The NO DA construction in Japanese
Date
1985
Authors
Sekizawa, Tamie
Journal Title
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Volume Title
Publisher
Canberra, ACT : The Australian National University
Abstract
The NO DA construction is one of the most common
expressions in Japanese and at the same time it is one
of the most difficult expressions for students of
Japanese to master. Many linguists and authors of
Japanese textbooks have attempted to describe various
manifestations of NO DA . in different contexts and
situations. This sub-thesis is an attempt to explain
these various manifestations in terms of a set of
invariant semantic components.
In preparation for the semantic analysis of NO DA,
the syntactic properties of this construction are first
examined, to show where NO DA is located in the clause
and how it differs syntactically from the rest of the
so-called 'evidentials'. Next, NO DA is compared with
expressions such as KARA DA and WAKE DA, with which it
has something in common, both syntactically and
semantically. On the basis of this discussion, two
invariant semantic components are proposed as being
common to all the manifestations of NO DA. The
differences between these various manifestations are
attributed to the linguistic or extra-linguistic
context of the utterance. In an effort to verify this analysis various
examples of the use of NO DA are examined, firstly in
its affirmative form, then in complex sentences
involving NO DA KARA (in a reason clause) and NO DA GA (in a prefatory remark) and finally in the conjectural,
interrogative and negative forms.
The primary function of the NO DA construction was
found to be one of cohesion. NO DA provides cohesion
not only between the proposition embraced by it and the
context or situation it refers to, but also between the
speaker and the addressee. A particularly important
factor is that, in using NO DA, the speaker indicates
that he assumes that what he is referring to is in the
consciousness of the addressee.
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Thesis (Masters sub-thesis)
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Open Access
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DOI
10.25911/5d70f33bbaa96