This volume is the first comprehensive handbook of Japanese phonetics and phonology describing the basic phonetic and phonological structures of modern Japanese with main focus on standard Tokyo Japanese. Its primary goal is to provide a comprehensive overview and descriptive generalizations of major phonetic and phonological phenomena in modern Japanese by reviewing important studies in the fields over the past century. It also presents a summary of interesting questions that remain unsolved in the literature. The volume consists of eighteen chapters in addition to an introduction to the whole volume. In addition to providing descriptive generalizations of empirical phonetic/phonological facts, this volume also aims to give an overview of major phonological theories including, but not restricted to, traditional generative phonology, lexical phonology, prosodic morphology, intonational phonology, and the more recent Optimality Theory. It also touches on theories of speech perception and production. This book serves as a comprehensive guide to Japanese phonetics and phonology for all interested in linguistics and speech sciences.

This volume will be the first full-length exploration in any language of the details of the history of the Japanese language written by experts in the different subfields of linguistics. Overall, while including factual and background information, the volume will focus on presenting original research of lasting value. This includes presenting the latest research on better studied topics, such as segmental phonology, accent or focus constructions, as well as both introducing areas of study which have traditionally been underrepresented, such as syntax or kanbun materials, and showing how they contribute to a fuller understanding of all of the history of Japanese. Chapter titles Introduction Part I: Individual Periods of the Japanese Language Section 1: Prehistory and Reconstruction Chapter 1: Comparison with other languages (John Whitman, NINJAL) Chapter 2: Reconstruction based on external sources: Ainu, Chinese dynastic histories, and Korean chronicles (Alexander Vovin, University of Hawai'i at Manoa) Chapter 3: Reconstruction from the standpoint of Ryukyuan (Thomas Pellard, CNRS) Chapter 4: (Morpho)phonological reconstruction (Teruhiro Hayata) Chapter 5: Morpho(phono)logical reconstruction (Bjarke Frellesvig, University of Oxford) Chapter 6: Towards the accentual reconstruction of Japanese (Akiko Matsumori, NINJAL) Section II: Old Japanese Chapter 7: Word order and alignment (Yuko Yanagida, University of Tsukuba) Chapter 8: What mokkan can tell us about Old and pre-Old Japanese (Takashi Inukai, Aichi Prefectural University) Chapter 9: Eastern Old Japanese (Kerri Russell) Section III: Early Middle Japanese Chapter 10: Morphosyntax (Yoshiyuki Takayama, Fukui University) Chapter 11: Varieties of kakarimusubi in Early Middle Japanese (Charles Quinn, The Ohio State University) Chapter 12: Linguistic variation (Takuya Okimori) Section IV: Late Middle Japanese Chapter 13: The morphosyntax of Late Middle Japanese (Hirofumi Aoki, Kyushu University) Chapter 14: Late Middle Japanese phonology, based on Korean materials (Sven Osterkamp, Bochum University) Chapter 15: Phonology, based on Christian materials (Masayuki Toyoshima) Section V: Modern Japan Chapter 16: The social context of materials on Early Modern Japanese (Michinao Morohoshi, Kokugakuin University) Chapter 17: Meiji language, including what sound recordings can tell us (Yasuyuki Shimizu) Chapter 18: Syntactic influence of European languages on Japanese (Satoshi Kinsui, Osaka University) Part II: Materials and Writing Section VI: Writing Chapter 19: Old and Early Middle Japanese writing (James Unger, The Ohio State University) Chapter 20: The continued use of kanji in writing Japanese (Shinji Konno, Seisen University) Chapter 21: History of indigenous innovations in kanji and kanji usage [particularly: kokuji and wasei kango] (Yoshihiko Inui) Chapter 22: From hentai kanbun to sorobun (Tsutomu Yada) Section VII: Kanbun-based Materials Chapter 23: Kunten texts of Buddhist provenance (Masayuki Tsukimoto, Tokyo University) Chapter 24: Kunten Texts of Secular Chinese Provenance (Teiji Kosukegawa) Chapter 25: Vernacularized written Chinese (waka kanbun) (Shingo Yamamoto, Shirayuri Women's University) Chapter 26: Early modern kanbun and kanbun kundoku (Fumitoshi Saito, Nagoya University) Chapter 27: A comparison of glossing traditions in Japan and Korea (John Whitman, NINJAL) Chapter 28: Influence of kanbun-kundoku on Japanese (Valerio Alberizzi, Waseda University) Part III: Broader Changes over Time Section VIII: Lexis/Pragmatics Chapter 29: History of basic vocabulary (John Bentley, University of Northern Illinois) Chapter 30: History of Sino-Japanese vocabulary (Seiya Abe and Akihiro Okajima) Chapter 31: The history of mimetics in Japanese (Masahiro Ono, Meiji University) Chapter 32: The history of honorifics and polite language (Yukiko Moriyama, Doshisha University) Chapter 33: History of demonstratives and pronouns (Tomoko Okazaki) Chapter 34: History of yakuwarigo (Satoshi Kinsui, Osaka University) Chapter 35: 'Subject-Object Merger' and 'Subject-Object Opposition' as the speaker's stance: 'Subjective Construal' as 'a fashion of speaking' for Japanese speakers (Yoshihiko Ikegami, University of Tokyo) Section IX: Phonology Chapter 36: Syllable structure, phonological typology, and outstanding issues in the chronology of sound changes (Bjarke Frellesvig, Sven Osterkamp and John Whitman Chapter 37: Sino-Japanese (Marc Miyake) Chapter 38: Development of accent, based on historical sources, Heian period onwards: The formation of Ibuki-jima accent (Makoto Yanaike, Keio University) Chapter 39: The Ramsey hypothesis (Elisabeth De Boer) Section X: Syntax Chapter 40: Generative diachronic syntax of Japanese (John Whitman, NINJAL) Chapter 41: On the merger of the conclusive/adnominal distinction (Satoshi Kinsui, Osaka University) Chapter 42: Development of case marking (Takashi Nomura, University of Tokyo) Chapter 43: Loss of Wh movement (Akira Watanabe, University of Tokyo) Chapter 44: Development of delimiter/semantic particles (Tomohide Kinuhata) Chapter 45: Electronic corpora as a tool for investigating syntactic change (Yasuhiro Kondo, Aoyama Gakuin/NINJAL) Part IV: The History of Research on Japan Chapter 46: Early Japanese dictionaries (Shoju Ikeda, Hokkaido University) Chapter 47: The great dictionary of Japanese: Vocabulario ... (Toru Maruyama, Nanzan University) Chapter 48: Pre-Meiji research on Japanese (Toru Kuginuki) Chapter 49: Meiji period research on Japanese (Isao Santo)

This account of the phonology of Japanese and its major dialects presents original analyses of every aspect of the Japanese sound system, including its segment inventory, prosodic units, mora and syllable, prosody, and accent.

A linguistic and historical study of the Manchu script in the early modern world Manchu was a language first written down as part of the Qing state-building project in Northeast Asia in the early seventeenth century. After the Qing invasion of China in 1644, and for the next two and a half centuries, Manchu was the language of state in one of the early modern world's great powers. Its prominence and novelty attracted the interest of not only Chinese literati but also foreign scholars. Yet scholars in Europe and Japan, and occasionally even within China itself, were compelled to study the language without access to a native speaker. Jesuit missionaries in Beijing sent Chinese books on Manchu to Europe, where scholars struggled to represent it in an alphabet compatible with Western pedagogy and printing technology. In southern China, meanwhile, an isolated phonologist with access to Jesuit books relied on expositions of the Roman alphabet to make sense of the Manchu script. When Chinese textbooks and dictionaries of Manchu eventually reached Japan, scholars there used their knowledge of Dutch to understand Manchu. In The Early Modern Travels of Manchu, Mårten Söderblom Saarela focuses on outsiders both within and beyond the Qing empire who had little interaction with Manchu speakers but took an interest in the strange, new language of a rising world power. He shows how—through observation, inference, and reference to received ideas on language and writing—intellectuals in southern China, Russia, France, Chosŏn Korea, and Tokugawa Japan deciphered the Manchu script and explores the uses to which it was put for recording sounds and arranging words.

This volume is the first comprehensive handbook of Japanese phonetics and phonology describing the basic phonetic and phonological structures of modern Japanese with main focus on standard Tokyo Japanese. Its primary goal is to provide a comprehensive overview and descriptive generalizations of major phonetic and phonological phenomena in modern Japanese by reviewing important studies in the fields over the past century. It also presents a summary of interesting questions that remain unsolved in the literature. The volume consists of eighteen chapters in addition to an introduction to the whole volume. In addition to providing descriptive generalizations of empirical phonetic/phonological facts, this volume also aims to give an overview of major phonological theories including, but not restricted to, traditional generative phonology, lexical phonology, prosodic morphology, intonational phonology, and the more recent Optimality Theory. It also touches on theories of speech perception and production. This book serves as a comprehensive guide to Japanese phonetics and phonology for all interested in linguistics and speech sciences.