Use of Japanese Honorifics in Daily Life: What the Traditional Theories Do Not Say.

要旨

This study investigated how native Japanese speakers use honorifics in everyday social interaction. Honorifics are affixes, words, and formulaic phrases that follow linguistic and sociolinguistic rules and are believed to mark a speaker's politeness toward an addressee or another referenced person. The honorific system is incorporated into most aspects of Japanese grammar. This study examines the validity of traditional theory and previous empirical research on Japanese honorifics by exploring how a Japanese speaker's use of them is related to characteristics of the speech situation. Using ethnographic methods, data were gathered from conversations of four Japanese speakers with various interlocutors in their daily lives. Results indicate that: (1) utterance type is highly influential in determining a speaker's use or non-use of honorifics; and (2) honorifics and used far more in creative and expressive ways (e.g., criticism, sarcasm, playfulness) than traditional theory recognizes. It is concluded that such creative use of honorifics represents an important dimension of Japanese, and that theory not taking this usage into account is therefore incomplete. Contains 12 references. (Author/MSE) ******************************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. ******************************************************************************** .S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION Off e of Educational Research and Improvement CATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATIOlg CENTER (ERIC) This document has been reproduced as ' received from the person or organization originating it. 13 Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction quality. 6 Points of view or opinions stated in this document do not necessarily represent official OERI position or policy. Use of Japanese Honorifics in Daily Life: What the Traditional Theories Do Not Say Yoshiko Okushi PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE AND DISSEMINATE THIS MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) , 1 This study investigates how Japanese speakers use honorifics in everyday social interaction. Honorifics are affixes, words, and formulaic phrases that follow linguistic and sociolinguistic rules and that are believed to mark a speaker's politeness toward an addressee or another referenced person. The honorific system is incorporated in to most parts of Japanese grammar. Most empirical sociolinguistic research on Japanese honorifics has employed questionnaires and interviews which rely on self-reporting by speakers and are not based on everyday speech acts. The empirical evidence suggests, however, that research based on real speech interactions produces results that are often at odds with results derived from purely self-reported empirical research. This study examines the validity of the traditional theory and previous empirical research on Japanese honorifics by addressing the question of how a Japanese speaker's use of honorifics is related to characteristics of the speech situation. In order to address this question an ethnographic approach was used to collect data from conversations of four Japanese speakers with various interlocutors in their daily lives. Results indicate that: (1) utterance type is a highly influential factor in determining a speaker's use and non-use of honorifics; and (2) honorifics are used far more in creative and expressive ways -for expressions such as criticism, sarcasm, and playfulness -than the traditional theory recognizes. The study concludes that the creative use of honorifics represents an important dimension of Japanese honorifics, and disregarding this dimension leaves any description or instruction of Japanese honorifics incomplete. This study investigates how Japanese speakers use honorifics in everyday social interaction. Honorifics are affixes, words, and formulaic phrases that follow linguistic and sociolinguistic rules and that are

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