Leiden University Student Repository

Aarssen, Anne (2014)

Japanese as an “Indirect” Language: Looking at Implicitation in the Japanese-English Translation of “A yō na B” Constructions

Bachelor thesis | Japanstudies (BA)

In Japanese, the phrase A yō na can be used to modify nouns. One of the ways that an A yō na B construction can be used, is to lend a sense of indirectness to an expression. In this thesis, I will investigate whether this sense of indirectness can be traced back in English translation, and what this can say about the features of the two languages. First, in order to grasp the diversity of usages of the A yō na B construction, I will provide an analysis of the several meanings, making use of a classification using the framework introduced in Takahashi (2009). Then, I will analyse within these categories how the construction can be translated. In order to do this, I will use a parallel corpus created from examples taken from a Japanese novel and its English translation. Finally, I will discuss my findings in the view of indirectness within language.

implicitation

translation

modifier

Japanese

English

Author

Aarssen, Anne

Faculty

Faculty of Humanities

Specialisation

Japanstudies

Supervisors

Yoshioka, Keiko

ECTS Credits

10

Language

en