An Introduction to The National Language Research Institute:
A Sketch of its Achievements
Third Edition(1988)/
HTML Version(1997)
[contens]|
[previous]|
[next]
II.1.7 The Process of the Uniformization of Standard
Language Use - A Survey of Three Generations
in Hokkaido -
(Report 27, 1965. 301 pages)
Hokkaido, the northern island of Japan, is the area with
the shortest history of development; except for the southwestern
peninsula and some coastal districts, most of Hokkaido was
settled by Japanese immigrants after 1868. We can thus find some
families where the first immigrants are now living with the
second and the third generations. The immigrants came
originally from all the provinces of Japan and brought their own
dialects. The present third generation, however, speaks a
common Hokkaido language, evolved on the island; their
language thus no longer represents the original dialects of the
first immigrants. This Hokkaido dialect, while very close to
the standard language, shows some similarities with that of
the To~hoku district, the nearest part of the Main Island
across the straits.
This report describes the characteristics of the new
Hokkaido dialect, its birth, and the process of its growth,
tracing the changes in the language from the first to the
third generations. The survey lasted three years (1958 to 1960)
and was made possible by a grant from the Ministry of
Education. The survey committee was under the leadership of
IWABUTI Etutaro~. The surveyors were SIBATA Takesi, NOMOTO
Kikuo, UEMURA Yukio, and TOKUGAWA Munemasa of the
Institute worked with four dialectologists from
Hokkaido, IGARASI Saburo~, ISIGAKI Hukuo, HASEGAWA Kiyonobu
and SATO Makoto.
The survey was composed of the following portions:
1. Case studies of nine families in four localities to
determine the changes in three generations.
2. A survey of 161 informants from the third generation in
three large cities.
3. A survey of the social background of approximately
10,000 people in Hurano Town, a typical small town of the
inland area, and a linguistic survey of 200 people of the
second and third generations there.
4. A linguistic survey of 86 informants of the second and
third generations in three localities formed by collective
immigration.
5. A survey of third-generation speakers in 40 towns in
Hokkaido and six towns in the northern part of the
To~hoku district.
6. A test of the differences in phonetic recording between
the team workers.
All these studies covered phonology, tones, grammar
and vocabulary; the materials are reproduced for the greater
part in the appendices.
The results gave a fairly clear picture of the
characteristics of the Hokkaido dialect, its regional
differences, and its relationship to both the To~hoku
dialect and the standard language. The language of the third
generation was found to have lost completely the characteristics
of the dialects of the first immigrants, except in some
isolated settlements formed by collective immigration. The tone
distinction between words also appears to be disappearing
gradually in the Hokkaido dialect.
The text of the report was mainly the work of NOMOTO Kikuo.
[contens]|
[previous]|
[next]