On expressions of agent de-topicalized intentional events: A contrastive study between Japanese and Russian

Abstract

In this paper differences in the depiction of the same event are described, setting forth the hypothesis that naturality of language or any language-likeness is due to differences in the construal of the objective world. As a case study, this paper considers how we express intentional events involving an agent that is unspecified or not important. To answer this question, data were collected from the same scene of a parallel corpus translated from Japanese to Russian (and vice versa). I then quantified the differences between the languages in the distribution of the constructions used, i.e., passive, indefinite-personal or active, intransitive, V-te aru construction or transitive, perfective or imperfective; and then determined what expressions are favored in each of the two languages. The data were then analyzed in detail to determine why these differences occur. The study yielded the following results.

I. In expressing a process, in Japanese, a passive construction is used, whereas in Russian, a passive indefinite-personal sentence is often used. In addition, in Russian, an active construction is sometimes used.

II. In expressing the results, in Japanese, an intransitive sentence tends to be used more often. In Russian, various expressions are used, including passive and intransitive sentences.

III. The difference between Japanese and Russian lies in the different ways of construal, that is, whether or not a speaker seizes and depicts events subjectively from the vantage point of the patient.