Journal of Historical Pragmatics - Volume 8, Issue 2, 2007

This paper investigates the correlation between semantic-pragmatic change of (inter)subjectification and its syntactic effects. It points out that the diachronic change of subjectification > intersubjectification (Traugott 2003) finds its synchronic counterpart in the rigid predicate order of Japanese. Furthermore, paying closer attention to a layered model in Japanese traditional linguistics, it claims that Japanese episodes of (inter)subjectification display core to peripheral positional shifts of grammaticalized items. In contrast, the opposite directionality is exhibited with the case of possible desubjectification (imperative > conditional). Putting these issues all together, the paper questions syntactic scope decrease as a parameter of grammaticalization, and supports instead structural scope increase, as in “C-command scope increase” (Tabor and Traugott 1998), “raising/upwards movement” (Roberts and Roussou 2003) and “syntactic impoverishment” (Company forthcoming a, b). Aside from this specific focus, this paper is also an attempt to synthesize the rich tradition of Japanese linguistic studies on subjectivity with their Western counterparts.

This article discusses the process of (inter)subjectification in grammatical constructions including tte, which is known as the quotative complementizer in present-day Japanese. About 170 instances of tte constructions that appeared in the conversational data spanning over 200 years are analyzed, focusing on three major types of constructions: the quotative tte construction, the topic-introducing construction, and the constructions with tte as utterance-final pragmatic particles. There are morphosyntactic changes concomitant to the process of (inter)subjectification; for example, the quality of the “quoted” element preceding tte has been extended to include less utterance-like materials. In addition, the “main” verb iu ‘say’ that is associated with the quotative tte has lost its verbal characteristics in the topic construction and disappears in the utterance-final particle construction. Subjectification, as well as intersubjectification, is observed locally in each position: after the quoted element, after the topic noun, and at the utterance-final position.

This paper explores the interplay of (inter)subjectivity and social norm. (Inter)subjectification is a diachronic process, strengthening the speaker’s (inter)subjective meanings. However, when language change, including (inter)subjectification, occurs, what roles do society or any other social factor play in such change? To address this question, I suggest a specific mechanism behind the speaker’s choice of linguistic forms. As episodes exemplifying intersubjectification, the meaning shifts of Japanese “involvement markers”, na elements, are examined. Their meaning shifts include: (1) from “self-addressed” (subjective) to “other-addressed” (intersubjective) meanings; and (2) from intersubjective to more intersubjective meanings. The (inter)subjective conversational strategies with the use of na elements contribute to fulfill one Japanese social norm, “harmony (wa)” (Ide and Kataoka 2002: v; Nakane 1970: 49). In this paper, the close connection between intersubjectivity and social norm is also shown, being supported by a classic cross-linguistic study of European T-V languages (Brown and Gilman 1960) and a cross-linguistic analysis of Korean and Japanese intersubjectification.

Grammaticalization of modal markers has long been thought of in terms of change from deontic to epistemic meaning. This change, then, is typically thought of as a mapping between conceptual domains. Contrary to this perception, I argue in this paper that (1) change from deontic to epistemic (that is, the acquisition of epistemic meaning by deontic markers), although salient in many European languages, is cross-linguistically a marginal tendency, (2), the cross-linguistically most salient tendency in the development of modal markers is towards greater speaker-orientation, and (3), this change can best be explained by primarily referring to pragmatic processes, rather than conceptual processes. I substantiate my claims by analyzing the cross-linguistic modality data in Bybee et al. (1994), by providing a catalogue of etymologies of Modern Japanese modal markers, and by analyzing the polysemy and semantic change of one specific marker in Japanese language history (-be-si) in detail.

In this paper the importance of distinguishing synchronic (inter)subjectivity and diachronic (inter)subjectification is stressed. Questions are posed concerning the robustness of hypotheses about matches between semantic function and syntactic position at the left or right periphery of the clause in Japanese, the extent to which subtypes of (inter)subjective function constrain the direction of shift over time, and the optimal unit of analysis (sentence, clause, or intonation unit).

This paper presents a “relativized” assessment of the analyses on subjectification and intersubjectification in Japanese presented in the four case studies (this issue), particularly through a comparison with Korean which shows remarkable similarity to Japanese in terms of morpho-syntactic structures and discursive practices.