A Study of Negation in Contemporary Japanese
-- From the perspective of Teaching Japanese as A Foreign Language in Taiwan –
Summary
As many know, negation is an expression used widely in contemporary Japanese language. Its importance can be seen from the results of numerous language research papers. In the field of Teaching Japanese as A Foreign Language, or Japanese education, in Taiwan, the issues of how negation is introduced in various Japanese textbooks and what teaching methods are used to enhance learning effectiveness are the ones not to be overlooked.
The purpose of this thesis is to introduce the linguistic theories of Japanese to the teaching and learning of Japanese negation in Taiwan, and to discuss the features, roles in sentences, and related topics of negation with accuracy and objectivity. It is also hoped that the results of this thesis will be of contribution to the Japanese education in Taiwan, in the field of negation-expression.
The research focuses on the negation-expression of contemporary Japanese. Within which, the emphasis is placed on the teaching and learning of it in Taiwan. Example sentences have been collected from various Japanese textbooks and dictionaries, in a hope that through the analysis the actual education practices and learning effectiveness will be understood better.
The research is conducted on the basis of several theories including semantics, syntactics, pragmatics, as well as studies on Teaching Japanese as A Foreign Language. Apart from gaining an understanding toward the teaching and learning of Japanese negation expression in Taiwan, a large quantity of example sentences have also been collected for analysis purposes. Furthermore, by examining the translations done by learners and comparing the negation sentences between Mandarin and Japanese, the findings provide an insight into the how negation is used in these two languages.
This thesis is constructed into seven chapters as introduced below. The author argues that negation should be divided into two groups of ‘meaning negation’ and ‘format negation’ when studying it. In first chapter, the characteristics of the ‘meaning negation’ are especially looked at from a language formation perspective. The author believes that through this perspective learners will be able to see the diversity of negation expression in Japanese.
Second chapter focuses on ‘format negation’, dividing it into nine categories of ‘prohibition expression’, ‘request expression’, ‘euphemistic expression’, ‘double negation expression’, ‘invitation expression’, ‘request-confirmation expression’, ‘refusal expression’, ‘desire expression’, and ‘idiom expression’. Furthermore, analyses are made on example sentences collected from approximately thirty different textbooks.
Third chapter examines one of the frequently used negative question patterns, “のではないか (no dehanaika)”. Generalisation and analyses of word connotations are made from the example sentences of “のではないか”, collected from textbooks used by various Japanese institutions in Taiwan. In addition, the degree to which this pattern “のではないか” is mastered by learners is understood through their written translations.
Fourth chapter examines the features of double negation in Japanese language. The author emphasises the importance of negative expressions when discussing double negation. She believes that Japanese learners in Taiwan will be able to master the usage of double negation better if the meanings and purposes of negative expressions are fully understood.
In chapter five, the features of negation in Japanese are demonstrated through the aspect of vocabulary. The chapter places its discussion around the word, “全然 (zen zen)”. Example sentences of “全然”, collected from various literature by the author, are divided into 12 patterns. These sentences are then further examined from a syntactical aspect to discover the co-occurrence relations between “全然” and affirmative and negative sentences.
Chapter six discusses the role of the particle “ハ (ha)” in negative expressions. It also examines the relations between the two through an analysis of all the negative sentences that contain the particle “ハ”. The author believes that applying the findings of this research to teaching will help promote the understanding of their relations, which in turn, will enhance learning effectiveness.
Finally, seventh chapter marks the conclusion. This chapter includes summarizations of each chapter and the research findings of the thesis. Topics for further studies are also discussed in this section.