Numerous abbreviations are created and cease to exist in Japanese language due to the advancement of globalization for the present, but they are regarded as childish words of lacking formality and have not been fully studied. In addition, most of preceding studies on abbreviations focused on word-formation. So, there have not been many studies that examined the word form of all the abbreviations quantitatively using plural data.
On this account, this study concretely examined the word formation and morphologic characteristic of abbreviations in Japanese language, using such 4 kinds of analytic data as Japanese dictionaries, slang dictionaries, newss and magazines. In addition, this study looked into the history, creative factors, function and positioning of abbreviations.
In the second chapter, abbreviations were divided into single word abbreviations and compound word abbreviations and then their word formation was examined. The typical abridgment form of abbreviations was a ‘below-omission style (下略の型)’ that abridging rear part, regardless of word kinds.
From the third chapter to the sixth chapter, the morphologic characteristic of abbreviations was examined from such 4 aspects as mora (syllable), line, word kind and abridgment form. Study findings are as follows:
First, abbreviations were examined by moras using 3 Japanese dictionaries in the third chapter. Most of abbreviations have the form of 2, 3 and 4-mora abridgment and abbreviations that abridged more than five moras are extremely rare. This practice derives from Japanese sense of sound of which basic unit consists of 2 moras and this fact can be confirmed by mora analysis or Japanese onomatopoeia (オノマトペ) in Japanese dictionaries. As for lines, the frequency of appearance was higher in ‘ア line’, ‘カ line’, ‘タ line’ and ‘ハ line,’ and abbreviations in other lines were rare. In particular, abbreviations in ‘ワ line’ were only 4 words and abbreviations in ‘ア line’ were loan words for the most part. As for word kinds, loan words were most frequent and it was followed by ‘Chinese words / words of Chinese character’, and ‘words of Chinese character’ in order. In addition, the abbreviations of ‘hybrid compound words’, such as ‘loan word / word of Chinese character’ and ‘native word / word of Chinese character’, were only 12 words and its rate of appearance was only 3.9%. Finally, as for abridgment forms, most frequent was ‘below-omission style’ that abridging the rear part of original words.
In the fourth chapter, abbreviations in slang dictionaries were compared with those in Japanese dictionaries. The results of analysis by moras were nearly the same with that of Japanese dictionaries, but the analysis by lines resulted in a little different outcomes. Most frequent abbreviations appeared in ‘ア line’ and it was followed by ‘カ line’, ‘サ line’ and ‘ハ line’ in order. On the other hand, the frequency of appearance in ‘ナ line’, ‘ヤ line’ and ‘ワ line’ was rare and abbreviations in ‘ワ line’ were only 8 words. This fact is a little correlated with Japanese 50-phone-oriented distribution of vocabularies and can be confirmed via the ‘ア・カ・サ・ナ・ラ lines’ in detail. As for word kinds, single word abbreviations appeared by the order of ‘loan words>native words>words of Chinese character’, whereas same-kind compound word abbreviations appeared in ‘loan word / loan word’ and hybrid compound abbreviations appeared in ‘native word / word of Chinese character’, ‘native word / loan word’, and ‘word of Chinese character / loan word’ by 24 times respectively. Among ‘single word abbreviations’, 2-mora loan word abbreviations appeared nearly twice more than 4-mora abbreviations, a typical formation of abbreviations. This fact seems to be the results that younger people, who felt 4 moras are too long, create shorter mora abbreviations. Finally, as for abridgment forms, ‘single abridgment’ abbreviations were 311 words and ‘double abridgment’ abbreviations were 216 words, and the most frequent pattern of abridgment was partial omission from an original word. And among single abridgment abbreviations, ‘below-omission style’ was 65.9%, thus confirming the fact that representative slang abbreviations in slang dictionaries were ‘below-omission style.’
In the fifth chapter, the abbreviations, presented in headword (見出し語), were examined using a representative Japanese news, Asihi News (朝日新聞). As for moras, 4-mora abbreviations were most frequent. In addition, even-numbered mora abbreviations were nearly twice more than odd-numbered mora abbreviations. This result seems to be consistent with the result of the third and the fourth chapter. As for lines, there were lines to which word kinds were widespread, such as ‘ア line’, ‘カ line’ and ‘ハ line’; in which such abbreviations that deviating from typical number of moras appeared frequently, such as ‘サ line’; and in which the creation of abbreviations was difficult, such as ‘ワ line.’ As for word kinds, ‘word of Chinese character / word of Chinese character’ were most frequent and it was followed by ‘word of Chinese character / loan word.’ In case of compound words, ‘word of Chinese character / word of Chinese character’ were 123 words (50.4%), among 244 compound abbreviations. As for abridgment forms, ‘single abridgment’ abbreviations of which abridged place was only one were 233 words and ‘double abridgment’ abbreviations of which abridged place was two or more were 150 words, thus presenting the fact that one-place abridged abbreviations appeared most frequently in the headword of newss. In addition, the abbreviations of ‘upper-omission style’ and ‘middle-omission style’ were only 19 words, and their rate of appearance was only 4.9%.
In the sixth chapter of final step examination of morphologic characteristics, abbreviations of new-generation words in ‘the Basic Knowledge on Modern Terminology (現代用語の基礎知識)’ were examined. As for moras, like previous chapters, most of abbreviations have the form of 2, 3 and 4-mora abridgment, but most frequent abbreviations had a 3-mora abridgment form. As for lines, ‘カ line’ was most frequent by 14 words, and it was followed by ‘サ line’ and ‘タ line’ in order. The sum of these three lines occupied 53.0% and therefore new-generation abbreviations were widespread in ‘カ・サ・タ lines.’ As for word kinds, among 66 words, 32 words were loan word abbreviations. In addition, 9 ‘compound word’ abbreviations included loan words, thus resulting in the fact that total 41 abbreviations included loan words. On the other hand, abbreviations, consisted of ‘word of Chinese character’ or ‘word of Chinese character / word of Chinese character’, were only 9 words on the whole, thus presenting the phenomena of younger people’s avoidance of words of Chinese character. Finally, as for abridgment forms, ‘single abridgment’ abbreviations were 38 words and ‘double abridgment’ abbreviations were 28 words, thus presenting the fact that one-place abridged abbreviations appeared a little more in new-generation words. In addition, among 38 ‘compound word’ abbreviations, 26 were ‘below-omission type.’ When they were added to 25 ‘single abridgment’ ‘below-omission’ abbreviations, the sum became 51 words (77.2%) and therefore the typical abridgment pattern of new-generation abbreviations seemed to be ‘below-omission type’ that abridging the rear part of original word, as presented by the results of Japanese dictionaries, slang dictionaries and newss.
Since the purpose of this study was to secure the objectivity of data and quantify the morphologic character of abbreviations, such 4 kinds of printed materials as Japanese dictionaries, slang dictionaries, newss and magazines were used as analytic data. Language is ever changing and it seems to be not easy to grasp the process of change only with printed materials. In this vein, it seems to be necessary to carry out studies with visual images in which the sense of actual scenes is vivid. In addition, the phenomena of abbreviation in Japanese language have not been taken place all of a sudden. It seems to be a phenomenon that has been naturally formed in the long history of Japanese language. Therefore, the investigator hopes diachronic study on abbreviations in senryu (川柳) or before the age of Meiji or comparative studies with Korean language will be carried out in the future.
，韩语论文，韩语论文范文 |
