talked about cases where a verb is used in Japanese even though an adjective would be called for in English. For example, the word “fat” is given as futoi in most dictionaries. However, for living things, the verb futoru “to grow fat” is used instead. These differences may appear unimportant to a foreign speaker, but seem obvious to a native Japanese. By learning which circumstances warrant a verb rather than an adjective, a host of common mistakes can be avoided.
The report touched on the subjective nature of i-adjectives, a topic which is extremely important but only rarely mentioned by most textbooks. Though the research in this area is still unclear, it is apparent that i-adjectives have a high level of subjectivity, and are so because they indicate the speaker’s feeling about a situation. An English speaker says “I’m cold” and talks about the temperature; a Japanese speaker says samui and talks about what the temperature is doing to his own feelings. This explains why a Japanese speaker can say “I’m cold,” but not “He is cold.” Explaining this conceptual difference will correct common mistakes made by Japanese learners.
There still remains much work to be done on the subject before the research is ready to be published into a textbook. However, the six chapters of the first and most elementary unit explaining the major parts of speech and sentence structure is mostly completed. Specifically regarding verbs, the concept of vector (as in kureru and ageru) still needs to be researched, as well as differences between transitive and intransitive forms. I discovered as I did my research that there was a lot more to learn and explain about the basics of verbs than I had imagined, and so I limited my research to those basics. However, the final textbook will include in-depth discussions of these and other concepts necessary to an accurate and substantial understanding of the Japanese language. Finally, the textbook will need to be tested in a classroom setting to see if it achieves the desired improvements in speaking and writing ability. Dr. Watabe and I continue to work on the book, and look forward to seeing it in use as soon as possible