English Produced by Japanese L2 Users: A Preliminary Analysis of Grammatical Forms

136 Pages·2023·2.1 MB·English

by  Toshiko Yamaguchi

Toshiko Yamaguchi
English
Produced
by Japanese
L2 Users
A Preliminary Analysis of Grammatical
Forms
English Produced by Japanese L2 Users
Toshiko Yamaguchi
English Produced
by Japanese L2 Users
A Preliminary Analysis of Grammatical
Forms
123
ToshikoYamaguchi
University of Malaya
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
ISBN978-981-19-3884-9 ISBN978-981-19-3885-6 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-3885-6
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Preface
This book has been written to provide an initial overview of the grammar of
Japanese English. The motivation for this endeavor is threefold: first, the signifi-
canceoftheEnglishlanguageintheworldweliveintoday;second,thenoteworthy
nature of the English language used by non-native speakers; and third, the need to
understand how non-native speakers handle English. The importance of under-
standingdifferentvarietiesofnon-nativeEnglishisevidentgiventhefactthatthere
aremorenon-nativethannativespeakersofEnglishintheworld.Nevertheless,our
systematicknowledgeofsuchvarieties,suchasJapaneseEnglish,ispoor.Mypoint
ofdepartureforthisbookwastodescribethelanguageitself.Indoingso,Irefrain
from adopting a framework to lay out the research, choosing instead to be open,
empirical, and inductive. The conviction I have gained from looking at raw data
overthepastfewyears,or,moreprecisely,sinceIstartedmakingaudiorecordings
in December 2016, is that there are certain fundamental links between L1 and L2,
and I understood that the nature of these links needed to be clarified before they
could be examined in terms of highly articulated concepts such as localness, na-
tivization, fluidity, or construction, and naturally this recognition led me to the
intriguing multi-competence perspective that had already captured scholars’
attention.Ichosetofocusongrammarduetomybackgroundinlinguisticsandmy
belief in its centrality in structuring non-native English. Every language needs
grammar to operate. Due to its framework-free nature, this book may be charac-
terized as an outlier, for better or worse, but it will have achieved its goal if the
reader gains a sound understanding of how Japanese English works, or what
Japanese users of English actually do with it. I am grateful to Springer Nature
Singapore for including this study in its impressive repertoire on linguistics and
applied linguistics.
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Toshiko Yamaguchi
v
Contents
1 Background of the Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.2 ELT in Japan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.3 Four Assumptions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.4 Standard/Nonstandard English and Native/Nonnative
Speakers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
1.5 Japanese English. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
1.6 Recordings. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
1.6.1 Participants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
1.6.2 Topics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
1.6.3 Compilation of a Data Set and a Small Corpus . . . . . . . 14
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
2 Multi-competence: Beginning with Three Factors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
2.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
2.2 Three Premises and Four Scenarios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
2.2.1 Three Premises . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
2.2.2 Four Scenarios. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
2.3 Multi-competence Viewed from Usage-Based Linguistics . . . . . . 23
2.4 Three Factors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
2.4.1 Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
2.4.2 L1 Transfer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
2.4.3 Analogy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
2.4.4 L2 Innovation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
2.5 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
vii
viii Contents
3 A Sketch of the Structure of the Japanese Language . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
3.2 Sentence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
3.2.1 SOV Language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
3.2.2 Particles and Topic. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
3.2.3 Co-reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
3.3 Tense and Aspect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
3.4 Phrases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
3.5 Prepositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
3.6 Plural Nouns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
4 Prepositions in EJLU . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
4.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
4.2 Distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
4.3 Exploring Prepositions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
4.3.1 In . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
4.3.2 Of. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
4.3.3 To. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
4.3.4 For . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
4.3.5 About . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
4.3.6 With . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
4.3.7 At . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
4.3.8 From. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
4.3.9 On . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
4.3.10 Between . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
4.3.11 Inside . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
4.3.12 Outside, Into, Over. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
4.4 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
4.4.1 Summary of Frequency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
4.4.2 Summary of the Chapter. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
4.4.3 Commenting on Multi-competence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
5 Plural Nouns in EJLU . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
5.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
5.2 Distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
5.2.1 General . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
5.2.2 Nonstandard Usage of Plural Nouns . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
5.3 Exploring Plural Nouns. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
5.3.1 Concrete/Standard Marking. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
5.3.2 Concrete/Nonstandard Marking. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
5.3.3 Abstract/Standard Marking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
5.3.4 Abstract/Nonstandard Marking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Contents ix
5.4 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
5.4.1 Summary of Frequency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96
5.4.2 Summary of the Chapter. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
5.4.3 Commenting on Multi-competence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
6 A Glance at Other Grammatical Items in EJLU . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
6.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
6.2 Articles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
6.3 Past Tense . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
6.4 Present Progressive. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
6.5 Present Perfect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
6.6 The First Person Singular Pronoun . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
6.7 Relative Pronouns. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
6.8 Co-reference. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
6.9 Sentence Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
6.9.1 Topic-Comment. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
6.9.2 Coordination . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114
6.9.3 Semantic Transparency. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
6.9.4 Agreement with the Nearest Item . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
6.10 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
7 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
7.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
7.2 Subjectivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
7.3 Concreteness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
7.4 Encyclopedic Knowledge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
7.5 Usage Events and Codes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
7.6 Concluding Remarks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
Afterword .... .... .... .... ..... .... .... .... .... .... ..... .... 127
Abbreviations
ACC Accusative case
AE American English
ASP Aspect
B Benefit
con Contextualization
CONJP Conjunctive particle
COP Copula
DIR Direction
EFL English as a foreign language
EIL English as an international language
EJLU English produced by Japanese L2 users
ELF English as a lingua franca
ELT English language teaching
F Female
Fac. Factor
Freq. Frequency
FT Free talk
J Japanese
JE Japanese English
L1 First language
L2 Second language
LOC Location
LP Language proficiency
M Male
MC Multi-competence
MJE Hino’s model of Japanese English
N Noun
NE Native English
near Nearness
NMLZ Nominalizer
xi
xii Abbreviations
NNE Non-native English
NNEs Non-native Englishes
NNSE Non-native speaker of English
NNSEs Non-native speakers of English
No. Number
NOM Nominative case
NSE Native speaker of English
NSEs Native speakers of English
P Purpose
p Preposition
POL Politeness marker
POSS Possessive marker
PROG Progressive aspect
PRS Present tense marker
PUR Purpose
rear Rearrangement
S Specification
SE Standard English
Sem. Semantic
SFP Sentence final particle
SLA Second language acquisition
SN Serial number
SOV Subject–object–verb
TL Target language
TOP Topic marker
V Verb
WE World Englishes