The Declarative Function And The Semantic Stucture Of Modern Japanese Declarative Advernbs

This paper mainly concerns the semantic structure and syntactic function in modern Japanese declarative adverbs.Semantic issues are the most basic in grammar studies while the semantic meaning of Japanese declarative adverbs decides on its syntactic function.The semantic meaning of modern Japanese declarative adverbs is characterized by the combination of its subjectivity and objectivity.In line with this,studies on the connotation and structure of subjective and objective semantic meanings possessed by declarative adverbs could further elucidate its declarative syntactic function clearly.Studying on modern Japanese declarative issue has lasted for nearly a century accompanied with amounts of controversies.Further,the focus of the study has been shifted from declarative theory to mood(modality)in the 1990 s.No complete consensus on the study of Japanese declaratives or mood has been reached even up to now.There are still divergences existed in how to classify declaration or mood of sentences as well as what contents are involved in the declarative or mood domain,etc.Moreover,the researchers mainly concentrate on the semantic analysis and syntactic functional interpretation of the declaration or mood at the end node of a sentence.The declarative adverbs,as the declarative echoing component or subordinate component,are mostly referred to as the test means for the study on the declarative form at the end of a sentence,while systematic research is rare.Also,no satisfying results are yielded on the classification and origin of declarative function in declarative adverbs.In this sense,this paper on the semantic structure and syntactic function of declarative adverbs is of great theoretical significance and academic value to studies on declarative adverbs,and even to the whole declarative theory.This paper adopts the method of traditional empirical analysis in writing,and selects a large number of sample sentences from Japanese Corpus(Modern Japanese written language Balanced Corpus(BCCWJ))and Japanese websites(owing to the limited number of language materials in the corpus.The author also selects a large number of sample sentences as analyzing materials on www.so-net.ne.jp and other Japanese websites,ensuring the accuracy of samples via detailed examination)as examples,and makes a further detailed analysis.In terms of content,this paper pays attention to the interpretation of semantic features,syntactic modified functions and pragmatic functions of modern Japanese declarative adverbs.The method of combining subjectivity and objectivity with semantic theory is leveraged on the semantic analysis of declarative adverbs,which is closely related to the declarative grammatical attribute of declarative adverbs.The research method of Japanese pragmatics is introduced partly on the explanation of the syntactic function of declarative adverbs,throwing lights on finding out the relevance among the inner composition segments of declarative adverb co-occurrence sentences,or the relevance between declarative adverb co-occurrence sentences and the co-text.On the basis of combing the previous research on declarative theory and declarative adverbs as well as putting forward the author’s own declarative theory and classifying methods,the author concluded the declarative function of modern Japanese declarative adverbs into three types,namely,declarative inducing function,declarative modifying and limiting function,and pragmatic declarative function in this paper.The induction mechanism of the subjective and objective semantic structure of declarative adverbs to declarative function is revealed via analysis on three classic declarative adverbs consisting of “Tabun”,“Zehi”,and“Tasikani".Furthermore,based on the classification of the declarative attribute of the negative auxiliary verb "Nai",the function of negative echoing declarative adverbs are divided into three categories: the judgment of expressing possibility,the evaluation of degree and the cognition of pragmatics.Meanwhile,Two representative instances are selected from each category respectively(judgment category of possibility Negation: “Masaka”,“Kanarazusimo”,evaluation category of degree negation: “Totemo”,“Amari”,cognition category of pragmatic negation: “Kessite”,“Betuni”).A rather detailed and in-depth analysis is investigated from the perspective of the semantic structure,declarative function and mutual relationships on these 6 classic declarative adverbs contributes to the thorough understanding of the whole negative echoing adverbs,and even the semantic structure and function of the whole declarative adverbs.Through the analysis of this paper,the conclusion could be summarized that the subjective and objective semantic structure of declarative adverbs induces declarative function.More specifically,the objective semantic meaning of the declarative adverbs(the semantic description on the attribute characters of the content of sentence material based on the objective world,specifically referring to the combination of semantic components which describes the existence style as well as attribute degree of the proposition state in the declarative adverbs objectively)and the subjective semantic meaning(the expression of speaker’s subjective attitude towards the situation of proposition based on the objective semantic component,or the semantic components of the way to convey the subjective propositional state of affairs to the hearer),which directly derives the diversified declarative functions of declarative adverbs.