Requesting an account for the unaccountable: The primordial nature of [NP+wa?]-format turns used by young Japanese children

Abstract

This study examines, from a conversation-analytic perspective, the use of [NP+wa?] format turns ([NP+wa?] turns) by young Japanese children aged 23–33 months, who have started using the so-called topic marker wa. Most of their [NP+wa?] turns are used in one of the following environments: 1) the NP in an [NP+wa?] turn refers to a person or object absent from the scene, 2) the NP refers to an object of noticing that is present at the scene, and 3) [NP+wa?] turns are used repeatedly. I will show that each of these situations provides co-participants with guidance to determine how the NP referent is relevant to the here-and-now and what kind of response is expected. I will then claim that [NP+wa?] turns provide these children with a convenient and powerful tool to engage with the everyday social world around them; that is, to explore how the life-world is organized and ordered. Furthermore, I will propose that wa can be seen as marking the speaker's claim that the recipient should be able to detect the preceding NP referent's relevance to the here-and-now. I claim that this is what is fundamentally involved in the “topic-marking” function that is conventionally associated with the particle wa.