Individual differences and study abroad: Women learning Japanese in Japan

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Individual differences and study abroad Women
learning Japanese in Japan

• December 11, 2006

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• When we study a second or foreign language in the
  classroom, of course we study things like
  pronunciation, grammar and vocabulary.
• If we are lucky, we will also have a chance to
  study pragmatics a bitfor example, learning how
  to make or respond to compliments.

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• However, there is another dimension to language
  that difficult to teach completely in the
  classroom. That is the sociolinguistic aspects
  of using the language.
• This article is a study of two people learning
  about sociolinguistic aspects of Japanese while
  studying in Japan.

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Definition of sociolinguistics

• The study of language and linguistic behavior as
  influenced by social and cultural factors.
• These factors can include, for example, gender
  and social position.

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• As we saw in some earlier classes, women speak
  differently from men, and different social groups
  use different kinds of jargon.
• In most (all?) societies, children speak
  differently from adults, and adults speak
  differently in formal and informal situations.

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• Sociolinguistic aspects may be discussed or
  taught in the language classroom, but often there
  is very little chance to actually use them.

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• For example, students of Japanese learn something
  in the classroom about keigo (??).
• They will learn about both honorifics (sonkeigo -
  ???)and humble forms (kenjougo - ???).

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• They may read dialogs using these forms and they
  may memorize them.
• Students may also learn that some specific forms
  that are used more often by men and others used
  by women.

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• However, in class, they always interact with the
  same peoplethe same classmates, the same
  teacher.
• Students dont get a chance to be in a situation
  in which they really must use formal language,
  for example, or in which they are interacting in
  a group of all women or all men.

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• Lets look at some pages from a textbook for
  students of Japanese.

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• Although learners study honorific language or
  mens and womens language in Japanese classes,
  they usually dont get a chance to really use it
  there.
• Therefore, in a study-abroad context, when
  students of Japanese live in Japan, they finally
  have a chance to learn and use a wide range of
  different forms.

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• The article we are reading for today, Individual
  Differences and Study Abroad Women Learning
  Japanese in Japan is from a book focusing on
  studies of the effect of study abroad on learning
  a second language.

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• It examines the question of why some students
  learn the forms, while other seem pick up
  inappropriate forms.
• To understand the main points of the paper, it
  might be best to start at the end, with the
  Summary on pages 239 to 241.

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• This study discusses two women living and
  studying in Japan, Mary and Arina
• Both were aware of their face the image that
  they were presenting to others.
• Both women wanted to speak politely, and they
  knew that they needed to use honorifics.

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• However, they were ambivalent about using
  honorifics.
• This means that while they thought honorifics
  were necessary, they didnt always like using
  them.

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• Or in other words, on page 241, For both
  learners there is a conflict concerning how they
  view themselves, their view of Japanese women and
  womens language, and the language they need to
  speak appropriately in various situations.

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• At first, both women tried to find stratgies for
  speaking politely without using keigo hwoever,
  in the course of the year, Arina began to see the
  value of keigo and use it herslf.

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• This short paper doesnt give us many details
  about why Mary and Arina feel a resistance toward
  using honorific and humble forms, but you can
  probable think of some reasons.
• Why might they not want to use keigo forms or
  forms that usually used by women?

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Some possible reasons

• They might feel that womens position is lower
  then mens position in Japanese society, and so
  they feel that womens forms show weakness or a
  lower position.

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• They might feel uncomfortable with humble forms
  because they are from societies in which people
  dont usually use such forms. Instead, they may
  be used to situations in which people are
  expected to promote themselves in public
  situations.

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• For a similar reason, they may feel uncomfortable
  with linguistic forms which are sensitive to
  differences in age and status because their
  native languages/cultures do not have equivalent
  forms.

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• Seigal says that the learners conscious and
  unconscious desires to maintain their own
  self-image had an effect on their sociolinguistic
  competence in Japanese.

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About the two students (p. 226)

• Arina
• Native speaker of Hungarian also speaks English
  and German.
• 25 years old.
• Has studied Japanese for 4 years.
• First time in Japan.

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• Mary
• 45 years old.
• Lived in Japan 20 years ago for 1 1/2 years.
• Studied Japanese sporadically (on-and-off).
• Japanese language teacher in high school in New
  Zealand.

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• Siegal collected data from a variety of sources
  (see pages 226-227)

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The challenge of learning a second language
(Japanese)

• Speaking Japanese entails learning how to use
  the language within the structure of Japanese
  society.
• However, at the same time, learners are concerned
  with presentation of self in discourse.

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• That is, learners are concerned with their image,
  and how other people look at them.
• People build up their own self-image in their
  own language/culture before coming to Japan when
  they come to Japan, they want to maintain that
  self-image, but they have to do so using
  Japanese.

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• Siegal says, Learners might actually be
  creating a face that is outside the guidelines
  of appropriate behavior in the society.

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She describes a few possible reasons for this.

• They might not be good enough at using Japanese
  to create the kind of image they want, because
  they dont know the socio-culturally appropriate
  manner.
• However, another possible reason is that they
  might not accept certain societal rules
  concerning the conduct of everyday behavior.

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• For example, in the case of Japanese, they
  learner might reject the idea that people should
  speak differently to people who are above and
  people who are below them in social status.
• They might also reject the idea that men and
  women should use different forms.

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Mary and her advisor

• Mary (who was 45, and a high school teacher of
  Japanese) had an advisor who was younger than
  her, a male college professor.
• Siegal looks at seven speech activities in
  which Mary interacted with her advisor.

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• According to Siegal, Mary wants to be polite and
  do what she thinks is expected in Japanese
  society, but at the same time, she wants to
  present an image of herself as an equal to her
  advisor.

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• Perhaps because she is older than her advisor,
  and because her job is teaching Japanese, he
  wants her advisor to think of her as a colleague
  (someone of the same status) rather than as an
  ordinary student (someone of lower status).

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• Siegal says that Mary tries to do this by
  controlling the topic of the conversation.
• In the last interaction, she even presses her
  advisor to agree that her Japanese ability has
  improved.

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• Although Mary feels that she has been
  successfulthat she has used Japanese politely
  and appropriately-- the author feels that she has
  not.

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• On pages 229 to 232 Siegal mentions several
  things that Mary does wrongplaces where Mary
  uses an inappropriate form, or seems to
  misunderstand her advisors words or silences.

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What are Marys mistakes?

• Its a little hard to understand because Siegal
  translates the conversations into English, but in
  the discussion, she mentions some specific
  Japanese words in romaji.
• As you read, try to imagine what the original
  Japanese might have been.

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The mistakes discussed by Siegal are

• not using honorific forms such as ????????or
  ?????.
• using the form ????inappropriately
• using a singing voice tone
• not noticing when her advisor doesnt respond
  with aizuchi (??)
• using incorrect forms for thanking

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???/????

• It has more than one meaning/use.
• One is to mitigate the force of the speech act
  that is, to make ones speech sound softer or
  less certain.
• Deshou is often used among women to show
  conversational harmony.
• So Mary imagines simply that deshou shows
  politeness and hesitancy and is a good form
  for women to use.

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• However, Mary doesnt know that it can also have
  the implication of asking for confirmation of
  something that the other person is assumed to
  know, and that it therefore can seem rude when
  speaking to a social superior.

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Singing Voice

• Siegal talks about the singing voice which is
  typical of service encounters.
• In other words, this is the tone of voice used
  by female store clerks, restaurant workers, and
  so on. Its not used in conversation between
  people who know each other.

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• Can someone demonstrate a singing voice for us?
• ?????????
• ??????????????

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Aizuchi conversational feedback

• These are words and phrases that a listener uses
  to show that he or she is listening and
  understanding.
• Some common phrases in Japanese are ????? or
  ????? or ??.
• There can also be non-verbal feedback, such as
  nodding.

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• On page 231, Siegal says that when the professor
  doesnt give feedback to her, Mary should have
  realized that it might be because he is
  uncomfortable, either with what she was saying or
  with the way she was saying it.

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Thanking

• Mary pressures her advisor to praise her progress
  in Japanese.
• When he does so, she says, doumo sumimasen (page
  232).
• Siegal remarks that this is a proper response
  when receiving a gift, but not when receiving a
  compliment.

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• Instead, Mary could either have said
  ????????????? or she could have denied the
  compliment.
• However, she doesnt want to deny it since she
  had pressured her advisor to say it in the first
  place.

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• In summarizing Marys speech in these activities,
  Siegal says that in some cases, her pragmatic
  failures or pragmatic incorrectness seem to be
  due to misunderstanding (e.g., the singing
  voice), but others might be the result of her
  not wanting to follow the conventions of society.
  

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• According to convention, as a student, her social
  position is lower than that of her advisor, but
  probably because she is older and she is also a
  teacher, she sees herself as equal or close to
  equal in status to her professor, she might be
  trying to resist using forms (like honorific
  forms) which would place her in a lower status,
  and instead uses forms which (she thinks) make
  her seem more like someone of equal status.

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Discussion

• For Japanese and non-Japanese students Do you
  ever feel uncomfortable using honorific or humble
  forms? When and where?

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• For students who are now studying Japanese What
  have you been learning about keigo in your
  classes? Where do you learn about it outside the
  classroom? In what situations have you felt that
  you need to use keigo, or have wished that you
  could speak it better?
• For native Japanese speakers How did you learn
  to use keigo?

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• Something interesting A book to teach native
  Japanese speakers about keigo

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Arinas case

• Siegal thinks that Arina was much more successful
  that Mary in learning sociolinguistic competence
  in Japanese.
• She attributes this to that fact that Arina took
  the opportunity to participate in and learn from
  foreigner-only speech events events where a
  foreigner is asked to speak precisely because
  s/he is a foreigner.

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Foreigner-only events

• 1. A self-introduction at a cultural exchange
  event sponsored by a local organizationArina was
  given guidelines for the self-introduction.
• The form was as important (or more important)
  than the content.

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• 2. Stationmaster-for-a-day
• Arina was given a speech to memorize which
  contained many keigo phrases.
• She was just one of many participants, so it gave
  her the chance to hear speeches of many other
  people.This gave her a very interesting view of
  the use of keigo.

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• Arina noted that people who seemed rude or
  arrogant in private still used keigo forms,
  including humble forms, in their speeches (page
  236).
• In other words, Arina sees for herself that the
  use of a particular form can be useful for a
  particular purpose she can also see (unlike
  Mary, perhaps) that using humble forms in the
  correct situation does not lower someones status
  in reality.

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• 3. Speech at the businessmens club
• She wrote the speech herself, using a Japanese
  speech writing book for native speakers
• Siegal says that the results were mixed Arina
  successfully used many forms which she had
  memorized in the stationmaster speech. However,
  she did make some mistakes. (Page 237)

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• Arina knows the sasate itadaku form Yet, even
  though she knows the use of this phrase, she
  still does not completely know its usage.
• In other words, her knowledge of the sasate
  itadaku form is still not complete she can
  recognize it, but still isnt sure when to use it
  instead of another form.

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• As for the content of the speech, Siegal notes
  that Arina starts well, beginning by downplaying
  her Japanese ability.
• Remember This is a convention that works well
  for foreigners speaking in Japanese, but it might
  not be a good idea for people learning to speak
  other languages or in other cultures.

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• However, Siegal feels that she was less
  successful in that she included serious
  criticisms of Japan in her speech, when it seemed
  from the other students speeches that the
  audience didnt expect that. Instead, they
  wanted to hear something lighter and more
  humorous.

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• Siegal notes Arina has now, at the end of her
  year in Japan, finally acquiesced to a
  characteristic of the Japanese language
  formulaic phrases and honorific language have
  their places in certain contexts.

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Discussion

• Siegal implies that it might have been better if
  Arina had not made such serious criticisms of
  Japan That is, even though she was asked to
  speak about her bad experiences in Japan, it is
  unlikely that the members of the Uma club wanted
  the serious critique that she embarks upon.

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• Do you think Arina was unaware that the audience
  didnt really want to hear a serious critique?
  Or did she know, but do it anyway? Do you think
  it would have been better for her to have done
  what was expected?

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Comparing the cases of Arina and Mary

• At the start, both Arina and Mary seemed
  uncomfortable with using keigo and seemed to want
  to avoid it.
• Instead, they both had a strategy of using
  regular polite forms such as deshou, desu, and
  masu.

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• This strategy is not successful for Mary,
  however.
• She uses the form deshou without understanding
  all its possible meanings, and this leads to
  pragmatic failure.

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• Arina, in contrast, put herself into situations
  in which she was forced to use keigo.
• She memorized speeches and by watching others,
  she started to understand the use and value of
  keigo. This makes her willing to use it for
  herself.

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• Siegal concludes that study abroad does not
  automatically mean that learners will understand
  speech events, but it gives them an opportunity
  to do so.
• Whether or not they make use of the opportunities
  depends in part on factors such as self-image.

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• For students who are now studying abroad
  (learning Japanese in Japan)
• Do you ever participate in foreigner-only
  speech events? Why or why not?
• For students to plan to study abroad soon
• Thinking about this article, what kinds of
  opportunities will you look for in order to
  improve your language skills?

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• Note Even native speakers have difficultly in
  some kinds of formal speech events, such as
  giving speeches and presentations in front of an
  audience.

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• There is an organization called Toastmasters
  which has clubs around the world where people can
  learn to improve their speaking skills.
• http//www.geocities.com/tokyo_toastmasters/

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Look at footnote 2, on page 241-242

• Keigo is learned as an advanced form, and one of
  the teachers in Japan told his Japanese language
  class not to be concerned with honorific usage,
  that desu/masu was considered fine for foreigners
  to use.

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• However, Siegal disagrees, and quotes someone
  else who she agrees with, saying that keigo is
  necessary for the learner to present him/herself
  as a normal, educated human being, not
  extra-polite, but someone who does not,
  figuratively speaking, step on other peoples
  toes.

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What do you think?

• Should foreigners in Japan learn to use keigo, or
  is it enough just to learn to use desu and masu
  forms? Why do you think so?

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Reminders

• The second homework assignment is due on January
  9. If you didnt get the explanation last week,
  pick it up today or download it from the class
  web page.

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• There is no reading for January 9.
• There will be a guest speaker, Prof Mutsumi Imai
  from Keio University, who will talk about
  childrens first langauge acquistion.
• For January 16, read Langauge and Memories in
  the Judicial System.