Volume 37, Issue 1

Kawahara, Noto, and Kumagai (2018b) found that within the corpus of existing Pokémon names, the number of voiced obstruents in the characters’ names correlates positively with their weight, height, evolution levels and attack values. While later experimental studies to some extent confirmed the productivity of these sound symbolic relationships (e.g. Kawahara and Kumagai 2019a), they are limited, due to the fact that the visual images presented to the participants primarily differed with regard to evolution levels. The current experiments thus for the first time directly explored how each of these semantic dimensions—weight, height, evolution levels, and attack values—correlates with the number of voiced obstruents in nonce names. The results of two judgment experiments show that all of these parameters indeed correlate positively with the number of voiced obstruents in the names. Overall, the results show that a particular class of sounds—in our case, a set of voiced obstruents—can signal different semantic meanings within a single language, supporting the pluripotentiality of sound symbolism (Winter, Pérez-Sobrino, and Brown 2019). We also address another general issue that has been under-explored in the literature on sound symbolism; namely, its cumulative nature. In both of the experiments, we observe that two voiced obstruents evoke stronger images than one voiced obstruent, instantiating what is known as the counting cumulativity effect (Jäger and Rosenbach 2006).

This paper provides a comprehensive description and analysis of Japanese apophonic compounds, such as ama-gasa ( ame  +  kasa ), ko-kage ( ki  +  kage ) or kamu - tikara ( kami + tikara ), in which the initial element exhibits one of three different pairs of final vowel alternations. The three pairs involved are e ∼ a , i ∼ o , and i ∼ u . To determine the controlling factors for apophony, its morphological function, its overall characteristics and its interaction with other compositional devices of Japanese (mainly rendaku) we constructed a database of 2,322 compounds. Each compound has as an element at least one of 22 “apophonic nouns” which may undergo vowel alternation when the initial element in a compound. The core results of this study are that there exists a range of morphological, lexical and phonological factors which tend to favour or disfavour apophony. The phonological factors mostly pertain to the length of either element in the compound. Further, it was also found that apophony is generally not linked, either positively (redundancy of morphological devices) or negatively (economy of morphological devices), to rendaku.

This paper examines the emergent new usage of the Japanese adverb hutuuni . For most speakers of Japanese, this adverb means ‘ordinarily, usually, normally’, but among young adult speakers of Japanese, it has come to be used as an intensifier. Based on blog and conversation data as well as two surveys, the paper identifies wide ranging new senses of hutuuni , such as ‘very’, ‘fairly/pretty’, ‘contrary to or more than what I expected’, ‘not flattery’, and ‘honestly, speaking a true mind’. Focusing on its intensifier function, Imoto, Ryō. 2011. ‘Futsūni kawaī’-kō [A study of ‘Futsūni cute]. Shōgaku Ronshū 79(4). 59–75 proposes a scale analysis. Noticing that hutuuni typically occurs in a context where the expected level is set low, he argues that the function of hutuuni is to upgrade the level to the hutuu ‘standard’ level. He states that the intensifier usage is not the result of the semantic change of hutuu . The present study, on the other hand, suggests that the intensifier usage of hutuuni involves both syntactic and semantic change. Syntactically, hutuuni which is a verb modifier has come to modify adjectives, which has contributed to its new intensifier function. Semantically, we propose two possible paths to a degree word/intensifier for hutuuni , in line with the framework of the ‘subjectification’ and ‘intersubjectification’ of meaning proposed in Traugott, Elizabeth Closs. 2003. From subjectification to intersubjectification. In Raymond Hickey (ed.), Motives for language change , 124–139. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Using data from interviews and television programs where social demeanor must be observed by the speaker, this study examines what the Japanese speaker does when reporting a transitive event where the speaker is the Undergoer and the Actor is someone they are expected to express respect toward. The speaker’s decision in such contexts is influenced by two seemingly conflicting motivations, i.e. tell a story from a speaker’s perspective by placing empathy on self (the “Speech-Act Empathy Hierarchy”) (Kuno, Susumu & Etsuko Kaburaki. 1977. Empathy and syntax. Linguistic Inquiry 8(4). 627–672) or give up this privilege of empathy in consideration for the respected Actor in the event. The study suggests that social consideration takes precedence over of the Speech-Act Empathy Hierarchy unless both are satisfied simultaneously. This study identified further factors that appear to be at work: productivity of the construction, desire to portray themselves as an affected Undergoer of the event, and reluctance to convey a sense of benefit.